Over 12,000 on Borders housing lists

EXCLUSIVE by DOUG COLLIE

The number of applicants on the housing lists of the four Borders-based social landlords currently exceeds the overall total of tenancies available in the region, according to information published by the Scottish Housing Regulator.

Annual returns from Scottish Borders Housing Association (SBHA), Berwickshire Housing Association (BHA),  Eildon Housing Association and Waverley Housing Association show there were 12,084 applicants on their combined lists with 6,039 new applications received during 2017/18. The four organisations own 11,212 houses for rent between them.

Some of the applications will be duplicated across the Borders RSLs (Registered Social Landlord), while Eildon and Berwickshire have identical waiting lists as a result of their 'partnership' called Borders Choice Homes, part of Homehunt Scotland. We have been careful not to double count their numbers. The statistics also show there were 459 applications from homeless people during the financial year.

SBHA had 2,000 new housing applications in 2017/18 resulting in an overall total of 5,721. The Eildon/BHA figures were 2,987 new applicants and a total list of 4,739 while Waverley reported 1,052 new enquiries and a total housing list of 1,624.

In the five years to 2017 590 "affordable houses" were built in the Scottish Borders - an average of 118 new homes per year - according to figures contained in the council's local housing strategy. The new document covering the period 2017-2022 includes proposals for 1,192 new builds covering all forms of housing.

The regulator has today (August 31st) published an annual report detailing the performance of all social landlords in Scotland with individual sections for each RSL covering tenant satisfaction and quality of the houses in their ownership.

George Walker, the Chair of the Scottish Housing Regulator, said: “Overall, Scotland’s social landlords are continuing to perform well. They’ve maintained a strong performance across the majority of the Charter standards and outcomes. They continue to do well when it comes to the things tenants told us matter most to them. This good news is reflected in the high levels of tenant satisfaction which now sits at over 90%."

The data shows a mixed picture for the performance of the Borders RSLs. Here are the main facts and figures taken directly from each landlord report:

SCOTTISH BORDERS HOUSING ASSOCIATION - At 31 March 2018 your landlord owned 5,636 homes. The total rent due to your landlord for the year was £20,678,872. Your landlord increased its weekly rent on average by 4.90% from the previous year. Tenant satisfaction - Of the tenants who responded to your landlord’s most recent tenant satisfaction survey:

74.8% said they were satisfied with the overall service it provided, compared to the Scottish average of 90.5%. 72.5% felt that your landlord was good at keeping them informed about its services and outcomes compared to the Scottish average of 91.7%. 59.9% of tenants were satisfied with the opportunities to participate in your landlord’s decision making, compared to the Scottish average of 85.9%. 94.4% of your landlord’s homes met the Scottish Housing Quality Standard compared to the Scottish average of 94.2%.

BERWICKSHIRE HOUSING ASSOCIATION - At 31 March 2018 your landlord owned 1,782 homes. The total rent due to your landlord for the year was £7,211,728. Your landlord increased its weekly rent on average by 2.00% from the previous year.

88.2% said they were satisfied with the overall service it provided, compared to the Scottish average of 90.5%. 88.5% felt that your landlord was good at keeping them informed about its services and outcomes compared to the Scottish average of 91.7%. 82.0% of tenants were satisfied with the opportunities to participate in your landlord’s decision making, compared to the Scottish average of 85.9%. 85.7% of your landlord’s homes met the Scottish Housing Quality Standard compared to the Scottish average of 94.2%.

EILDON HOUSING ASSOCIATION - At 31 March 2018 your landlord owned 2,270 homes. The total rent due to your landlord for the year was £9,260,515. Your landlord increased its weekly rent on average by 4.00% from the previous year.

92.7% said they were satisfied with the overall service it provided, compared to the Scottish average of 90.5%. 89.3% felt that your landlord was good at keeping them informed about its services and outcomes compared to the Scottish average of 91.7%. 79.5% of tenants were satisfied with the opportunities to participate in your landlord’s decision making, compared to the Scottish average of 85.9%. 94.4% of your landlords homes met the Scottish Housing Quality Standard compared to the Scottish average of 94.2%.

WAVERLEY HOUSING.ASSOCIATION  -  At 31 March 2018 your landlord owned 1,524 homes. The total rent due to your landlord for the year was £5,973,577. Your landlord increased its weekly rent on average by 3.80% from the previous year.

92.6% said they were satisfied with the overall service it provided, compared to the Scottish average of 90.5%. 91.5% felt that your landlord was good at keeping them informed about its services and outcomes compared to the Scottish average of 91.7%. 80.7% of tenants were satisfied with the opportunities to participate in your landlord’s decision making, compared to the Scottish average of 85.9%. 95.7% of your landlord’s homes met the Scottish Housing Quality Standard compared to the Scottish average of 94.2%.

*The full returns submitted to the watchdog by each landlord can be accessed via the Scottish Housing Regulator's website. It is also possible to compare the performance of landlords throughout Scotland.

Council's chosen fund on mis-selling 'blacklist'

EXCLUSIVE -by our FINANCE UNIT

The bankrupt and worthless offshore investment fund, favoured by Scottish Borders Council to provide the money for a £23 million waste treatment facility for the region, features in a series of recent successful compensation claims lodged with the Financial Ombudsman Service against firms of financial advisers..

And the controversial unregulated New Earth Recycling & Renewables [NERR] is now regularly listed by websites advertising no-win-no-fee recovery services as having been potentially mis-sold to hundreds of unsuspecting investors.

A total of 3,249 investors lost £292 million when NERR collapsed in 2016, a year after the Borders local authority abandoned its multi-million pound waste management contract with New Earth Solutions, NERR's business partner.

It later transpired that investors' cash had been used to prop up the failing NES Group before the entire operation went belly up. The financial disaster also cost local council taxpayers at least £2.4 million, the sum spent by SBC in unsuccessfully attempting to deliver the treatment plant planned for Easter Langlee on the outskirts of Galashiels.

Liquidators continue to investigate NERR which was part of the Isle of Man-based Premier Group with the possibility of having uncooperative directors or managers brought before the Manx courts to be cross-examined on oath.

This year alone there have been a number of compensation claims against so-called independent financial advisers (IFA) settled by the ombudsman. The amounts lost in NERR following the transfer of pension pots and savings runs into hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Among the firms ordered to make good NERR investors' losses are Active Financial Partners, True Bearing, Leech & Burgess, Parker Kelly Financial Services, Helm Godfrey Partners and The Citimark Partnership. Sums invested in the dud fund ranged from £10,000 to £100,000, and in virtually every case the unregulated entity should not have been offered to members of the general public.

The complaint against advisers Parker Kelly in which £25,000 had been lost resulted in the following passage being included in the Ombudsman Gideon Moore's report: "There was no recourse for the investor if the joint venture (between NESG and NERR) defaulted [and it did]. The loans did not have to be repaid for a period of 15 years, which meant from the start liquidity could be a problem for any investor seeking to access their funds. The adjudicator accepted there may have been shortcomings in how these funds were managed by the providers (which may include potential allegations of fraud)".

There were different allegations - this time involving a possible conflict of interest - in a complaint upheld against Citimark.

Again, the investor who placed £100,000 in NERR did not get ownership rights so ‘unsecured’ meant the investor had no recourse if the joint venture defaulted. The adjudicator thought it too much of a coincidence, given the overlap between the fund and the adviser, for the investor identified only as Mr C to have randomly chosen the investment himself. 

Ombudsman Kim Parsons wrote: "The business [Citimark] has now acknowledged there was a conflict of interest. The conflict of interest between the adviser’s role with Citimark and his role in Premier New Earth and Eclipse is important. The Citimark partners were also directors of Eclipse Investor Services LLP. Eclipse had a financial interest in Premier New Earth – the UCIS recommended to Mr C. 

It also emerged during the investigation into a different complaint against Citimark that IFAs were being paid commission of 4.36% of any investment and 0.5% of the value each year. Investors faced the prospect of an exit charge of 8% in year one reducing by 1.6% a year. There was an annual management charge of 1.5%. 

But Citimark told the FOS why they believed the New Earth fund was a good investment. They said that in 2008 equity markets had crashed, banks had failed and major property markets were in a slump. This meant that many investors, including Citimark clients, were seeking alternative options to traditional markets.

Citimark said the New Earth fund offered a number of features that differentiated this investment from other mainstream/non mainstream investments: *It was uncorrelated to the major traditional equity, property or bond markets; *It was regarded as a socially responsible, green investment, based on waste recycling management processing; *It was an asset-backed investment, generating utility or property-style revenue;  *The customers of the underlying business were local authorities, regarded as blue chip customers; *The offering reflected the general thrust of EU regulations and aims to reduce carbon-footprint, a theme many investors considered in line with their own attitudes towards the planet.

Unfortunately apart from providing handsome annual fees for its Isle of Man managers and promoters the NERR fund proved to be totally worthless. And Scottish Borders Council, one of the "blue chip clients" mentioned above was, in truth, just another of NERR's victims.

Now the fund has become a target for claims management firms such as SIPP Claims, Neglect Assist, and Aspire Business Management. A typical commission charged by such companies is 25% of any compensation won plus VAT. Perhaps the hapless local authority which suffered at the hands of NESG and NERR should give one of the reclaimers a call!

A classic case of Jethart Injustice - Part three

EWAN LAMB concludes our First World War trilogy which has literally shone a light on 'the good burghers of Jedburgh'

It is difficult to imagine the feelings of injustice which filtered through the streets and closes of the royal burgh of Jedburgh in August 1916 after Scotland's Lord Advocate refused to reduce the "wicked and scandalous" fines imposed on poorer members of the community for breaching wartime lighting regulations.

An impassioned plea to the House of Commons by local Liberal MP Sir John Jardine - to be supported by a number of other disgusted members of various political persuasions - would ultimately fail, leaving otherwise law-abiding citizens who had been hit with financial penalties of up to £15 (£1,200 in today's values) to face the prospect of prison.

The lighting regulations were part of the defence of the realm, aimed at protecting communities from German air raids. The law demanded that lights inside households and businesses should not be able to be seen outside otherwise an offence had been committed.

It is interesting to recall the views expressed by some of those who took part in the House of Commons debate after Sir John, whose address was featured in part two of our story, sat down. He had highlighted the fact that the fines handed down in Jedburgh Court by the judge, Sheriff-Substitute Ronald Baillie were higher than those meted out anywhere else, five shillings to fifteen shillings having been the norm.

"It is a scandalous case of inequality of treatment as between one person and another, all being entitled to the same treatment according to the law", declared George Barnes, Labour MP for Blackfriars. In other words, one law for the wealthy and a different one for poor people.

In Mr Barnes' view Sir John had unearthed a rather bad case of Jedburgh justice. 

"It is perfectly true, as he [Jardine] says, that there have been numerous cases of people who have been dealt with for this offence, and some of them rather glaring eases", said Mr Barnes. "The brother of the Lord Chief Justice, a few months ago, was fined, I believe, £2, and that was a rather glaring case, where the light was observable a considerable distance. I will not say that there was any wickedness in regard even to that case.

"But that was a case of some danger. There was a case of an hon. Member of the House, about the same time, who, I believe, was fined £1, and there have been other cases in which the fine has been considerably lower than that. I join in the protest which has been made by the hon. Member that poor people in Jedburgh, away from the entrance to the High Court in London, should be fined £15 for a trivial offence of this sort when other people get off so lightly."

Mr Barnes went on to attack the former Scottish Secretary (Thomas McKinnon Wood) for failing to stand up for the Jedburgh 'victims' of Sheriff Baillie's severity.

Said Mr Barnes: "There is a more important question—that is, the conduct of the Secretary for Scotland as the guardian of the interests of the Scottish people. I heard my hon. Friend say that Scotland was treated badly, that she did not get justice in many ways.

" I would attribute it to this fact, that there is no cohesion between Scottish Members, and that no pressure is brought to bear upon those who are supposed to be the guardians of the Scottish people, as there ought to be, in a collective manner. I trust that from to-day, having regard to what has happened, we shall exert a little more pressure in some organised way to see that people in Jedburgh and other places in Scotland get something like justice meted out to them."

"This is a scandalous case. There is no wickedness or premeditation about this thing. I hope that something will be done to see that these scandalous fines are reduced."

Edinburgh East MP James Hogge (Liberal) was equally scathing in condemning the level of the Jedburgh fines.

He told The Commons: "I think that the fines that were exacted in these particular cases were wicked, in fact they were monstrous fines, and I think that the ex-Secretary for Scotland did himself an injustice in not taking the matter up and having those fines reduced. I am extremely sorry to hear that the present Secretary for Scotland (Jack Tennant) has also refused to reopen this particular matter.

"I would suggest to him that if he wants a popular reception in Scotland he had better go to Jedburgh, and he will there find what the people of Scotland think of any Minister who refuses to take up a matter of this kind. It is common knowledge that a Member of this House was fined only a short time ago for not having his blinds drawn. Here we are dealing with humble people in Jedburgh".

Those thoughts were echoed by Lanarkshire Liberal MP William Pringle who said: "- I think there was a case for interference in this particular instance. I think the fines imposed were altogether out of proportion to the offences committed.

"Only last week an hon. Gentleman who sits on the Front Bench was fined five shillings. He is a Minister in the Department that is very largely concerned in the administration of this particular Act. He ought to have known the law. These men (in Jedburgh), we are told, had been warned. Here was a man who should not have required to be warned at all. He ought to have known all the Regulations. Yet in spite of that he gets off with a paltry fine of five shillings."

But if the campaigners expected Lord Advocate Robert Munro to buckle and give ground on the issue they were very much mistaken. According to him the Jedburgh offenders may have been lucky to escape fines of up to £100 (£8,000 in today's money) or a prison term with or without hard labour. This is what he had to say (verbatim Hansard account of Parliamentary proceedings):

"I beg my hon. and learned Friend to remember that in administering the law under the Defence of the Realm Regulations, the sheriff, if he had so pleased, was empowered by Parliament to fine these people not only £7 10 shillings. or £10, as the case might be, but he was authorised by this House, if in his discretion, and looking to the circumstances of the particular case, he thought fit to do so, to do what?—he was entitled to impose a fine of £100 with imprisonment, with or without hard labour, and the forfeiture of goods.

"That was the law which the sheriff-substitute had to administer. I want the Committee to put to themselves this question: How are you to arrive at the conclusion that this fine was exorbitant or excessive, to use the adjectives which my hon. and learned Friend has used, if, in point of fact, the sheriff-substitute had the power to impose infinitely more severe penalties than he did?

"I must protest at once against the suggestion that a breach of these Regulations is a trivial matter. That was said in the course of the debate, and I was surprised to hear it said especially when we read that only last night on the South-East Coast of Scotland there was a Zeppelin raid. These are not Regulations which are to be lightly treated or regarded as Regulations which can be disobeyed without any serious consequences being entailed. I protest against that theory at once, and emphatically. 

"The situation was this: in the particular district with which we are concerned—and no one has a higher respect for that district than I have; I have visited it with my hon. and learned Friend on, I think, more than one occasion—it is perfectly certain that there was considerable carelessness in the observance of these Regulations before these charges were made, and very considerable laxity, of which complaint was made. Not only were these Regulations not properly observed, but the very persons who were charged in these particular cases with breaches of them had been specifically and repeatedly warned with regard to their breach of the Regulations, and it was under these circumstances that the fines of which complaint has been made were imposed. 

"They were imposed in a locality where these Regulations were not carefully observed, upon persons who had been repeatedly warned of the serious consequences of breaking the Regulations, and they were imposed for a breach of Regulations which are essentially important in their observance.

"Since those sentences were imposed the result has been shown to be most salutary in this particular locality, and the observance of the Regulations has been infinitely better than before. To suggest that there was any partiality or respect of persons, or that heavy fines were imposed because the person charged was poor or in humble circumstances is quite idle and grotesque. The circumstances  were considered quite apart from the financial or social position of the persons. It was partly as a punishment and partly as a deterrent."

So what became of those good folk of Jedburgh who were saddled with a criminal record and a large sum of money to find to avoid a jail term? What happened to David Cockburn (fined £15); or Matthew Noble (£7 10 shillings) and Mrs. Noble, his wife, (also £7 10shillings), or George Forbes (£10) or George Beveridge (£10), and James Hunter (£7 10 shillings). That's a combined sum of £4,750 in 2018 values.

They certainly seem to have been dealt a cruel hand by a vindictive judge and a merciless group of Government ministers. But then again perhaps you think differently.....

A classic case of Jethart Injustice - part two

EWAN LAMB continues the story of a First World War political saga centred on Jedburgh

Some of the Jedburgh residents who were fined up to £15 each in 1916 for failing to comply with strict lighting regulations imposed to protect communities from German air raids were earning only 30 shillings a week at the time, the House of Commons was told.

The penalties handed down by Sheriff-Substitute Ronald Baillie at the local court were believed to have been the highest dished out anywhere in the country. And the sense of 'Jethart Injustice' was considerable when, at a later sitting, he restricted the sanctions on those who failed to draw their blinds at night to between five and fifteen shillings.

A series of appeals for common sense over the summer of 1916 in an attempt to have the 'grotesque nature' of the original fines scaled back was ignored by the Secretary of State for Scotland's office.

As Hansard, the official record of Parliamentary proceedings shows, local Roxburgh MP Sir John Jardine (Liberal) used a debate on Civil Service estimates for the Scottish Secretary's department to propose lopping £100 (some £6,000 in today's money) from the Ministerial budget for salaries and expenses. It opened the way for him to pursue the cause of the "small merchants and traders in the Royal Burgh of Jedburgh".

In a passionate, and at times fiery, speech to MPs Sir John said: "The accused say that these fines are excessive. That is their grievance. They held a public meeting to express that view. A former Provost was in the chair, and they unanimously stated what they thought about it.

"Their first grievance is the excessive fines, but their second, the point which I bring forward now, is the refusal of the Minister to bring the prerogative of mercy into play. It is the same power which is constantly put into operation by the Home Secretary in England. It is a very well-known procedure in England and is not unknown in Scotland."

In a direct challenge to his own ruling Liberal Party Sir John continued: "I have been  appealed to as the Member for that county (Roxburgh) to bring forward what these people who have to pay the fines, and their neighbours, ratepayers, and others, at a public meeting alleged to be grievances, because the Secretary for Scotland ought to have examined into them and rectified what there was of excess."

The courageous Sir John told the House: "They say the amounts are heavy if considered along with their pecuniary circumstances. These are not great and rich people who have motor cars to ride in every day or who dress themselves in purple and fine linen.

"They are the ordinary, quiet shopkeepers and little innkeepers of a little country town in Scotland, and to them £15 or £10 is a big sum to pay, especially as it is known that the trade of Jedburgh is suffering because of the War, and they have had many expenses and have given very much to charity, and, like most of us, have had bereavements.

"No country excels the borderland in traditions of valour, nor, as I believe, in present courage in coming in great numbers to the flag and taking a great part in the fighting in all parts of the world.

"The people generally are in such a condition that all public authorities ought as far as possible to be generous, and, while being just, to imitate the Crown in its office of mercy. I believe that very strongly, because I know the people well."

Fines of the magnitude handed down by Sheriff Baillie for lighting regulation offences could not be found in any other part of Scotland, claimed Sir John. He had found that in Glasgow the fines were often two shillings, rising to fifteen shillings sometimes, and in many other boroughs the scale of fines was similar to the range in Glasgow. And the accused in Jedburgh who had been saddled with huge financial penalties had no right of appeal.

The Borders MP went on: "It is a sound and reasonable discretion that a fine is meant not as a means of sending people to prison, but merely to give them a reminder that they must not break the law.

If you sentence a servant girl, who does not pull down a blind, to a fine of £10, she has to go to prison, and the evil done is great.

"I have mentioned already that the sheriff-substitute administered the law in the way I have referred to. On a next occasion the fines inflicted by the same sheriff-substitute went down from £15 to five shillings. That, I say, is a more reasonable way of dealing with things.Unless these fines are reduced it will be an intimation to this and to any other Court that they may go on inflicting fines of £100 and £15, which are far beyond the means of the people to pay."

Then Sir John made reference to the case of the Home Office minister "who committed an offence for which people in the Burgh of Jedburgh were fined £15, whereas he got off with five shillings."

The law was no respecter of persons, and ought to be equally administered, he suggested,, so that the people of Jedburgh and the county of Roxburgh must not be left to say that it was only in that part of Scotland that heavy fines were inflicted. 

"We must have something like an average, and a measure of common sense. I saw that a Member of this House got off  with only a fine of  five shillings, and that the wife of a titled judge of this country, I think, got off with £2 odd, but I am not going to speak evil of dignitaries or of anybody else, and I am not going to give names."

TO BE CONTINUED....

HOW DID THE COMMONS RESPOND TO JARDINE'S BARNSTORMING SPEECH?

FEATURE - A classic case of 'Jethart Injustice'

EWAN LAMB - with a feature length story (in instalments) on a wartime campaign against blatant judicial  unfairness which fell on deaf ears.

When two Government minister in the department responsible for enforcing World War I's crucial lighting laws were convicted in 1916 on a breach of the regulations aimed at protecting the country from German airship raids, the public probably expected them to pay heavily for their misdemeanours.

But when it emerged that the culprits had been fined "paltry" sums of £1 and five shillings respectively (equivalent to £82 and £20.67 today, according to the inflation calculator) there was a political uproar centred on the Scottish Borders town of Jedburgh.

A handful of Jedburgh residents, all of them said to be from much poorer families than the highfalutin politicians,, had been absolutely hammered by the local judge at Jedburgh Sheriff Court who imposed fines ranging from £7.10s (£619) to £15 (£1,239). The total in financial penalties added up to £57.10s (£4,753), way above the fines handed down in other parts of the country. And failure to pay would mean a spell in jail.

There was outrage in the town at the scale of the punishments meted out by Sheriff-Substitute Ronald Baillie. A public meeting was convened at which citizens had their say, and a petition was sent to the Secretary of State for Scotland Thomas McKinnon Wood requesting him to use his powers to mitigate the penalties. He refused.

In a previous article we told how Sir John Jardine, the Liberal MP for Roxburghshire, had attacked his own Government's policy of allowing young boys to be birched for trivial offences such as poaching rabbits or trout from the estates of the local gentry.

Sir John's intervention in the case of the "Jedburgh Birchings" was made in 1909. But he was even more forthright in his criticism of the lighting regulation fines of 1916. He raised the issue in the House of Commons several times, and the strength of feeling sparked a full-blown debate. Those Jedburgh fines were to be condemned as wicked, monstrous and 'a scandalous case of inequality'.

The regulations, imposed on the outbreak of war, required every household and place of business to ensure no internal light on their premises could be seen outside. It meant blinds had to be drawn at all times during the hours of darkness.

The threat of Zeppelin raids particularly on east coast towns was considerable, and yet the rules were to be breached on many occasions in all parts of the country, sometimes due to carelessness or negligence, at other times when people simply forgot to pull their curtains before receiving a visit from the local constabulary.

Prosecutions generally resulted in fairly modest fines in the range two shillings to one pound. But Sheriff-Substitute Baillie, in the beginning at least, had different ideas on how to chastise those who failed to stick to the regulations. However, soon after his 'monstrous' fines on the little people of Jedburgh it is reported he fined the next offender just fifteen shillings.

Sir John first raised the issue of the harsh financial penalties imposed on his constituents during a Commons sitting in May 2016. He told the House that on or about the 13th April Mr. David Cockburn was fined £15, Mr. Mathew Carstairs Noble £7 10s., Mrs. Noble, his wife, also £7 10s., Mr. George Steel Forbes £10, Mr. George Beveridge £10, and Mr. James Hunter £7 10s.

He asked Mr McKinnon Wood to investigate all of the circumstances "with a view to considering whether the prerogative of mercy of the Crown should graciously be exercised as regards the amounts of fines,"

But the Secretary of State was completely unmoved, replying: "I know of no reasons why I should intervene. It is of great importance that the Regulations should be strictly observed."

James Hogge, Liberal MP for Edinburgh East was scathing in his criticism of the treatment handed down in Jedburgh's court. He said: "The fines mentioned amounted to £57 10s., and were imposed on a rural town in a rural part of Scotland far removed from the sea. The fines in similar cases elsewhere have rightly or wrongly only ranged from 15s. to 30s. Will the right hon. Gentleman, in view of the status of these people, see that while they are adequately fined there is some remission made?"

He may have been a member of the same political party as Sir John Jardine and Mr Hogge, but Mr McKinnon Wood was not for turning. He told them: "I cannot promise to make any remission. The Sheriff is perfectly competent to judge as to the proper fine to be imposed. I do not think that the point that this is an inland town is one which would lend much comfort to the inhabitants, as we have had Zeppelin raids over inland towns more than once recently."

Despite his lack of success, Sir John would raise the Jedburgh cases again three months later with a new Scottish Secretary (Jack Tennant) in office. Sir John had discovered that Mr Noble, fined £7.10s by Sheriff Baillie, had not even been at home when his wife committed the offence "through negligence while spring cleaning". Yet both parties had been fined.

Exorbitant and extraordinary fines had been denounced as far back as the Declaration of the Estates of the Kingdom of Scotland of 1689, so would Mr Tennant ascertain whether the Jedburgh fines should be reduced, asked Sir John.

Mr. Tennant: "Full inquiry was made into these cases by my right hon. Friend who preceded me as Secretary for Scotland, with the result that he found no reason for his interference, and I do not propose to reopen them."

A separate question the following day about Mr Cockburn's £15 fine received equally short shrift from the Minister.

It was at this point that the incredible disclosures about the fines 'suffered' by the Government's own Ministers for breaching the regulations came to light.

William Pringle, Liberal member for North West Lanarkshire said: "Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Attorney-General was only fined £1, while this poor man was fined £15?

And an English MP told the Commons that in England and Wales prosecutions were undertaken by the Home Office, and the Under-Secretary for the Home Department had recently been fined only 5s. for an offence such as this.

This prompted Mr Hogge to ask: "Why is it that the Attorney-General is fined £1, and the Under-Secretary to the Home Office 5s., while this man in Jedburgh is fined £15?

However, according to Mr Tennant the matter was entirely at the discretion of the courts.

TO BE CONTINUED.....

NEXT: MPs ATTACK SCOTTISH SECRETARY FOR 'LACK OF MERCY'

From scallywag to 'supreme sacrifice'

DOUG COLLIE tells the story of a young Borderer punished by the birch and by German machine gun fire in his short, tempestuous life

It is hard to imagine a situation in Twenty-first Century politics in which 'The Honourable Member for Roxburghshire' or any other MP for that matter would stand up in the Commons to challenge and criticise their own party's criminal justice system.

But that is exactly what happened on more than one occasion in 1909 when Sir John Jardine, Liberal MP for Roxburghshire took up the case of a 13-year-old boy from Kirk Yetholm, near Kelso - described as a member of a hawker family - after the kid was birched for taking trout from the Bowmont Water by wire snare.

Apparently young William Norris had come to the attention of the authorities on more than one previous occasion, and had been the subject of a number of police warnings before Sheriff Substitute Hugh Baillie, the judge presiding at Jedburgh Sheriff Court, ordered the wee miscreant to be given a good thrashing.

Before becoming a MP Sir John Jardine had himself gained considerable experience in administering the law. He was judicial commissioner for Burma in 1878 and chief justice in the High Court of Bombay from 1895-97 before retiring from the legal profession.

Sheriff Substitute Baillie certainly seems to have been an enthusiastic advocate of birching, having meted out a similar punishment to three young rascals from Jedburgh for the heinous crime of poaching rabbits before he turned his attention to William Norris.

Sir John first raised the issue of the 'Jedburgh birchings' in Parliament on July 7th 1909, according to Hansard, the official record of proceedings in the House of Commons. Britain was ruled by a Liberal Government at the time.

He asked the Lord Advocate if the three sentences of birching passed by Sheriff-Substitute Baillie at Jedburgh on three boys of 12 or 14 years of age, had yet been executed in regard to a prosecution for taking rabbits out of a trap in Lord Campbell's park; whether any of these children had been previously convicted; and whether, in similar cases, the First Offenders Act or the Children Act has been brought to the notice of the courts in Scotland?

He was told by Lord Advocate Alexander Ure "I am informed that the sentences referred to have been duly carried out. None of the boys had been previously convicted. On the passing into law of the Probation of Offenders Act, 1907, and the Children Act, 1908, respectively, the attention of judges in the summary criminal courts in Scotland was directed to the provisions of these Acts by circulars issued from the Scottish Office, and I am further informed that in selecting the form of punishment which he considered the most judicious in the circumstances the Sheriff-Substitute had fully in view the various methods of dealing with these cases open to him under these Acts."

But in September Sir John felt duty bound to raise the vexed question of birching a second time.

This time he asked the Lord Advocate whether his attention had been drawn to the case of William Norris, a boy of 14 years of age, who had been sentenced by Sheriff-Substitute Baillie at Jedburgh to be birched for taking trout from Bowmont Water; whether the prosecution was a private one or had been initiated by any official acting under the Tweed fishery laws; whether any sentences of birching had up to the present time been passed as regards offences against the Tweed fishery laws; and if The Probation of Offenders Act, 1907, was applicable to such cases?

The Solicitor General for Scotland (Mr. Arthur Dewar) told him -"Inquiry has been made, and it appears that the prosecution was not a private one or under the Tweed Acts, but was at the instance of the Procurator Fiscal for contravention of the Trout and Freshwater Fish Acts by taking 42 trout by means of wire snares. Two boys were prosecuted, both of whom pled guilty. Norris, being under 14 years of age, was sentenced to four strokes of the birch. The Probation Act is applicable, but I am informed that the boy had been previously twice convicted of malicious mischief, and had been repeatedly cautioned by the police."

At least two other Liberal MPs condemned the use of the birch on small boys in the following exchange:

Mr. JOHN WARD (Stoke-on-Trent) Liberal-Labour. Does not the hon. and learned Gentleman think that it is an atrocious punishment for a boy?

Mr. SPEAKER (James Lowther, Conservative 1^st Viscount Ullswater ) – MP for Penrith. That is a matter of opinion.

Mr. JAMES DUNDAS WHITE (Dunbartonshire) Liberal. Will my hon. Friend take steps to see that the penalty of birching shall not be inflicted on small boys for catching trout?

Mr. DEWAR I am afraid the Act of Parliament says that birching may be inflicted in the discretion of the sheriff in certain cases, and here my hon. Friend will notice that the boy had been twice previously convicted.

So whatever happened to William Norris, born at Kirk Yetholm on October 11th 1895 to John Norris and Margaret Frater?

The truth is William did not live to see his twentieth birthday after suffering a much more deadly punishment than the birch.

On New Year's Day 1915 9174 Private W Norris, of the 1st Battalion Scots Guards together with an unspecified number of his fellow soldiers perished as they attempted to capture and hold a German observation post by the village of Cuinchy in rural France. Apparently they were mown down by withering machine gun fire, and owing to the position where they fell it was not possible to recover the bodies.

The history of his regiment says the 1st Battalion had gone to France as part of the British Expeditionary Force in the latter half of 1914. William and his colleagues had been crouching in trenches knee deep in water for several days prior to the fatal 3 am raid which cost him his life.

Private Norris, like so many of the fallen, has no known grave. His name is commemorated on the Le Touret Memorial, Pas de Calais, France, and on the village war memorials in Leitholm and Yetholm. He was posthumously awarded the Victory Medal and the British 1914/15 Star.

Trade union time costs revealed - but not at SBC!

WORLD EXCLUSIVE by EWAN LAMB

Local councils and all other public authorities have, for the first time, published figures showing the cost of so-called Trade Union Facility Time, and it is clear the national bill will run into many millions of pounds.

But although Scottish local authorities and other bodies operating in the public sector posted monetary amounts on their respective websites by the July 31 deadline, Scottish Borders Council's document does not include a figure...only the fact that the 32 "relevant union officials" cost the equivalent of 0.107% of the total wage bill in 2017/18.

New regulations were introduced by the UK Government in 2017 making publication of the trade union information mandatory, including cash sums which the public could identify.

The regulations are designed “to promote transparency and allow for public scrutiny of facility time. They create scope for sensible savings by improving public accountability which will ensure taxpayers’ money is only spent on justifiable and accountable trade union work that represents value for money”.

Facility Time is the provision of paid or unpaid time off from an employee’s normal role to undertake trade union duties and activities as a trade union representative. The first set of figures for 2017/18 had to be made available publicly by July 31st this year.

Not Just Sheep & Rugby randomly accessed the newly published statistics for 16 of Scotland's 32 councils as well as a number of other organisations in a bid to establish what facility time was costing.

The figures range from the modest to the gargantuan although we offer no opinion on their merit or otherwise.

The largest sum we identified was for NHS Lothian where 167 'relevant union officials' including 27 who devoted 100% of their time to union duties cost £1,084,421 (0.12% of the health board's wage bill).

Other notable totals were for Renfrewshire Council where £619,180 was spent on the activities of 56 officials; at South Lanarkshire Council with 236 officials cost £478,291, the Scottish Government (£476,589 for 115 designation trade union officers), Police Scotland where £462,760 was the bill for 47 officials, and Scottish Fire & Rescue, £344,051 for 154 individuals.

The total amount of money required to pay for the trade union facility time at the 22 organisations we looked at was in excess of £5.5 million.

Here is a list of the individual returns from those 22 bodies in no particular order:

:LOCAL AUTHORITIES – Fife – 69 relevant union officials (£269,401); Scottish Borders 32 (no figure given, but costs equivalent to 0.107% of total wage bill); Dumfries & Galloway 25 (£86,214); East Lothian 10 (£36,037; West Dunbartonshire 75 £106,841; Aberdeen City 48 £316,260 plus 77 education TU officials (£216,910); Dundee City 32 (£116,089; Falkirk 43 (£109,738); Stirling 19 (£56,869); South Lanarkshire 236 (£478,291); Moray 19 (127,946); Perth & Kinross 35 (£79,395); North Ayrshire 173 (£137,238); West Lothian 38 (£171,740); Renfrewshire 56 (£619,180); Angus 43 (£125,241).

OTHERS – Scottish Government 115 (£476,589); Registers of Scotland 10 (£148,190); NHS Lothian 167 (£1,084,421); NHS Education for Scotland 8 (£14,516); Police Scotland 47 (£462,760) including 12 full-time union officials; Scottish Fire & Rescue 154 (£344,051) five full-timers.

Not Just Sheep & Rugby does not venture into Englandshire very often. But we thought it would be interesting to compare the cost of trade union activities in some of the organisations south of the Tweed.

There was a shock of astonishing proportions almost right away when we discovered Transport for London has 731 union officials, and the spend in 2017/18 came to an eye-watering £7,487,069. That figure is greater than the 22 Scottish totals combined.

Manchester City Council reported expenditure of £233,980 on 84 trade union officers. Our nearest neighbours, Northumberland County Council chalked up a reasonably modest £90,558 for 36 officials.

Meanwhile Northamptonshire County Council, the Tory controlled local authority currently on the brink of bankruptcy, spent £108,361 on 23 individuals. That is probably barely enough to save them from the debtors' prison!

Birmingham City Council, the second largest local authority in the country has trimmed spending on facility time in recent years. It is one of the few councils which has been publishing statistics for several years. In 2013/14 the city racked up £1,124,924 on 96 officers. But by 2017/18 the figure had fallen to £859,710 for 57 members of staff receiving time off for union duties.

Finally, Leicester City Council's figures last year were £430,536 for 95 officials.

The publication of the data may well spark "outrage" in some sections of the press.and media.