Sir, I refer to the article that appeared in your last week’s publication about the desperate need for a transport solution in Rosehall.
I am extremely concerned about the way in which Highland Council have handled this issue. Surely they were aware months ago that the Post Office was not interested in submitting a price to continue to run the Lochinver to Lairg service. Did they inform the local community of this at the time?
If they knew that there was going to be a gap in public transport did they include an alternative service when they tendered their public transport network last year? If so what was the result?
Unfortunately because of the secrecy that has surrounded the tendering process and award of contract, it has been virtually impossible to get answers or to find out what services are available.
In the past, when Highland Council has tendered their public transport network, the proposed contract awards were made public prior to the councillors being asked to make a decision.
For some reason the current administration excluded the public on 22 September when the proposed contracts were discussed.
Four months on, and four weeks after the contracted services have started, Highland Council have still made no public announcement on the services they have
commissioned.
When asked about this the public transport officers have claimed that it is up to the bus companies operating the services to tell local communities. However who has a duty to inform the public when the service is withdrawn? Surely this should have been done by Highland Council?
The public transport services available to Rosehall also include two dial-a-bus services. One of these runs under contract to the council, the other by the Bradbury Centre who had their grant funding from the council removed in 2008 and have been running a dial-a-bus on Monday and Friday since 2009.
The Bradbury designed their services to enable people to get to day care and lunch club at the centre but the services are also available to the general public.
On Tuesdays, up until the end of December, the council had a contract with John Macleod, the local bus operator, to provide a dial-a-bus service, enabling people in Lairg and Rosehall to travel within the area but also to get to the Migdale Hospital (and the Bradbury).
I found out about the withdrawal of this service at the beginning of December and wrote to the Director of TEC Services at the council on 7 December. I sent reminders and eventually got a holding response on 21 December to say that, due to council holidays, the matter would not be looked at until mid January.
Again, if the community had been notified of the withdrawal when the decision was made at the committee meeting on 22 September, then a solution could have been discussed and implemented without leaving people abandoned in rural communities.
When is the council going to come clean and tell us what contracts have been awarded, to whom and how much they have spent?
Sheila Fletcher,
Director,
Bradbury Centre,
Bonar Bridge.
