MEMBERS of Britain's largest union, Unison, yesterday passed a unanimous vote of no confidence in North Lanarkshire Council chief executive Andrew Cowe and three suspended council officials.
Leaders of construction service workers, who chaired a packed meeting in Bellshill, said they were annoyed at claims made by the council that job losses could result from the financial crisis.
Unison's North Lanarkshire branch secretary John Barton said: ''Members also expressed a desire to work with the interim management to find a way through this sorry mess. However, they will not be slow in coming forward in terms of putting a vote of no confidence in the interim management should they fail to deliver.''
Unison said it wanted safeguards on jobs and services and insisted other departments should not suffer because of the crisis in the Direct Labour Organisation. Unison's regional officer for the North Lanarkshire branch, Mr Phil Martin, said management and the administration should be held accountable if the legal scrutiny reveals mismanagement.
Meanwhile, it was revealed that an accountant was appointed four months ago to oversee finances in North Lanarkshire DLO. Senior officials and leading councillors were anxious about the department's spending and wanted tighter controls.
The accountant started work early in February and it was he, said a senior council source yesterday, who discovered the #4.8m accounting deficit and massive wages to manual workers.
The source said: ''Construction services appeared to want a very experienced accountant to overview finances. The appointment was made with the agreement of council leader Harry McGuigan who heads the policy and resources (vacancy control) sub-committee.
''If Councillor McGuigan saw the need for an overseer of finance in building services at a time when the council was actually cutting back on jobs, he, too, must have been worried about the state of affairs within building services.
''So how could he say last week that the deficit report when it landed on his desk on May 20 came as a bombshell to him? And that he was gutted that there was anything wrong with its finances and that he felt badly let down by officials.
''It is pretty obvious that people in the know - department heads and the constructions services convener - were extremely anxious about where the money was going. They were not being told what was happening to the money and wanted someone in there to spell out where it was all going''
It has been revealed that one plumber in the DLO earned #54,000-a-year under the schemes while two other workmen notched up total earnings of #41,700 and #32,900. North Lanarkshire was one of the few council's in Scotland to make its DLO tender for contracts below #500,000. Previously such contracts went automatically to the DLO.
According to council records, the main duties of the new chief management accountant were to overview the financial management information system and compile detailed financial reports.
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