Lessons are still to be learned as school plans ruffle feathers

Stracathro: The area could lose a school as well as a hospital ward

It was a difficult week north of the Brechin line.

Despite being entirely expected, the decision to close the Mulberry mental health unit was no less palatable.

Health bosses who put the Stracathro ward into an induced coma a year ago finally decided to switch off its life support as the victim of a Tayside-wide services review.

In a twist of irony, that final say was taken in Perth, to where families of some vulnerable patients will now be forced to make the tortuous journey by public transport to visit loved ones.

However, as one fight lost was met with a sense of resigned anger, fresh battle lines were being drawn a tiny distance away.

Education chiefs have unveiled a schools strategy with a 2047 horizon which will leave Angus schools either revamped, rebuilt – or closed.

It’s a bold vision and includes plans for a new Monifieth High and a single campus for Arbroath’s two secondaries.

However, the hottest tattie councillors have found in their hands is the idea of shutting Stracathro Primary, whose children would go to an enhanced Edzell school – along with glens kids for whom empty Tarfside and Lethnot were once the clear choice.

One might share the incredulity expressed by furious Stracathro parents that the council’s pre-consultation on this grand plan was broad brush and gave no hint their school was in the crosshairs, especially given the range and scale of the proposals.

Equally, it’s difficult to argue against the council being in a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” position.

There have been school estate changes in Angus before with some – such as Isla Primary – handled very well.

Others – the Arbroath superschool plan – were an unmitigated fiasco, so it seems lessons may not have been properly learned.

And there is also a very large elephant in the yet-to-be-built classrooms.

The council doesn’t know where all of the money for this 30-year vision is going to come from.

In an era of impecuniosity, maybe some more time needs to be spent on doing the sums.

Picture: Kim Cessford. Parents with some of the children who attend Stracathro Primary School. They have been told the school may close under plans revealed by Angus education chiefs.