A right to know

IT is quite worrying that some of our most prominent public servants don’t seem to consider transparency as one of their top priorities.

Inverclyde Council, Police Scotland, the Scottish Fire & Rescue Service (SFRS) and the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) are all involved in a plan to evacuate thousands of people from their homes in the event of a blaze at Devol Farm.

To devise a document that involved so many households, then refuse to disclose it is unacceptable.

People have a right to know the risk that exists to facilitate such a complicated multiagency plan and the steps that will be put in place to combat it.

There is clearly significant concern over the 15,000-plus tyres illegally dumped at the old farm to formulate such a response.

To then keep people in the dark over that risk and what would happen next is wrong.

Hopefully someone with the authority to release the document will read this column and do the right thing. If they want our readers to have confidence in what they want them to do, they need to trust them with the information.