Councillors were branded “ratbags” when an argument about bedroom tax plunged a Fife Council meeting into chaos.
Campaigners against the UK Government’s under-occupancy tax hurled insults from the public benches after provost Jim Leishman told the council chamber an SNP motion could not be tabled.
The motion from the opposition stated that no council tenants should be evicted as a result of rent arrears attributable to the bedroom tax, which was brought in this week and means social tenants with more rooms than the Government judges necessary will have their housing benefit cut.
Auchmuty and Dovecot Tenants and Residents Association member Davie Nelson called out: “You’re talking about people’s lives here, Jim. You’re ratbags, that’s what you are, ratbags. The whole lot of you should be thrown out.”
Amid jeers from campaigners against the bedroom tax, councillors had angry exchanges and Mr Leishman was forced to intervene.
He said: “Members of the public are obviously very emotional. Let’s control this and debate this.”
The Labour administration stood firm on its position that a blanket ban on evictions was not feasible.
Council leader Alex Rowley said he had been prepared to debate Councillor Brian Goodall’s motion on the condition the paragraph about evictions was deleted.
The motion also included a call to support affected tenants and to separate rent arrears related to bedroom tax from other rent arrears to prevent the tax from scuppering future allocations or housing transfers.
The administration said the motion could not go ahead as, at last month’s executive committee, it was agreed eviction could be avoided where tenants contacted the council to discuss their financial position.
Members of the opposition made two attempts to put their case back on the agenda, claiming it was unfair to make tenants jump through hoops to avoid eviction.
SNP councillors called for two votes to suspend standing orders to overturn the provost’s decision and also the clause making the executive committee’s decision binding for six months. However, they were outvoted both times.
Councillor Peter Grant said: “I don’t care how much debate we have. I want to get out of here, debate or no debate, knowing that we will not have evictions. What if a tenant can’t jump through hoops?”
Councillor David Mogg added: “The policy is some people will get evicted, that’s your policy.”
Mr Rowley said: “Bedroom tax is a serious threat to tenants in Fife and the next parts of welfare reform will pose equally serious threats. Here we have groups of people trying to play politics.
“We need a policy that protects council tenants and we need to go further to protect housing association tenants.”
He continued: “The advice given very clearly on this was the last paragraph was not competent because that decision was previously taken.
“I contacted the mover of that motion. Yesterday, the position as I understood it was Brian (Goodall) was willing to take that paragraph out.”
The council’s leader’s statement led to a furious reply from Mr Goodall, who denied he had agreed to drop the paragraph.
Following the meeting, Mr Rowley expressed disappointment there had not been harmony in the chamber, with both SNP and Labour fundamentally opposed to the imposition of the tax.
Mr Goodall later contacted The Courier to say: “I can fully understand why the public in the gallery were so angry. I’m disgusted with the behaviour of Fife’s Labour councillors too.”