The boss of one of Scotland’s top hotels has sensationally quit as head of a community watchdog group.
Stephen Leckie, chief executive at the Crieff Hydro, stood down as chairman of Crieff Community Council sparking an exodus of members and bringing the group to the brink of collapse.
It follows a long-simmering row which was sparked by a leaked email, which appeared to show the group secretary Jean Ann Scott Miller criticising a member of the public, local historian Ian Hamilton.
The email was passed on to Mr Hamilton who lodged an official complaint to Perth and Kinross Council. He said the correspondence, from January, had been kept secret from other members of the group.
At a community council meeting two weeks ago, Ms Scott Miller apologised for the email and submitted her resignation.
Now Mr Leckie has resigned after a memo from the council’s information compliance manager Donald Henderson, who was tasked with reviewing Mr Hamilton’s complaint accused the community council of not doing enough to control and manage the situation.
Mr Leckie was followed out the door by members Andrew Snowball, Chris McKintosh, Graham Donaldson and David McNaughton.
This leaves just seven community councillors, and if the group loses another member it may be forced to fold.
On Thursday, Mr Leckie stressed that the fall-out from Mr Hamilton’s complaint was not the main reason for his departure.
“I have been in this position for five years and in that time, our hotel business has grown and grown,” he said. “We now have a workforce of more than 1,200.”
“I took the decision to devote my time and attention to the company and it felt like this was the right time to move on.”
He said: “This complaint was, in the council’s words, ‘trivial’. I don’t see how they say I should have dealt with it when I never received it in the first place.”
Mr Leckie said: “Why did four other people resign? Well, I suppose they didn’t want to continue without me.
“This is an opportunity for new people to step in and start afresh.”
Mr Hamilton said he had taken exception to minutes of the community council’s June meeting which were posted on social media and incorrectly stated he had complained on behalf of the Strathearn Archeological and Historical Society.
“The whole episode was a shambles,” he said. “As far as I’m concerned though, this matter is now dead and buried. It is good that everyone can now draw and line under this and move on.”
Remaining community councillor Craig Finlay said: “The secretary of Crieff Community Council resigned two weeks ago after her position became untenable.
“The connected matter, which caused so much disruption within recent weeks, has now regrettably led to our chairman resigning. This was not a situation we wanted to be in, and another four community councillors have since resigned.”
He added: “Those of us remaining will now work to put the disruptive issues of the past few weeks behind us and continue to focus on growing the good work we have been cultivating over recent weeks, for the benefit of all of Crieff.”
Mr Finlay added: “It’s important that we have a team of community councillors who join for the right reasons – to make life better for others – and, to this end, I would encourage anyone with that interest to become involved.”
Ms Scott Miller said: “It’s sad what happened to the community council. We achieved so much over the last five years.”
