An Aberdeenshire councillor has quit as a governor of the Dick Bequest teaching fund amid a “blood money” row over its links to the slave trade.
Andrew Hassan, a Liberal Democrat, told the local authority he will not be accepting the job of helping to oversee the controversial £1.8 million trust.
The move emerged after we reported this week that opposition SNP councillors and a local church minister had condemned the council’s ruling administration for deciding to continue appointing two trustees.
They said the authority failed to take a stand against slavery and the use of “blood money” in local schools.
Next week, the spotlight will fall on Aberdeen University’s senate as it considers whether or not to reappoint two governors to the trust.
What is the Dick Bequest?
The bequest was established following the death of James Dick in 1828.
It has been offering grants to teachers and schools in Aberdeenshire and Moray for almost two centuries.
Last year, the shocking truth about the way Mr Dick made his fortune in the slave trade was revealed by two historians, David Alston and Donald Morrison.
They have led calls for the remaining money to be returned to Jamaica.
But the trust has been criticised for failing to take any action in response to the research.
There are 10 trustees, of which five are lawyers elected by the Society of Writers to the Signet.
A further two are put forward by the senate of Aberdeen University and three are appointed by Aberdeenshire and Moray councils.
To try to find a way forward, Mr Alston called on the organisations involved to refuse to reappoint their trustees, enabling regulators to intervene and take control of the cash.
But Aberdeenshire Council’s education committee agreed earlier this month to appoint Mr Hassan and Councillor Gordon Lang to the board.
Nomination refusal
However, Mr Hassan confirmed on Thursday: “I notified officers from the Legal and People Department of Aberdeenshire Council on Tuesday morning of my intention to not accept the council nomination to the Dick Bequest trust, and an alternative nomination will now be sought.
“It will be up to officers to bring forward the arrangements to identify another councillor nominee in due course.”
The Mid-Formartine councillor would not be drawn on the reasons for his decision.
Members of the ruling Conservative-Lib Dem-Independent administration had previously argued in favour of reappointing trustees, saying it would be better to be “in the tent” fighting for change within the trust.
However, SNP councillor Louise McAllister said the decision meant the council was “normalising slavery” and sanctioning the “further use of this blood money in our schools”.
The administration’s reasoning was also criticised as “spurious” by Reverend Carl Irvine, of St Andrew’s Church in Inverurie, who sits on the education committee.