TWO Labour MPs have expressed concern over a leading Liberal councillor's position as a shareholder in a bus company seeking to buy the Burnley and Pendle Transport undertaking.

Pendle MP Gordon Prentice and Burnley MP Peter Pike want Ian Gilhespy and his wife Gill barred from voting on whether to sell the council bus company.

The two MPs have put down a Commons Motion expressing their worries over Pendle Liberals' determination to sell the company or at least the half of it owned by Pendle Council.

And they make clear that they are worried about the role of Mr Gilhespy, who is an employee of and shareholder in Stagecoach - a private firm bidding to buy the council undertaking.

Mr Prentice and Mr Pike have also "deplored" the Gilhespys' threat to sue Pendle Labour Party over a leaflet drawing attention to these facts.

The two MPs have put down the Special Motion on the Order Paper of the House of Commons - the daily agenda circulated to all MPs, ministers and senior civil servants.

Entitled "Ian Gilhespy and Burnley and Pendle Transport" it notes that Liberal controlled Pendle Council jointly owned the firm with Burnley Borough Council.

The Motion states that the Liberals wish to sell the entire company or if Burnley Council refuses to agree, its 50 per cent stake in it to a private bus operator.

The Motion says the Liberal plan is "misconceived and short-sighted in that the bus company regularly turns in a healthy profit for both councils."

The Motion notes that this proposal was never put before voters in the main 1995 local elections and that therefore the Liberals have no mandate for the sale.

The Motion also "expresses concern that a Liberal councillor, Ian Gilhespy, is an employee of and shareholder in Stagecoach, which is bidding for the company: believes that councillor Gilhespy should not vote on the sale when it comes up before the council on the grounds that he has direct interest; utterly deplores the actions of Mr Gilhespy and that the Liberal Mayor of Pendle, Gillian Gilhespy, in threatening through their solicitors to issue a writ for libel damages in respect of a leaflet circulated by Pendle Labour Party which draws attention to these facts." BILL JACOBS

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