I WAS first elected as a city councillor in May last year and I have to say the experience has been quite a shock.
We came in hoping to bring in new services and we have had to come to terms with the fact there is no money because it was all spent by the previous Liberal Democrat administration.
Not only that, but the budget was overspent, so the council is no
w having to make all these cuts.
It has been quite heartbreaking seeing the effect these cuts have had on people. As a councillor who is supposed to be there to help, that is hard to cope with.
Seeing schools close, or easy targets like services to the elderly and disabled, is pretty tough to accept and explain.
My background before becoming a councillor was as a businessman, so I was one of the first to challenge the council leadership on what was going on.
It concerns me that even though we now have a cross-party leadership team, there are just three or four councillors who make the decisions, and their record is not good.
We all agree, though, that Aberdeen should get a fairer share of money and that would help, but until that happens, if it ever does, we have to spend the budget we have available and somehow need to start doing things for people again rather than taking away services.
The full article contains 247 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
