Board staff set to tell Assembly of concerns Kirk's communication war to erupt

In an unprecedented move, virtually the entire staff of the board will present a petition directly to the assembly calling for a special commission to examine their concerns.

Details of the extraordinary petition and the response to it appear in a document sent out to commissioners. The Herald has obtained a copy.

The 29 signatories run key departments including the press office, the broadcasting arm Pathway Productions, Life and Work magazine and the Saint Andrew Press.

They accuse the board of running a callous and destructive regime which acts in secret and has flagrantly disregarded the will of the General Assembly, the Kirk's supreme authority.

The row has particular significance because of the Moderator-designate's call to communicate the Christian message more clearly, but this is the very area where the Church is riven by internal strife.

It blew up last October over proposals by the acting board convener, the Rev David Macleod, and the director, Mr Brian McGlynn, to merge departments with the loss of one-third of the jobs. The petition says this would have imposed a top-heavy management structure and closed most departments or rendered them unworkable.

The plan was supposedly shelved after a public outcry but internal rumblings over the review continued into this year. Matters became so heated that, in another unprecedented move in a Kirk department, four board members resigned in protest, leaving a rump of seven, including the four-strong review group, to carry on.

Staff say trust has broken down, making day to day operations increasingly difficult and undermining the credibility of its work.

They accuse the review group of failing to consult and ignoring assurances given at last year's assembly that no major changes would be made without the assembly's approval.

''There was evidence of financial figures that had been approved by the board being subsequently altered for presentation to staff, the General Treasurers Department, and others'', the petition says.

''Payment was made to an outside firm for accounting services without proper discussion and minuted approval, even though such services are available to the board through the General Treasurers Department which has an assembly remit to provide them.''

The staff say deep distress was caused when employees were invited to apply for new posts without proper consultation.

''There was a failure to provide any form of pastoral care and support for staff following the presentation of the review or in the period since, despite the fact that a number of staff are being treated for stress-related illness and other problems,'' they say.

The petition says the board no longer functions in the way proposed at the 1995 assembly and senior staff are excluded from the major part of meetings. ''Virtually every part of the board business is now treated as confidential'', it adds.

Senior figures in the Church last night expressed shock at the scale and nature of the allegations in the petition.

The Rev Denis Duncan, who was responsible for setting up Kirk links with the media 30 years ago, said: ''It is an astonishing document. ''It certainly reveals a more serious situation than even I thought there was. This goes to the fundamental essence of the board of communication's work. It questions virtually everything. There is really such a crisis that one does not quite know where to begin.''

Mr Duncan said the action by staff in presenting the petition was entirely valid. ''I think the assembly has to act in some way. They have simply got to respond and it seems to me that the director's position must be essentially untenable in these new circumstances.''

''The whole thing seems to have been very badly handled. How can you communicate the gospel to the world if you cannot communicate successfully with one another? The petition seems to open up whole new areas of problems in the department which I was not aware of. It is very worrying and very, very sad.''

Former Moderator, the Very Rev Dr James Simpson, who last year accused the board of acting unconstitutionally in proceeding with its review, said: ''I am just sorry that it has come to this. There seems to have been a complete breakdown in relationships between the board and almost every member of staff. This concerns me greatly.''

The signatories range from book warehouseman to section managers. The Herald understands that the only employees who did not sign were Mr McGlynn and his secretary. Both he and Mr Macleod are relative newcomers to Kirk administration, having arrived from previous careers in banking and local government.