"That's when I realised it had not been the most sensible thing I had ever done"

DEFIANT York transport boss Ann Reid said today she would not resign over the fiasco of the green traffic lights at her daughter's wedding.

In her first interview since a storm of controversy broke over the way her daughter Hannah's wedding party was whisked through nine sets of lights on green by council engineers testing a new system to aid emergency vehicles, Councillor Reid rejected Labour calls for her to stand down.

She said her decision to allow the wedding party to be used in the experiment was "not the best judgement I have ever made", but insisted she agreed to the trial "for the best reasons".

She believed she was helping to test a traffic control system that could save lives, she said.

Coun Reid spoke exclusively to the Evening Press shortly after the leader of the Labour opposition group on City of York Council, Dave Merrett, called for her resignation.

He said: "Coun Reid is clearly in breach of the Code of Conduct, which states councillors should not use their position to secure personal advantage.

"The code also demands that members do not bring the council into disrepute. This fiasco has produced a national outcry and York council has been made a laughing stock.

"Residents need to feel confident that the authority conducts its affairs properly and fairly, without personal advantage to any councillors, whatever position they hold.

"Coun Ann Reid should immediately resign as executive member for transport, as a first step to restoring faith in the council."

Labour transport spokeswoman Coun Tracey Simpson-Laing said: "This has been an enormous error of judgement on Coun Reid's behalf - but we need to find out why this was allowed to happen.

"It beggars belief that no one involved gave a thought to how inappropriate this was. A full investigation is needed."

But Coun Reid denied bringing the council into disrepute and making it a laughing stock. She said: "I think if anybody has suffered, it is me, quite honestly."

If a week is a long time in politics, it must seem like an eternity for Coun Reid.

A week ago, York council's Liberal Democrat transport chief was getting ready to go to Cornwall on holiday.

Then came a call from the council press office. A journalist was asking why she had allowed highways engineers to use a new traffic management system to whisk her daughter Hannah's wedding convoy through nine green lights in York on the way to the wedding.

It had been weeks since the wedding had taken place, but suddenly, Coun Reid admits, she got that sinking feeling.

"At that point, that's when I realised that maybe it had not been the most sensible thing I had ever done," she said.

She issued a statement in which she apologised "for this misjudgement and the lapse in my usually high standards". The Evening Press splashed with the story on Saturday - and by this week Coun Reid had made headlines all around the world. Even the Melbourne Herald Sun in Australia ran the story, under the headline 'Better Wed Than Red.'

She was still clearly smarting when, back from her holiday in Cornwall, she agreed to meet for an interview in the Guildhall. "If this is the only news they've got in Melbourne, Australia, then...." she said, leaving the sentence unfinished.

She was in bullish mood, too. By calling for her resignation, the Labour group were just seeking to make political capital, Coun Reid claimed.

She admitted she had been foolish and nave and had, at the time of agreeing to take part in the trial, "misinterpreted what might be the reaction".

But she insisted she had not done anything wrong, and had not benefited personally from the traffic trial - although she admitted the wedding party's journey took about ten minutes less than it might otherwise have done.

She had nothing to fear from an investigation by the standards board she said - and even appeared to welcome such an investigation. "I would say that that would be a course of action that should be followed."

And would she resign?

"Not at the moment, no. I think I've had support from a wide variety of quarters, which does show that the view of the Labour group is not necessarily shared."

So that's a definite 'no' to resigning, then? "While I have still got the confidence of my group the Liberal Democrats I will not think of handing in my resignation."

She is still confident of that support. She only got back from holiday on Tuesday night, she said. "So I don't know what they have been saying to each other. But I know what they have been saying in emails to me, which is that they give me their full support."

And what if there was a standards board investigation, which was to find against her? Would she then consider resigning?

There hadn't, as far as she was aware, been a case of a York councillor ever being found 'guilty', she said. "But from what I understand they would recommend any sanctions and yes, I would stand by them."

So the lady's not for going - at least not for the moment. While she has had plenty of detractors on the letters page of the Evening Press (correspondents calling for her to go, and labelling what she did an "absolute disgrace") she has also had her supporters. "If her daughter's wedding coincided with a needed check on the traffic light emergency system, then everyone benefited," wrote Allan Phillips, from Idaho in the United States. "The system was proven, and her daughter got to church on time - where's the harm?"

The astonishing thing about the whole affair, however, is how a politician of her experience - she has been a councillor for more than 19 years - could have been so nave as not to have realised how things would look.

How on earth did she ever come to agree to her daughter's wedding party being used for the trial?

She went to traffic officers at the council initially to ask them for advice on the best route for her daughter's five-car wedding convoy to take from her home in Woodthorpe to the Treasurer's House, where the wedding was being held, she said. She then got into a discussion with them about the 'green wave' system that was under trial.

This system enables traffic lights to be turned to green to allow emergency vehicles through. It uses a comprehensive system of traffic cameras to track a specific vehicle and change each set of lights to green as it approaches.

A similar system has been operating in York for some years - but until now, it has operated only along fixed routes, and has entailed changing all the lights on that route to green in one go. Because the lights are green for only a limited period, an emergency vehicle held up by traffic could miss one of the green lights - and then get trapped by a sequence of red ones.

The new system, being able to track an individual vehicle anywhere in the city and change the lights as it approaches, would be much more flexible and efficient - and could, Coun Reid said, ultimately save lives.

All well and good. But why was it her daughter's wedding convoy that was used to test it?

Traffic officers were keen to test the system with a number of cars travelling together, Coun Reid said, because it could be difficult to track a single car in heavy traffic.

As she was discussing the trials, after coming to officers for advice on the best route for the wedding party to take, someone suggested the convoy would be a good opportunity to test the system.

And whose suggestion was it?

It was not easy to remember the exact sequence of events, she said. The wedding took place weeks ago, and the conversation about the trial was even earlier than that. "I don't really know. I think it may have been an officer. But I cannot really remember where the suggestion came from. I have lots of conversations about lots of trials."

Anyway she didn't think at the time that there was any problem, she said, or she would never have agreed to the trial. "I truly believed I was helping."

She realises now that it was an "uncharacteristic lapse" in judgement. But if anyone has been harmed by the whole thing, she insists, it isn't the council's reputation but her own.

Has she learned a lesson from the last few days?

"I think in future I would be extremely careful in involving myself in practical work that the council is doing."

Updated: 10:07 Thursday, October 20, 2005