ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ

Moves to expand Early Learning and Childcare (ELC) and implement 1140 hours of funded ELC in ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ and Bute by August 2020 are on schedule, ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ’s Community Services Committee has confirmed. The expansion in childcare, from 600 hours to 1140 hours, is part of a Scottish Government initiative aimed at providing young people with a high quality experience that can make a significant contribution to their development, and help close the poverty related attainment gap.

Caring pupils at Clachan Primary School have been hard at work over the last few months, preparing 48 Christmas cakes to give to retired residents in the local community. The annual school tradition dates back more than two decades and sees the children bake, package and hand-deliver the cakes to elderly people in the village.

Welcome to ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ’s weekly news round-up. Thank you for reading it. If you have ideas on how we could make it more useful for you, we’d love to hear them. Please let us know by emailing press@argyll-bute.gov.uk Support extended for care experienced children and young people ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ has reaffirmed its commitment to improving the educational attainment and life chances of care experienced children and young people.

Helensburgh Town Centre has just been designated a new conservation area by ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ.  The designation recognises Helensburgh’s special architectural and historic qualities and will promote the high quality built environment. The next step is to prepare a Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Plan. This plan defines what is special about character and appearance of the conservation area and how the way the space is used may change.

Ongoing investment in ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ and Bute’s roads continues to halt deterioration and overall condition of the roads shows continued improvement. And ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ and Bute remains in the top five fastest improving Scottish Local Authorities in terms of road condition. The Annual Status and Options Report (ASOR) summarises the council’s road assets as at April 2018 and sets out future options that can be considered in terms of investment.

A council contribution of £270,000 capital funding towards a flood protection scheme for Campbeltown will go forward to be considered as part of the budget process in the 2020/21 financial year. This was agreed by the council’s Economic Development and Infrastructure Committee on Thursday 5 December, which also approved the preliminary confirmation of the Campbeltown Flood Protection Scheme (CFPS).

Planning to ensure that the council-run cemeteries can meet the needs of communities in the future is already underway. The Economic Development and Infrastructure Committee agreed on Thursday that local residents should be asked about their personal choices and for their views ideas for ways forward, during 2020, so that a new set of cemetery policies can be proposed. According to statute, local authorities are only required to provide one cemetery per area. ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ and Bute had 65 cemeteries available for the purchase of lairs.

ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ has reaffirmed its commitment to improving the educational attainment and life chances of care experienced children and young people. At a meeting of the Council’s Community Services Committee members were given an update on the progress of work to support vulnerable young people across ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ and Bute.

ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ is one of eight local authorities across the North and West of Scotland which are working together to ensure children and young people are given the best educational opportunities. Known as the Northern Alliance, the partnership is a Regional Improvement Collaborative (RIC) set up to secure excellence and equity in education.

Counselling services are to be made available to young people in ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ and Bute, as part of the Scottish Government’s 10 year Mental Health Strategy. At a meeting of ºúÌÒÅ®Éñ’s Community Services Committee this week, members agreed to support the initiative, which will see children as young as 10 having access to a trained counsellor.