SCOTLAND'S top justices of the peace have been accused of pursuing a witch-hunt against a whistleblower who exposed a £3000 "junket" to Africa.
The Scottish Justices Association (SJA), which represents the country's 400 JPs, has denounced the anonymous whistleblower who revealed public cash was being used to help send the group's secretary to a luxury hotel at Victoria Falls in Zambia.
A new motion passed by the SJA's executive "deplores the conduct" of the whistleblower, and says leaking "confidential information obtained by virtue of their office to the media" was "likely to bring the office of the Justice of the Peace into disrepute".
However, some JPs have also said last month's trip was a "junket" and a "gross misuse of public funds". After the Sunday Herald reported the trip, Scotland's top judge ordered a clampdown on all foreign travel by judges, sheriffs and JPs. The Lord President, Lord Gill, now personally vetoes any publicly funded trip lacking a "clear justification".
The SJA trip was to a five-day conference held by the Commonwealth Magistrates' and Justices' Association (CMJA) in Livingstone, which calls itself "the tourist capital of Zambia". The venue was the opulent Zambesi Sun Hotel next to Victoria Falls, and the final day of the conference was set aside for sightseeing trips.
The trip was undertaken for the SJA by its secretary, Group Captain Keith Parkes, a former RAF pilot who sits as a JP in Perth.
A report to the September meeting of the SJA's executive strongly defended his attendance as part of a longstanding tradition. However, the minutes stated "some members of the executive council used rather inflammatory and pejorative language" about the Zambia trip when it was first suggested.
In trying to prove the Zambia trip was not a junket, the SJA listed a series of other CMJA conferences attended by Scottish JPs, and the feedback they gave their colleagues. But many of the exotic trips appeared to have yielded very little concrete information.
In 2007, two JPs went to a CMJA conference in Bermuda and produced a report of just 650 words. The next year, two JPs went to a CMJA conference in South Africa (cost: £4227) and produced "rather short reports that concentrated on their personal impressions of Nelson Mandela rather than what had been said at the conference". One report was 650 words, the other 250.
In 2009, a JP went to a conference in the Turks and Caicos Islands at a cost of £2609, part-funded by the Scottish Government, and produced an "informative" report of 6000 words. In 2010, another JP went to a conference in Brighton costing £500 and wrote no report at all on what he had done and learned there.
A year later, a JP went to a CMJA conference in Malaysia (cost: £2056) and wrote 700 words. And in 2012, the same JP went to Uganda (cost: £1749) and wrote just 600 words.
Independent MSP John Wilson said: "Whistleblowers should not be subject to any kind of witch-hunt. It's in everyone's best interests these issues are brought into the public domain. It shows no-one should be above public scrutiny.
"If the justices are concerned, they should first look at themselves to see if they are upholding the judicial code of conduct and working in the interests of the public pound."
SJA chairman Allan Clasper, a JP in the Highlands, said: "I have no comment to make."
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