Oct 1 2009
Councillors have rejected a call to rule out using compulsory purchase orders to move people from where Donald Trump plans his £1bn golf resort in Scotland.
The homes and land of four people are being targeted as part of the US tycoon's plans for Menie. The BBC reported Aberdeenshire Council decided it was inappropriate to reject the use of CPOs completely, without a full report.
However, some councillors did say they would never vote to use CPOs to move the four residents from their homes. The council meeting was being held at the Aberdeen Exhibition and Conference Centre (AECC) today.
Scores of protestors turned up, with signs such as "Stop the Trump clearances".
The Trump Organisation wants more time for negotiations with four owners who have refused to sell their properties. The CPO motion was proposed by Councillor Martin Ford, who chaired the council committee that originally rejected the proposal for the development.
That proposal was later called in by the Scottish government, and approved. Cllr Ford said he remained fundamentally opposed to compulsory purchase orders being used.
He told BBC Scotland: "It is the instinctive reaction, the gut reaction of virtually all if not all of Aberdeenshire councillors, as it is with most other people, that this would be a monstrous breach of people's basic rights, quite unfair and is wholly unjustified."
Mr Trump has accused the councillor of putting his own political agenda above the interests of local people, but Mr Ford has denied he has been carrying out a personal vendetta.
Mr Trump's son, Donald Trump Jnr, earlier said the owners had been offered a 15% premium on market value.
He said they had also been given the chance to buy new homes at cost price, and the lifetime use of facilities at the new resort. Mr Trump has said he hopes to create the "world's greatest" golf resort at Menie.
Source: http://www.aberdeenshire.gov.uk/