Following today’s Regulation and Licensing Committee meeting, EFTA has written to Committee Convener Cllr Tom Adams and Fife Council’s Tom Brown seeking urgent clarification of the decision to treat all 431 objections to Uber Scot Limited’s application as invalid.
We have also asked that the application is not determined under delegated powers until the legal position concerning electronically submitted objections has been considered and clarified.
Our email is reproduced below in full:
Dear Cllr Adams and Mr Brown,
Fife Council received 431 objections to this application. Each objector’s name and postal address was supplied within the email submitted to the Council. Those submissions were received and treated by the Council as objections.
At today’s committee meeting, Uber challenged their validity on the basis of the requirements in paragraph 3(1) of Schedule 1 to the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982. Fife Council’s legal representative conceded that point, the committee declined to permit the objectors to address the issue, and subsequently resolved that there were no objections, with the consequence that the substantive application will now be determined under delegated powers.
The objections were submitted electronically. Paragraph 16A of Schedule 1 specifically regulates electronic communications and paragraph 16A(3)(b) provides for the statutory signature requirement to be satisfied electronically.
Before any delegated determination of Uber Scot Limited’s application takes place, please confirm whether paragraph 16A was considered by Legal Services before the concession was made to the committee, and provide the Council’s paragraph 16A determination, including the means of authentication specified by Fife Council for objections submitted electronically.
Given that the finding that there were no objections is the basis upon which the application is now proceeding under delegated powers, we request that no delegated determination be made until this issue has been considered and clarified.
Yours sincerely
James Glen