I've always assumed Kirkintilloch is a pretty enviable corner of Scotland. Quiet. A half-decent high street. Canals. Low crime. It also sits within East Dunbartonshire Council — consistently one of the wealthiest council areas in Scotland and something those of us living under Glasgow City Council could only dream about. I’m not the only one. In 2024, it was named the best place to live in Scotland. So imagine my surprise when I drove through the town recently, admiring the gorgeous town houses and litterless streets, and began to notice shop after shop plastered with the same red prohibition symbol.
STOP KIRKINTILLOCH BID. In big black bold letters, shouting at me from across the pavement. Why? As you're about to find out, this was the first of many ‘whys’ for this story.
I wonder what they think of the BID? Photo: Beth Templeton/The Bell
Why were over 70 local businesses in a WhatsApp group, declaring war with a local organisation (one that gets £40,000 annually from the local council, no less) supposedly set up to help them? Why was a nameless old man ripping down said posters? And, why was a group established to promote the interests of local businesses falsely claiming to have decorated the area in hanging flower baskets?
It began, as all the great mysteries do, at the local salon.
The hairdresser speaks
It was 21 August, when a short email arrived in my inbox suggesting I “look into Kirkie beef”. So I did. Scouring Facebook on a Sunday night, I came across a video posted on the 28 July by hairdresser Paul Smith. It was the kind of video that immediately makes you stop scrolling. Smith would later sit in his salon with his head in his hands laughing as he recalled it, but at the time he was clearly anything but amused. The video was an eight minute long rant and at the end he asks a seemingly simple question: “Kirkintilloch BID themselves have admitted not a lot has been done in the last two years, so any money that has been collected, where has it went?” I would soon find out the amount presumably collected was some £144,000. Smith wasn’t the only one wanting to know where it had gone.
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