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Friends and readers. A reader from Canada who visited Edinburgh this summer has asked us if we know anything about Caroline Park which he seen while staying locally.

We are pleased to try and help our friend and visitor from Canada.

Built on the estate of Royston by George Mackenzie,first Vicount Tarbet in 1685,Caroline Park is a good example of a Scottish 17th century mansion[although it was referred to as a cottage on an inscribed lintel placed above the entrance by it’s builder] and incorporates the original 16th century Royston House in the central courtyard around which it is built.

The south frontage was added in 1696,the projecting portico having an iron balcony above it and the centre block being terminated on either side by imposing,ogival-oofed pavilions.A magnificent wrought-iron staircase and painted wall and ceiling panals adorn the interior,this work together with two fine panelled plaster ceilings,being of great interest as representing the manner in which the baroque flood,rising in the south of Europe,ebbed against the shores of Scotland.

The house passed into the possession of the Dukes of Buccleuch in the 18th century and the marriage of Caroline [whose mother had been a maid of honour to George 11’s Queen Caroline] the daughter of the Duke of Argyle,to the Earl of Dalkeith,the heir to the Buccleuch estates,is believed to explain the name which was given to the mansionhouse.

For many years Caroline Park was occupied by the Printing Ink Factory and Chemical Works of A.B. Fleming and Co. Ltd. who ensured the maintenance and preservation of the house but who moved to larger premises in 1979. It is now in private residential occupation.

It is the great misfortune of this historic mansion,which stands near the sea to the north of West Granton Road,to have survived in a deteriorated and industrialised environment,but the house itself can no doubt be assured of continued protection. One of the well-known occupants in the past was Lady John Scott,the author and composer of Annie Lawrie. 

We hope this is of interest.  

Friends and readers. Our post on the illeagal removal of two members from the NET board has sparked a number of comments. The two concerned have yet to go public on this sinister move but our friend fair comment seems to know who they are and we thank that reader for the information.

If our friend knows the circumstances surrounding,what seems on the face of it a ridiculas decision then we would be pleased to hear from them. Our concern is that local people who are elected on to Community boards or Management Committee’s can be dumped if their faces don’t fit or don’t vote in the required way.

Surely if you are voted onto something by the Community through an AGM or now through the Community Councils,then that is the only way you can be voted off,and not by a decision taken behind closed doors which is a direct slap in the face to the Community at large,this regardless of your political view. 

The democratic process of direct Community involvement is in danger of being over run if this decision is allowed to stand. It has been well known for some time that the former Pilton Partnership and now the North Edinburgh Trust was a vehicle for the Labour Party and it seems still is.

The decision to remove support for the Pennywell owners group was a disgrace and something which the trust must answer for. If the board is being lead by the nose on these decisions then the funders must step in and take action.

Pilton Sucks has always been suspicious of the former Pilton Partnership and it’s grant allocations to local projects,where if you look to it’s annual report shows the majority of the board members had a direct interest in funded projects,should they have been allowed to sit on this board?

Yet according to a post recieved from Red Devil the two members who were removed from the board had no financial interest in any of the local projects,the plot thickens.

So we have two Questions. Why were these two members removed from the board without consultation with those that elected them onto the board? And why were it the two that had no financial interest or any other kind of direct conflict interest in local projects.

Clearly the other Community Councils must sit up and take notice if they can be steped on as easy as this. The locally elected members have a role to play here,in what is a subversive move to remove two Community elected members. These board members that took this decision should hang their heads in shame.

Friends and readers. We have been informed that several people involved in the Muirhouse Social Work Centre bullying cover up have had a change of heart and are now of the opinion after an incident involving a female member of staff that bullying has taken place but require this member of staff to come forward allowing them to take the action they should have taken some time ago.

The rumour surrounding this female member of staff came from a very reliable source,and it is now become clear that other members of staff have become aware of intimidating behaviour,but they need to come forward. Denial after denial about bullying  starts to make this dinosauric department look stupid,and worse still deceitful, as yet another staff member has suffered abusive behaviour at the hands of this known thug.

The pressure for an full outside independent investigation into these serious allegations,something which Pilton Sucks has been demanding for quite some time may now prove to be an attractive option for those who now have the mark of cain upon them and wish to wriggle out of their responsibilities.

How many more employees have to suffer abusive behaviour before this awful department gets the message and takes the proper action righting a dreadful wrong

Friends and readers. We have received another post from a local reader agreeing with our friend from Trinity, he to feeling that Thurday evenings meeting at Royston/Wardieburn Community Centre was a one sided affair, and he left the meeting none the wiser as to exactly what was the action plan required to go forward.

He felt that a lack of presence from the local Community Council on the panal was very disappointing and wants to know why that was the case.

Once again we repeat,we do not know and it might be worth asking a Community Councillor to find out the reasoning behind their absense from the panal. In fact we will throw the question out into the Community. Does anybody know why there was no representation from the Community Council on the panal at Thursday evenings meeting?  

Friends and readers. We received a post yesterday from a reader in the Trinity area who attended the public meeting held at Royston/Wardieburn Community Centre on Thursday 27/08/09 re- the potential closure of Royston Primary School.

She wanted to know why there was no presence on the panal from Granton/District Community Council,which she found strange.

We don’t know is the honest answer,we can only guess that no-one from the Community Council was invited to sit on the panal,which if that is the case is a strange decision indeed.

We understand from our reader that both our MP and MSP were on the panal which is another strange decision,as both have no say in local authority matters. There has been we have to say a strong rumour which we also heard but did not pay much attention to,that there was political interference in the choice of chair for the meeting.

Again if this is the case,then that was another mistake. Pilton Sucks understands that there is at the moment a consultation exercise taking place at the moment which includes Royston Primary School.

We do not have all the facts to hand which makes it difficult to make a sound judgment on what should happen to the school,but clearly there is local concern about the potential loss of the school which we share.

Our bigger concern however is political mischief making in the early stages of this process. Let us not forget the previous administration had a hit list of schools they intended to close one of which was Royston Primary.

Well intended but inexperienced people can often be taken advantage of when emotions run high, and having a panal dominated by one political party smells exactly of that. If this was a meeting which had an MSP and an MP on the panal why then were the prospective parliamentary candidates not invited to give their view point?

This is an important issue and not one for an MP to try and manufacture votes from. This is a local issue and local representatives should be giving their opinions. There is a need for clear heads and even clearer thinking with opinions sought from all quarters and not just one political party trying to regain lost ground.

No doubt our friendly Labour dominated NEN will put a spin on it but they to must be careful to produce a balanced viewpoint and keep their political flag out of sight as local newspapers are under scrutiny at the present time and have to justify their existance.

Our early opinion is Royston probably has a case to remain open but may have to bring in other revenues to do so,possibly through lets or long term leases to out side organisations looking for meeting spaces or such like.

Was this discussed? probably not and that is another missed opportunity. We would urge all involved in this ongoing debate to tread carefully and not jump to quickly onto a political bandwagon,because it seems the right thing to do.

On a personal political point Labour have taken this community for granted for a very long time and given the chance would do so again. Take all opinions on board and then take a balanced view which gives you the strongest case. Don’t gerry mander a panal and then let them choose who should chair it. That’s an old trick which gives the impression of a fair and open debate with no hidden agenda. 

Friends and readers. When Adam was told not to eat an apple from a paticular tree,he did,and the rest is history. The fruit of a nation lies within it’s people and their desire to provide for themselves and their families a better life.

What happens when that fruit is allowed ot wither and die,society breaks down and the fallout effects us all. The garden of Britain which afforded us the freedom to live our lives within the rules set down in our democratic values is turning into a desert of what might have been but is no more.

What will emerge when this terrible economic turmoil is over is anybody’s guess,but one thing is certain nothing will ever be the same again. Trust is all but lost in our banking system yet we own most of it now and own it reluctantly. The black hole in the pension schemes, a black hole incidently caused in no small way by the then Chancellor a certain Gordon Brown robbing the funds,means retirment frought with uncertainty.

Reports now tell us there may be up to 10 million without some form of work and claiming benefits of one kind or another, and mortgage defaults are at their highest ever.Our garden of Eden which provided for our elderly and infirm,our young and those who had needs which could only be met by social help is fading away leaving a barren arrid land were only those with enough wealth will continue to go on as if nothing had happened.

We are promised vast wealth if we can predict six numbers so we scurry away to our nearest outlet and part with money we know we should’nt in an attempt to escape the cycle of misery which only these six numbers can cure. Our new garden of Eden is a 14 million to one chance but we pray and bite our nails hoping it’s our turn and we can escape the doom and gloom,with a big house and an even bigger car. In truth this is fools gold as only the very few as we all know get the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow while the rest of us pay for their luck.

The Jarrow marches of years ago demanded action and it lives on in history. Our present day problems are tied into complex economic issues based on world wide supply and demand,where finance is king and we are mere serfs there to do it’s bidding. The power of the people is now just a distant memory and we are at the mercy of the market which takes no prisoners and stamps on the weakest.

Britain is now a comodity and it’s people bought and sold like slaves in the markets of Rome. We have come round almost full circle and once again will have to climb the ladder of prosperity if that is at all possible. 

Friends and readers. As the General Election comes ever nearer and the Government,if you believe the opinion polls are heading for electoral disaster,we ask the question,Is there really an alternative?

Due to the financial mess which was caused by greed and stupidity massive spending cuts seem to be top of the agenda for both of the major parties,which means hard times for many are on the way. Let us not forget the 11 Trilion pounds worth of credit debt still to hit us head on.

What do the Torries propose to do about it,hammer the weakest and cut the taxes of the top earners,nothing new there then. Yet they seem to have a large lead in the opinion polls. Let us drift back to a time when the Torries were last in power. Survival of the richest was the order of the day and dam the rest. Simple but effective. Major’s Government lurched from one crisis to another and blamed everybody but themselves. Sound familiar.

The Thatcher legacy provided us with a greed is good mentality and poor deprived Communities bore the brunt,of this cut throat policy. They wasted the resource of North Sea Oil paying to keep people in poverty rather that invest in a nations greatest asset,It’s people.

The financial centre of Britain went wild with glee and fortunes were made for the few while poverty continued to increase amongst the most vunerable in our Communities. The Torries left a trail of disaster in their wake but pointed to a healthy financial sector. Major dithered and went with the flow and his Government collapsed in on itself.

Drift back to the present and what do we have. Growing unemployment on a scale that makes Thatcher look soft hearted. Along side that we have massive increases in home repossesions as the greedy financial insitutions the very same ones that got us into this mess call in their loans to try and balance their books on the backs of misery.

Wage freezes,wage cuts low paid jobs,qualifications needed to stack shelves in the super markets,our young people the future of this nation already having a taste of the scrap heap with no hope in the near future and there lies a recipe for another wasted generation.

The Executive in Scotland has tried to combat this by announcing a programe of apprenticship training and a package of financial support for business which is vital to keep our nation in reasonable health. Locally we have a house building programe ongoing and a regeneration of our Community which we hope will create training and employment.

This in itself will not stop the drift to financial meltdown but it is a start and other local inititives will help also. Our Governement bailed out the banks on the instuction they would continue to lend,they didn’t and have snubbed that instruction which Chancellor Darling has done nothing about. recently large rewards for the idiots that got us into this mess have started to reappear and our Government say’s little and does nothing,while the rest of us mere mortals worry about putting food on the table and paying our way.

Some of our European partners have shown some signs of a recovery wheather it can be sustained is another question,but Britain continues to sink with no signs of fair weather. The expences scandal opened up to all of us exactly what was going on in our name as our honourable MP’s lived off the backs of the taxpayer and the fat of the land,while Britain burned.

We are now being told to expect more misery,suprise suprise before things get better and our politicians will go to the polls with increasing unemployment little or no hope for our young people,an unpopular war in a far flung land which is costing lives, and a Government drifting and hoping things improve before the election date is called.

Tax increases are in the pipeline and our contribution to the EU has increased. Our services are in danger of disappearing in their present form as the majority of us wait and watch and hope we can survive through it all. Britain has once again become the sick man of Europe through no fault of it’s working people but through the sheer greed of those that thought they could make a quick buck and to hell with the rest.            

Friends and readers. We have been told although yet to be confirmed that two Community members of the board of North Edinburgh Trust have been removed illegally. If this is correct then we are appalled and disgusted by this sinister turn of events.

We have in the past been critical of this Labour party dominated organisation and now it appears we have been vindicated by this latest turn of events. We informed our readers that as the Pilton Partnership whose board was filled with Labour Party supporters many of whom either worked in or managed local projects and recieved funding from the Pilton Partnership.

This in itself was to say the least very suspicious and a direct conflict of interest for this old pals act. Now it seems they are taking the chance to rid themselves of two board members whose names we as yet do not know but that won’t take to long to find out.

This band of comrades that have done well out of the previous SIP funding have now decided and taken it upon themselves to remove two board members completly ignoring the due and democratic process.

We understand that the two concerned were voted on to the board by their Community Council and therefore it is to that Community council they are answerable and not to a band of self interested comrades.

We find this situation totally unacceptable and our elected members must take action against this Council funded organisation. It is not up to them who sits on their board and they should hang their heads in shame,but we know they won’t. 

Once more this Council funded organisation is under a dark cloud as they attempt to close ranks and get rid of people who don’t think the same way as they do.

This type of Stalinist mentality has no place in the new set up so we are keen to know how they think they can get away with it. There now clearly exists a seige mentality at the NET and the barricades are being put up to anybody who does not share their views.

our opinion is that this nest of vipers should be removed and new elected members be put forward and the manager Ms. McKenna should tender her resignation with immediate effect.

Friends and readers. We recently received a post from a City employee thanking us for highlighting the real problem of what our friend called institionilised bullying. She became  aware of the problem that existed at the Muirhouse Social Work Centre,after talking to a colleague that had previously worked there.

What started as a ripple has grown to engulf all who have played a part in this dreadful situation. What should have been dealt with immediatly was badly mis-handled with the perpetrators to date going un-punished and the victims still awaiting justice.

This whole mess goes up the food chain to chief Social Worker Michelle Miller who we are told regarded abuse of staff as a CULTURAL THING. What chance justice if that is the attitude of the person who should have taken decisive action to deal with a problem many others were all to aware of.

What we uncovered was to say the least disgraceful compounded by the fact that some senior members of staff already knew that there was -quote- staff issues within the Muirhouse Centre and serious problems within the Community Service team.

It soon became clear that damage limitation would be needed as the problem may become public knowledge with the number of people involved. According to our inside source, at no time was there an attempt to deal with what was fast becoming an out of control problem.

What has been leaked to us over the period is mind numbing at best with a total dis-regard for human dignity allowing behaviour designed to cause maximum damage to the intended victims.

What has suprised us was the amount of information which came from various sources,all saying the same thing bullying was a daily activity hidden by a fear of worse to come if it was reported. Reports had reached the ears of senior staff of unrest and discontent all related to bullying,yet it was quitely swept aside.

The reason for this we can only speculate but one reason that came up a couple of times in various exchanges was that Muirhouse would be set up as an example of good practice thereby deflecting any adverse publicity.

This was doomed to failure from the start as the cover up that ensued started to show cracks. To many people were involved for this tactic to hold firm as one report after another consistently told of sustained bullying over a long period of time. The media started to pick up on stories and the Justice Minister has now started to question some of the working practices related to Community Service.

Now the politicians have got on board how long will it be before some or all of the people involved in this hideous cover up jump ship to save their own skins. Time is not on their side as these and more questions will have to be answered ,and not what has gone before just swept under the carpet.

We can speculate again,and suggest that something akin to a high profile legal debate may need to take place if the truth is to come out,and we feel this would be no bad thing in fact it maybe what is required to sort this mess out. Again we can only speculate,but it would not take a genius to realise that a number of careers could be on the line and those involved will only be to aware of that possibility.

Widely known about and nothing done to prevent or stop it,quite the opposite do nothing harass the victims further try and wear them down and all will be forgotton. This tactic as with all one dimention thinking is doomed to fail.

The fallout from this serial bullying will be widespread and could well force a major change in Criminal Justice working practices,something we feel is long overdue. The dinosaurs that manage this service have only themselves at heart and themselves to blame for allowing this can of worms to burst open.

What started as a workplace bullying problem which should and could have been dealt with under the City’s own flawed policy’s and proceedures has been allowed to escalate into what may yet become a nation wide debate on the running and managing of Scotlands Community Service scheme. 

Iain Taylor-Pilton Sucks .com 

Friends and readers. We received a couple of posts from one of our readers [fair comment] who feels that our view of employing more local people in local projects is mis-guided,and that the Muirhouse Six Circle project was going down the tubes anyway and that the merger with PEP saved the project.

On their first point. He/She pays a dis-service to local people by suggesting local people should not be given the opportunity to work in and manage these projects. The whole point of inward investment is to empower local people to be in a position to do just that and not sit on the sidelines being spoon fed.

The poverty industry in Pilton and surrounding area has for years been dominated by patronage and anyone who didn’t agree with the powers that be at that time got no-where. The corrupt practices by the previous Labour administration meant jobs for the boys and their pals,while locals were patronised with management committee positions designed to make it all look democratic and above board. The whole system was riddled from top to bottom with bad practice and self interest.

Now with the immergence of the Neighbourhood partnerships this is being exposed,and none more so that the recent threats made to a member of the funding panal who happened to question some aspects of a grant application. The threats came from a member of PEP an organisation which received large sums of public money,and never had to account for it before in open forum.

On the Muirhouse Six Circle issue,an Issue that has still to be fully explained,a merger was pushed through in double quick time to join with an organisation PEP who had absolutely no knowledge or experience of working with offenders,more so offenders with disabilities. The then Pilton Partnership facilitated the merger and a direct conflict of interest was ignored,but the old pals act overlooked that little detail.

We are also aware that monies had been mis-used within the Muirhouse Six Circle Project and that the manager eventually resigned with a pay off from the Pilton Patnership,we wonder how many of the board members of the Partnership knew that.

So why did the Six Circle management Committee not know about or deal with the problem. On closer inspection we see that the chair of that organisation went on to chair PEP. What happened to the £60,000 statutory grant that they got and management committee member Don Millar, himself a senior manager within Criminal Justice was supposed to monitor,what pressure was excerted on him to shut up and go away. 

Who was in fact driving this merger it’s plainly obvious to us, and the line runs straight through the Pilton Partnership to the then chair of the funding panal and the then manager of the Partnership. What public consultation took place over this merger? Why did the Social Work Department not object to an organisation without any experience in this field swallowing up Six Circle,worse still they had put public money into Six Circle with no accountability to the public.

These and more questions still remain unanswered,and we have no doubt that dubious practices to say the least were afoot. The Six Circle building still remains empty and closed in Muirhouse Crescent.

What should have happened but was never on the secret agenda. Someone preferably from within the Community with some Criminal Justice experience should have been brought in to continue the project,and the management committee should have been disbanded and a new one elected. For it is there the problem lay. Management committee members serving more than one master and pushing this still most secret and murky merger.

Will the truth ever come out. The board of the Pilton Partnership might know but most of them were in bed with the Labour Party and were involved in other Partnership funded projects. On closer inspection and looking at previous annual reports that were available to us it would appear that only one member of the then board had no ties with Partnership funded projects,that in itself is highly suspicious,so even if that one person had objected it would not have mattered,game set and match then.

The Fairer Scotland Fund whatever it’s drawbacks brought into the public arena like never before exactly who was getting what,and the cat was out of the bag,forcing projects that had just put their hands out before and got what they wanted to justify their requests,this of course forced a back lash of anger resulting in the ill fated meeting in the West Pilton Neighbourhood Centre were several people were threatened.

This is what happens when the old guard and it’s feather bedding were ask to account for their spending over a number of years,and right there within the criteria that had to be met for funding was employment and how many local people were actually employed within these projects.

So there you have it a merger that is at best head scratching until you examine it a bit closer and begin to understand exactly how and why it came about. And the new funding arrangements which exposed  the reality of local employment, and it was shameful to say the least.