Campaigners to launch Kingask legal challenge

Gordon Berry, The Courier, 26 July 1999

A top level legal challenge may be launched against Fife Council’s handling and approval of controversial golf, hotel and leisure plans for Kingask, near St Andrews.

It was revealed yesterday that a special meeting is to be held to consider the terms of legal opinion obtained by local people concerned over the way the £50 million scheme was approved.

The move - which is likely to result in action in the Court of Session - comes at a time when Fife Council is preparing an inquiry into claims that officials were told to “trim their reports, come in line, or stay silent” as the application was considered.

Approval came after the matter was taken out of the hands of local councillors and passed to the central strategic development committee, but there have been claims - strongly rejected by the council - that a number of policies were breached.

The claims were made locally and were echoed by a range of national conservation bodies that united against the plans.

These included Scottish Natural Heritage, Historic Scotland, the Association for the Protection of Rural Scotland, the Scottish Civic Trust, and the Architectural Heritage Society of Scotland.

Yesterday the chairman of St Andrews Community Council, Dr Frank Riddell, told The Courier that local people had gone to the expense of obtaining counsel’s opinion on several issues.

He said that over a hundred signatures had been sent to the community council from people requesting a meeting on that opinion.

Dr Riddell said that he could not go into any detail about the issues, but added that after inspecting a great deal of written material, counsel had felt that there could be strong grounds for a judicial review.

He said a special meeting of the community council was being arranged, and this would decide if further action would be necessary.

“This information has been made available by people who have been advised by legal counsel that the community council is regarded as the most appropriate body to take the matter forward.

“The meeting will be public but there might be a point when private discussion will be necessary as legal or financial points are being dealt with.”

The judicial review process allows certain types of planning application to come before the courts where it is felt that illegality, irrationality, or procedural impropriety has occurred.

Decisions can only be challenged on points of law and not by objectors who are unhappy with the proposals.

Lord McCluskey said the review was, “One of the old forms of remedy now rediscovered by the judges to enable citizens to challenge infringements of their rights - especially infringements by public officials.

Lord McCluskey said that through the process judges had armed the citizen with rights “he did not know he had.”