Across Scotland newly elected councillors are reaching decisions on who will run councils for the next five years.

All parties get annoyed when they fail to win enough support to form the administration.

Under a first past the post system minority administrations are less likely, but a feature of proportional representations is that smaller parties have a greater influence.

The example of the Greens being in government in Scotland illustrates that point.

The single transferable vote will almost always mean no outright majority, requiring parties to put forward their vision and proposals to win over 50 per cent of the councillors.

Those who are not happy with this outcome sound like they are arguing for a return to first past the post, which in my view is less democratic.

In the Scottish Parliament I work with other parties to gain support for the issues I am working on.

In the last session I brought forward amendments to the planning bill to give local communities and local people the very same rights as developers.

The amendments were voted down by SNP and Tory MSPs and, whilst I was angry, I had to accept that SNP and Tory MSPs had every right to join forces to block giving communities more rights and more protection against the speculators and large developers because that is the system we operate in.

I recently put forward a motion for a member’s debate on the issue of the unequal treatment of care workers and the terrible impact on people who need home care.

In order to secure the debate, you need the support of at least one MSP from three parties.

Lib Dem MSP Willie Rennie signed immediately but SNP and Green MSPs refused to sign because, in their view, I was having a go at the SNP government.

I was not, I was simply trying to get the appalling state of social care up for discussion to highlight what actions are needed to fix it.

Murdo Fraser, a Tory MSP, signed the motion in order to allow the debate to happen and therefore I relied on a Liberal and Tory MSP to let me speak up for care workers and older people in Fife whilst the SNP and Greens were more interested in protecting the SNP government than they were in speaking up for those suffering from poor social care.

So, to those jumping up and down because they thought they had a right to take power, I would say don’t throw stones in glass houses.