The fog descends

As I took the children in to school and nursery today, the fog made driving treacherous with visibility of only 100m. The kids in the playground loved the excitement of not being able to see and being chased by the fog.

The traffic sounds were almost non-existent, despite being only yards from the busy road. However, the fog was punctuated by the sounds of a local farmer shooting geese and the shotgun blasts bounced and echoed through the fog.

But the fog in the Council chamber had obviously descended much earlier and had reduced visibility even further, when Councillors decided against closing two secondary schools.

Hopefully, the full Council will take a decision, rather than prevaricating about taking a decision, next week, against the alternative of considering all the schools together, which will lead to confusion, probable legal challenges, and undoubtedly some bizarre results.

The Herald reports that Daliburgh costs £24,745 per pupil (compared to a Scottish average of £4,675).

However, the religious appointees to the Committee seem to have held the balance between closure and delay, arguing in bizarre terms:

Rev Andrew Coghill shared concern with Daliburgh parents that the schools would shut in the face of an impending new law presuming against rural school closures.

He argued for a situation where the “axes falls on everyone at the same time so justice is seen to be done.”

Which seems to be a case of having your cake and eating it, and I hope his sermons are much more intelligible.

With pupil numbers in the Western Isles having fallen from 6,315 to 3,850 in 30 years, something needs to be done to rationalise schooling, but it looks like closure of Daliburgh may be rejected by the Government - although no extra money will be available - leaving another millstone around the neck of the Comhairle.