Dundee City Council leader John Alexander last week made a shock U-turn on his stance on the Olympia saga.
SNP councillor Mr Alexander backed calls for an independent inquiry into failures at the crisis-hit leisure centre, explaining he no longer had confidence in reassurances given by professionals and outside experts.
He changed his mind after repeated calls by The Courier, local residents and opposition politicians for an investigation into what has gone wrong at the £35 million facility, plagued with problems since it opened in 2013, with taxpayers left to foot a £6m repair bill.
Steve Finan has led the campaign for an Olympia probe while Jim Spence has written extensively about the impact its two-year closure has had on the community.
This is their verdict on the latest development.
STEVE FINAN: Olympia episode highlights issue with career politicians
I congratulate Dundee City Council leader John Alexander for his U-turn on an inquiry into the Olympia scandal.
But this episode is a stark example of the attitude of politicians to criticism, and also a warning why no one should go straight from university into a party political job.
MPs, MSPs and councillors shouldn’t even be on the ballot paper unless they’ve worked 20 years in the real world.
A lot is learned from a demanding workplace culture – being personally responsible for your actions, and having to face mistakes, as well as earning promotion for being good at the job.
Normal people know this. Career politicians do not.
In a real workplace, the response to a mistake is to find it and fix it – when a machine part doesn’t work, a junction box is incorrectly wired, a roof leaks.
This teaches you that real-world situations have real-world repercussions and need real-world remedies.
In politics, by contrast, the difference is the reaction to adversity.
‘They’ve never seen genuine accountability’
When storms come the first political response is to “mitigate”. That’s their word. It means cover up, deny or blame someone else.
Politics is more complicated than an incorrectly-priced tin of beans, yes. But many problems in the world of industry are highly complex too.
Solutions are found with creativity, intelligence and, most importantly, by tackling the problem head on.
It is different for career politicians moving from university into politics because they’ve never seen genuine accountability in a real workplace.
They learn from their first day – and this comes from the very top of the organisation – that no matter what happens the most important thing is to appear confident, sound sure about your direction of travel and keep telling everyone what a wonderful job you’re doing.
Career politicians rarely experience the full ramifications – with nowhere to hide – of accounting for their actions.
An election every four or five years is a broad brush matter.
It’s really not the same as a hard-nosed boss pointedly asking: “Why is this particular figure on this particular spreadsheet wrong?” Then looking you straight in the eye, waiting for an answer.
The politician’s mindset is that any critical comment, on any matter, is a politically-motivated attack by supporters of other parties.
They deflect, or counter-attack another party’s stance.
‘Face it like a worker has to’
All parties do this. How many times, reader, have you seen a politician interviewed and thought: “Jeez, just answer the question, eh?”
When shining an accountability light on The Olympia, I suspect there were failures at the design, procurement and construction stages.
But for years the city’s SNP group claimed no, nothing wrong here when it was blindingly obvious there was.
Here’s the crux, councillors. You approached this like politicians. You didn’t see Olympia as a problem for Dundee’s swimmers, you saw it as a problem for your party’s reputation.
You valued “mitigating” the blame for yourselves and your cronies above doing what was best for Dundee – and you dodged and deflected instead of facing it and fixing it.
When it comes to the inquiry, face it like a worker has to.
JIM SPENCE: Dundee SNP group put party before city
Dundee has been badly served by its civic leaders in the Olympia pool debacle.
The incompetence and indecision shown by those in the City Chambers is symptomatic of an administration out of its depth, treading water and hoping for someone to throw them a lifebelt.
Council leader John Alexander’s damascene conversion in recognising the need for an independent inquiry is welcome but it’s hard to resist thinking he’s hoping his dramatic change of heart will save the reputation of his drowning party and his leadership.
The problems plaguing the pool are now very well publicly documented; the latest cock up among a myriad of problems being the only cubicle in the men’s toilet has been out of action for months.
Instead of listening to genuine concerns of taxpayers, the council leader and others in the administration who’ve overseen the shambles have turned a deaf ear to any criticism.
His initial intransigence sums up much of modern politics. My party right or wrong is the guiding principle.
‘Not an easy job, but that’s the game’
Voters would’ve appreciated his approach to the problems being much more open and transparent, and his reputation might’ve emerged enhanced as a straight dealer.
As it is his previous inflexibility and obfuscation now make him look like a man without conviction, crumbling under increased media and public scrutiny.
There’s a fine line between strong leadership and pig-headedness.
The running of a city like Dundee with its fair share of problems requires mature and sensible governance.
It’s not an easy job and no one expects every decision to please everyone, that’s impossible in any arena in life.
There are tough calls to be made and often big decisions come down to gut feeling and instinct as much as the rule book.
But that’s the game politicians are in – and if they don’t have the aptitude for handling the major crises that land on their desks they’re in the wrong job.
I don’t think for a moment that John Alexander wants anything other than the best for the city of Dundee.
But it’s a difficult balancing act between achieving that and admitting publicly you, and the party of which you’re a member, has made a seriously expensive mistake with the city’s money.
‘Surrounded by lackeys’
Not just the council leader has been complicit in this failure of management though.
He’s been surrounded by lackeys too mindful of guarding their own positions to put their heads above the parapet to protest at the incompetence and indecision which has marked the entire Olympia scandal.
There’s a delicate balancing act between sticking rigidly to your principles and surrendering them to political pragmatism, but the SNP group at the city chambers have put duty to party ahead of duty to the city.
They’ve remained tight-lipped and loyal to their party machine rather than holding to account their own council leader and those council officers and others responsible for the maladministration of the Olympia debacle.
Now as public pressure mounts John Alexander has admitted it’s time for an independent inquiry into the issues which led to the most recent closure of Dundee’s flagship swimming centre.
It’s the right decision but it wouldn’t have been needed if he and the ruling group hadn’t been so obtuse in trying to hide the mistakes made by the ‘professionals and outside experts’, in whose assurances he now admits he has no confidence.
Ten years’ worth of problems have plagued the Olympia and Alexander has admitted he is “struggling to contain his anger”.
It would’ve been better for him and everyone else if he’d just let rip a long time ago rather than playing politics.
Conversation