A veteran Stonehaven councillor has given up her senior role after coming under fire for remarks about Travellers.
Comments made at a recent committee meeting have cost the 20-year council stalwart dearly, after sparking uproar and frantic efforts to censor the footage.
By standing down as chairwoman of the Kincardine and Mearns area committee, the councillor will lose out on an extra £10,000 each year.
Wendy Agnew stands down as Tories launch investigation
The Tory insinuated “gypsies are not British people” as talks over a Travellers site at Findon descended into mayhem last month.
Affronted opponents have since called for her to be booted out as convener, with a vote initially scheduled to take place at the next meeting on Tuesday.
This was, however, revoked in light of Mrs Agnew’s premature resignation.
SNP councillor Dawn Black, who called for the vote, said she is glad that her Tory colleague “realised her position as chairwoman was untenable”.
The remarks also prompted a complaint to the Ethical Standards Commissioner, while the Scottish Conservatives launched their own probe into the matter.
Ms Black added: “We all need to be aware of our privileged position and conscious of the impact of our words.
“The fact that Cllr Agnew holds these views and showed that bias during a committee meeting was unacceptable.”
Did she jump before she was pushed?
But it’s understood that, on Thursday, Mrs Agnew made the decision to call it quits.
The decision is said to have come at the urging of her administration colleagues.
And it came after Aberdeenshire Council lawyers covered up the eight-minute section of the meeting that proved her undoing.
All meetings are recorded and added to the authority’s Youtube channel for residents to watch.
On this occasion, it was decided to censor the chunk due to the risk it could cause offence.
The meeting in question:
Ms Black added: “It is a shame it took pressure from the administration group to persuade her to resign the position.
“It would have been highly embarrassing for them to have their chairwoman voted out by the committee.”
Do you think Wendy Agnew was right to resign? Let us know in our comments section below.
‘It would be the same if they were British people’
As we revealed on Wednesday, the issue flared up due to the retrospective nature of the application being voted on.
Mrs Agnew suggested this showed a willingness to ignore rules on behalf of the applicants.
She said: “If they’re ignoring this, they may ignore other things. That’s my problem.”
Fellow councillors immediately expressed reservations, urging Mrs Agnew to retract her controversial statements several times.
But Mrs Agnew added: “I don’t want to refute it. Anything could happen there. That’s all. It’s slightly worrying to me.
“And I’m not saying it’s just because they’re gypsies. It would be the same if they were British people. I’d be worried about this massive site. That’s all.”
Aberdeenshire Council confirmed: “We note Cllr Agnew’s resignation as chair and await a decision from the Kincardine and Mearns area committee about next steps.”
Wendy Agnew has been approached for comment.
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