EAST Renfrewshire is like few other councils in Scotland. The 60-odd square miles on the cusp of Glasgow’s southside is home to around 92,300 people, hosts some of Scotland’s best schools, half of the country’s Jewish population, and when people arrive, they tend not to leave.
And that’s part of the problem that’s dominating the council elections this year. More and more commuters are upping sticks and moving to the Eastwood area, staying in Busby, Clarkston and Williamwood, Eaglesham and Waterfoot, Giffnock, Netherlee and Stamperland, Newton Mearns and Thornliebank.
Why wouldn’t you? You have great schools, and with Rouken Glen, easily one of the most beautiful public spaces in the whole of the UK. It’s so good, that people who already live here are staying alive for longer.
East Renfrewshire has the second highest life expectancy rate in Scotland. This heady mixture of more young and more old people in itself creates problems for the council.
“East Renfrewshire has changed, in a single generation, from a leafy, community-spirited, commuter conurbation to a crumbling urban sprawl with overstretched infrastructure,” David Jesner, the chairman of Newton Mearns Community Council told the Eastwood Extra recently.
Anyone who has lived in a crumbling urban sprawl with overstretched infrastructure, and then visited the leafy towns of Eastwood, will know that Jesner’s comments are maybe a little far fetched. But how you cope with the new demographics is going to be the headache for whoever takes over the town hall next month. It’s the tension between coping, preparing and preserving. Rumours abound that the council has pretty much agreed to sell off a local park as part of a deal to build 400 new homes for a £112 million housing estate.
One independent candidate is standing on a Save Huntly Park ticket, while the Tories are pointing out that East Renfrewshire would struggle to cope with the sudden jump in population.
That independent is freelance journalist Paul Drury who only discovered the company’s plans by submitting a series of Freedom of Information requests to the local authority. “This is a monster development, the equivalent of dropping a small town into the heart of a village,” he argued.
The company have not yet submitted any planning application.
In their recent report entitled Planning for the Future of East Renfrewshire Council, the authority warns of the demand on schools and nurseries for places, and on care services for the old. This rise in commuters who live here and commute into Glasgow is also causing increasing demands on public transport, trains and the road network.
It’s worth looking at the schools in more depth. Just under a tenth of the 5 to 17-years-olds who go to school in East Renfrewshire come from outwith the authority’s region.
A tenth of that tenth are children at Calderwood Lodge, Scotland’s only Jewish school, which, while under the control of East Renfrewshire, through a quirk of demographics and council boundary reorganisation, is very firmly in Glasgow. That, however, is not for much longer, with a new campus being built in Newton Mearns. What makes this of note is that it will be a world first; the only Jewish-Catholic joint-denominational school.
This is, in fairness, a well-to-do area. It has one of the lowest rates of people claiming out of work benefits in Scotland. Though there are areas in Barrhead which are among the most deprived 15 per cent in Scotland, this is one of the country’s most comfortably-off regions.
The Tories could do well here, Jackson Carlaw won the Holyrood seat at the last election. The party were confident enough to have Ruth Davidson out in Giffnock, pulling pints in the Orchard Park hotel just last week. Parties don’t waste their leader’s time in seats with no chance of victory. And perhaps more than the council elections, the Tories think they have a chance of unseating SNP MP Kirsten Oswald in June’s snap election. Speaking to the Barrhead News, sitting Tory councillor Gordon Wallace warned of the problems of the overdevelopment: “We have schools that are absolutely full. It takes about 10 minutes to get through Giffnock in a car, never mind waiting for all these houses to be built and all the traffic that comes with it.
“We are absolutely overloaded and the frustration is that the majority of people who come to live in Giffnock come for a specific reason and that’s the health and wellbeing that we have around here.”
It seems likely though, given the numbers and given commitments against Tory coalitions provided by Nicola Sturgeon over the week, that it will once again be an SNP and Labour joint administration.
Then the eight Labour councillors and the four SNP joined forces. What might be different this time round is that that it could be the SNP’s eight councillors joining forces with Labour’s four.
Tony Buchanan, East Renfrewshire SNP group leader, is confident: “I am delighted that we have such an excellent balance of experienced and new candidates, bringing their skills and initiative together to benefit our local communities. Every candidate is committed to working hard and achieving the best results for all of those who live in our local area.”
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