Ten green bottles hanging on a wall . . After a while there were only two green bottles. Yet again you have reported (May 15) the fiasco of a local council, this time Highland, proposing to close schools against the wishes of parents and being forced to backtrack. From 10 proposals it was reduced to two.
Why do councils persist with a policy they know will land them in embarrassment? Why do councillors who have to face re-election next year allow the procedures to advance so far that, in Highland’s case, it was only the full council meeting which came to the rescue, the education committee having failed to see the light?
The former Strathclyde Region made a laughing stock of itself because it several times marched to the top of the closures hill only to march back down again.
Glasgow has apparently not learned from the experience. Council services are for people. As long as parents want to use a local school it ought to be available to them. On occasions parents have not opposed a closure plan because they saw the sense in it. Parents are not Luddite but councils are obtuse.
Jean Craig Rosemount Aberdeen
