OFFICIALS WILL review the work of Argyll and Bute Council during Storm Eowyn to fine tune responses to future weather events.
Councillors have also told a meeting that there is a “massive” role for communities to play in resilience against stormy weather in the Bute and Cowal area.
Councillors William Sinclair (Cowal, Liberal Democrat) and Gordon Blair (Cowal, SNP) spoke after a presentation by Andy MacPherson, climate change project manager for Argyll and the Isles Coast and Countryside Trust.
The discussion took place at a meeting of the council’s Bute and Cowal community planning group on Tuesday, February 4.
Councillor Sinclair said: “There is a difference as far as council resilience is concerned. We go into an emergency and our executive teams are looking at the big picture.
“However, there is a massive role for communities to play in this, because there are huge amounts of other things.
“What happens if a road is blocked off? It depends on what time it happens, but you are looking at children trying to get back home.
“There is a massive picture there, and for Councillor Blair, as chair of the area committee, that might be something that the community council chairs and vice chairs could be invited to discuss. That will be an opportunity for Andy to speak to them directly.”
Councillor Blair said: “As Councillor Sinclair says, we are will to try to make arrangements for [the committee’s meeting in] March at a preliminary meeting with colleagues.” Later in the meeting, he added: “On the responsibilities of the council, I had a response from somebody after a statement about council staff working hard and doing what they could do.
“There has to be a realisation that the council can only do so much. In the lead-up to the storm, everybody was advised that it was a red warning and it was quite appropriate for staff not to leave their homes while the red warning was out.
“I have asked the chief executive [Pippa Milne] and she has come back to say the resilience team will prepare almost like a post-mortem on the storm, looking at where we as a council can get our act together.
“It was the responsibility of the council to respond and I believe we did an excellent job, but that does not mean we cannot learn from any mistakes we made.”
Andrew Galloway Local Democracy Reporter
