Barriers are needed near to Kilmelford

Calor Gas attitude sparks fury

Sir,

Your article (‘Calor Gas customers get cold treatment’, March 15) on delays in Calor Gas deliveries is shocking but not surprising.

For the past nine years as a Calor Gas customer, I have struggled to secure timely deliveries.

Each time my gas levels are low, I have to make multiple telephone calls, often demanding to speak to supervisors, just to get a gas delivery for which I have already paid.

On one occasion I was told that the problem was that I lived in a remote location – but if I lived in a city centre I wouldn’t need to be reliant on tanker deliveries. Another time I was told that ‘they were overwhelmed’, and only delivering to people who had run out.

When I first signed up as a Calor Gas customer, I was given a written undertaking that deliveries would be made within five working days.

Calor Gas offers no such undertakings now.

The deterioration in service is unacceptable.

Every year, it seems to take Calor Gas by surprise that customers will need to use more fuel during the winter months.

To be told that ‘people should use what they have more sparingly’ is insulting: does Calor Gas really think that its customers would go to the expense of heating their homes to tropical temperatures during Scottish winters? I’m sure that all customers use gas sparingly, not least because of its high cost.

Calor Gas needs to get a grip. the

Thank you to the litter pickers

level of Sir,

Well done and thanks to the team who have done a fantastic job of clearing the mountain of litter that has been accumulating on our roadsides between Taynuilt and Oban.

Thanks must also go to the chap who has done a great job of edging both the pavements and roadside verges. What a difference this has made. And fingers crossed that the ‘big spring clean’ in Oban, organised by Maurice Wilkins, has been a huge success.

It’s a sad reflection on our society that so many still think nothing of throwing litter from their car windows or dropping it in the street.

Postcode woes lead to delivery difficulties

Sir,

We refer to your recent article regarding delivery difficulties to this area.

Those Oban and the surrounding area residents with postcodes PA34 5** are listed as living in the Highland region and our names do not appear in the Argyll directory.

In addition to this anomaly, we have been refused delivery of an internet purchase on one occasion and we are charged additional delivery fees on most internet purchases all because some jobsworth in Post Office HQ has not bothered to refer to a map of this area.

We have tried, along with one or two other Oban residents, to have this ridiculous state of affairs rectified but it is impossible to find in which department this jobsworth has his/her desk.

Contact has therefore been made with our MSP Donald Cameron to try to resolve this issue so we urge all those residents with the postcode PA34 5** to contact his office in George Street (telephone 01631 563474) to complain about the situation.

Hopefully, the Post Office can be made to see the error of its ways and put the other half of Oban back into Argyll and Bute. and Bute telephone

Storytelling for Year of Young People

Sir

As part of Year of the Young People 2018, Argyll and Bute Youth Services team is launching a storytelling project called ‘Once Upon a Time’.

We are collecting stories about Argyll and Bute and we will then collate them into an ebook for future generations to read. If you have any stories you would like to share then send them via email to youthservices @argyll-bute.gov.uk

Motorists pay the price for inaction

Sir,

Shockingly, 30 per cent of A-roads in Scotland are now classed as red or amber, meaning they are in need of inspection or requiring work.

These figures have a huge knock on for motorists who face increased damage to their cars, vans and motorbikes.

Ultimately, the SNP has failed to improve the situation in any real sense and motorists are the ones paying the price for inaction.

When you include the challenges that rural constituencies such as Argyll and Bute face, with the large upcoming spike in logging tonnage on our roads and the continued growth of heavy freight from our world famous distilleries. It’s clear that a piecemeal approach to road maintenance is not enough.

Argyll and Bute council has stepped up to the plate with plans to spend £15 million on roads over the next two years.

Now it’s time for the SNP at a national level to act. Sir,

It is very commendable that crash barriers are now being erected on the A85 between Pennyfuir and Dunbeg but why has a similar barrier not been placed at Loch Drimnin, outside Kilmelford village?

It is approaching two years ago when there was a horrific accident there that saw a car go off the road and into the loch, resulting in the deaths of two children.

It is a disgrace that a barrier was not erected immediately after the accident.

Come on, Argyll and Bute roads department: do something about this dangerous spot before there is another fatality.

Where is money to come from for HSCP?

Sir,

Argyll and Bute MSP Michael Russell shows breathtaking hypocrisy in his comments on the budgetary crisis facing the Health and Social Care Partnership in his constituency.

Where does he suggest the money comes from? Central government? The Scottish Government? Argyll and Bute is a large area with a very scattered population, making all service provision particularly challenging.

In light of Mr Russell’s obvious concerns, perhaps the Scottish Government could give some extra millions to the HSCP. After all, it has given £4 million to a few folk on Ulva.

Great success for Oban spring clean

Sir,

Our first Oban spring clean is over and must be considered a great success.

We would like to thank the crowd of volunteers of all ages who rallied to the cause and turned out to make our spring clean so worthwhile. I would like especially to thank our secretary, Claire Rizos, for organising the event and for dealing with the equipment hand outs and returns, also Janie Steele for her dedication and involvement with the beach cleans, and Faisal Juwel from Argyll and Bute Council for giving up his weekend to chase around the town picking up the bags to fill the skip which he’d organised at Rockfield. We should also thank the MacQueen Bros Charitable Trust for buying litter pickers for us, BID4Oban for helping to circulate our information to the business community and the GRAB Trust, for lending equipment. Thanks also to the kind folk at the Bridge Café who gave the Black Lynn volunteers free coffee and cakes.

We need to tackle the root cause of the littering and we hope that the community will continue to assist and encourage us in this. gun tèid daoine eile a bhrosnachadh a dhol an sàs oir tha sinn uile mothachail cho doirbh is a tha e daoine a thàladh gu comataidh sam bith gun iomradh air prìomh uallach a ghabhail. Fàgaidh sin aig amannan aon neach a’ giùlan dleastanas nas fhaide na dh’iarradh e neo i ach chan eil còir leithid de shuidheachadh stad a chur air iomairt gus duine ùr a thàladh chun na h-obrach. Tha e na adhbhar iomagain a bhith a’ faicinn cheannardan cuid de rìoghachdan mòra an t-saoghail a’ gleidheadh cumhachd leantainneach.

POWER tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Lord Acton wrote these words in 1887 but they are no less true now, and the world might understandably be concerned by processes which on one hand appointed Xi Jinping as president for life in the People’s Republic of China, and similarly delivered a fourth term to Russian President Vladimir Putin.