Ignoring residents’ concerns boosts suppot for Reform - Joanna Mowat

Joanna Mowat is Conservative councillor for City Centre Ward

They have objected to these changes. I have supported them in these objections but time and again the majority of councillors have voted for the changes and no one has paid any heed to the residents’ concerns.

They have put the ideological policy they approved ahead of the very real concerns of residents living in the Old Town.

The resident ended their letter by saying that they were minded to vote for Reform because no one was listening.

Reform UK party leader Nigel Farage on the campaign trail

The Diffley Partnership has carried out polling into Scottish attitudes. The findings are stark – those who are considering voting Reform report high levels of disengagement, fear and lack of enthusiasm about the future.

The First Minister has held a meeting billed as how to vanquish the threat of Reform. This is an appalling way to treat people who report they are scared, disengaged and unenthusiastic. Branding them as the problem and further ostracising them.

In any other walk of life – we would try to understand why this group felt like this and engage with them. Instead in Scotland today we cast them out, which will only confirm their fears and disengagement.

I have rarely seen such a wrong-headed way to treat people that is actively cruel to people who seem utterly scunnered by modern Scotland.

My colleagues in the Conservative group have written about the importance of delivering for the public and listening to them and how the council fails to do so.

The powers that be at the council didn’t ask whether there was another way to achieve the outcomes the changes purport to deliver.

Residents’ concerns were dismissed and the irony is – the Conservation Area Statement for the Old Town states that maintaining a residential population in the area is important.

I know that some people have already left because of these changes and I fear more will. If we carry on ignoring people not only will Reform be ushered in by her helpful handmaidens the “progressives” on the council but we’ll lose more residents in the city centre.

Conservative councillor for City Centre Ward