Celtic Was Right To Pay The Food Bank Fine, But Questions Still Need Answered.

The news yesterday that Celtic has agreed to pay the fines of the food-bank vehicles which were ticketed at the weekend is welcome, and shows our club at its best. For us it’s a modest sum, but it shows the right spirit and keeps us on the side of the angels.

For Police Scotland and the council – and for Celtic too – this issue still has a lot of unanswered questions, and the bitter taste it leaves in the mouth will not soon be removed.

The council’s answer as to how this happened was faintly ludicrous and makes them seem petty.

The police’s behaviour, in passing this matter to parking enforcement like some kid in the classroom tattling on somebody is absolutely pathetic and small-minded.

Did Celtic not work with these people beforehand to make sure that this all went smoothly?

That seems like a glaring oversight to me otherwise.

Did Police Scotland really need to push this issue and act as they did? Do they not care that this does damage to their image? Or are they so far up their own backsides now that this doesn’t bother them?

On top of this, there are conflicting versions of events. Police Scotland and the council contend that the entire area is restricted to vehicles on emergency service grounds, but this wasn’t a party bus or some for-profit sticking a burger van there, or people illegally parking their cars never to return. The drivers were with the vehicles.

The idea that this was some kind of move on the grounds of public safety is frankly absurd and insulting to our intelligence. This was a goodwill organisation doing public spiriting work.

What in God’s name goes through the minds of folk who’d ticket them for it?

How does our council look? Do they not care about their own public image?

The heartlessness of this, the senselessness of it, is extraordinary.

They should have issued an apology, rescinded the fines (this garbage that there is no mechanism to do so is exactly that; garbage) and cleaned up the mess they’ve made here. It is astonishing that they haven’t.

This matter shouldn’t be allowed to rest as is. Celtic, Police Scotland and the council all continue to have questions to answer here.

When a notorious pub can hire a tank for a day and park it outside without anyone blinking it is ridiculous to argue that food bank collections vans present some sort of major problem.

This was an offence against common decency.

The people responsible for it, from the police who were there to the jobsworths who wrote the tickets to the enforcement department which okayed it to the council officials defending it should be hanging their heads in shame.

It is obscene and their attempts to justify it make them look worse than ever.

Celtic has said that discussions have taken place to assure that this never happens again; all well and good, but very late to the party. Those discussions should have been had before this, to prevent this from happening in the first place.

In the midst of all the recriminations over this, it is to be remembered above all that the Green Brigade have done an amazing job yet again and that the Celtic fans have gone above and beyond.

The contrast is what makes this stink and for all the trifling justifications that have been offered for this, the people of Glasgow who depend on this service know who the heroes are and know who the real public servants have proved to be in this case.