MINUTES TIREE COMMUNITY COUNCIL

SEPTEMBER PUBLIC MEETING

7pm Wednesday 10 September 2025

1. Attendance: Gerard McGoogan (chair), Dr John Holliday, Frances Khetrat, John MacCaskill, Tim Arkless. Cllr Kirsty MacFarlane from Coll CC attended. One member of the public attended the Zoom call. There had been 490 views of the Facebook page by 12 September.
2. Apologies: Cllrs Jim Lynch and Willie Hume.
3. Welcome: the meeting was recorded and streamed live on Facebook. This recording was kept for 30 days and then deleted automatically. The Zoom recording was kept on a secure PC until the draft minutes had been approved and then deleted manually.
4. Minutes of last meeting: there were two corrections. Item 7: ‘Tiree is losing the Barra link on 10 and 17 October’ should have read ‘10 and 17 September’. The mezzanine deck’s inclusion in the booking system only went live last week. This is for a month’s trial. The minutes were proposed by GMG and seconded by JMC.
5. Matters arising (not covered later):

• The new container at the recycling centre: GMG had visited. The doors are shut due to the wind, and there is no signage. It would be better if it was inside, but there was currently no space. He was pleased to have been called a ‘customer’
• Visitor Levy: the Argyll and Bute Council consultation had now been published at https://www.argyll- -bute.gov.uk/moderngov/documents/s223618/APPENDIX%201.pdf

There had been 3,352 responses, two-thirds from residents. ‘Overall, the consultation found limited support for the implementation of a visitor levy scheme in its current form.’ 42% of residents did not support its introduction, compared to 26% who agreed with the levy coming in.

The ABC visitor levy Short Life Working Group will meet on 15th September, with a full Council meeting to follow on 25 September

• None of the three electric car chargers at the pier, which are run by ABC, have worked for a year. They are aware of this, and have tried to get engineers to the island without success. The Tiree Trust has been able to repair their charging points using a different contractor. Out of the eight public chargers on the island, four do not work. This appears to be a problem for island charging points. However, the island is theoretically quite well supplied (if they were all working) compared to the mainland

6. Correspondence:

• The Tiree Youth Partnership has made contact. We strongly supported this initiative. FK will get in touch with them, and TA will help
• It had been reported to us that the Kirkapol Church of Scotland, now in private ownership and a listed Schedule B building, had deteriorated. Historic Environment Scotland operate a Buildings at Risk Register, but this was not taking new applications
• We had been notified of a build-up of industrial waste at a location. We will research what is the correct agency and inform the correspondent

1. Meeting reports

• Mull Community Council: there had been an expression of interest from a sports organisation to send a team from Mull and Iona to the 2027 Island Games. We wondered if the same opportunities might be available for Tiree athletes, but most of the competing teams represented island groups like the Western Isles. We will contact in the first instance
• Integrated Emergency Management Workshop had been attended by GMG: he had been impressed by the way all the different emergency teams on the island worked together. He wondered if we should have an Island Evacuation Plan
• Community Link Work: this had been attended by GMG. The idea is to link the medical practice, social work and local groups. It works in Glasgow and Taynuilt, and they are looking to try it in a rural location
• Western Isles Environmental Hub had been attended by GMG. There is one in ABC. They are holding a COP2 at the end of the month. There is an Environmental Hub in Argyll and Bute

1. Transport updates (JMC):

• Islands Business Resilience Fund: JH and GMG had attended a meeting with representatives from Coll, Mull, Islay and Jura. The result has been a joint letter to the Cabinet Secretary to protest at our islands’ exclusion from the scheme. This had made the front page of the Glasgow Herald
• JMC will be away for two weeks. GMG will stand in for him
• We expect a Deck Space Pilot meeting soon
• The Tiree Transport Forum meeting has been postponed to the end of October. CalMac will attend. There are no minutes from the last meeting
• The winter ferry timetable has been published. One-third of our winter service will be supplied by the LOTI. They will restrict the Clansman’s booking capacity to that of the LOTI for the first two weeks, in case of delays. This is to prevent having to cancel bookings if there is an over-run in the dry docking programme. The bookings will be open from the 11th
• He had been asked to delay flight on 13/9 to allow more buyers to attend the livestock sale. This had come in very late. Loganair was happy to make the change, but the problem was the additional cost of keeping the airport open. Tiree Rural Development was looking into this
• There will be an upgrade to the ‘infrastructure at the Oban 1 linkspan and adjacent slipway to support the requirements for new vessels being proposed for routes from this berth’. A consultation will be open until Feb 2026. It is likely that this will cause some disruption during the build time, which is anticipated to be 48 weeks
• The start of the works on the new terminal building at the pier has been delayed to ‘early next year’, meaning there may be disruption over Easter

1. Future Tiree veterinary arrangements: the Trust and others have put in a lot of work on this. Animal Care Tiree, a group of farmers and crofters, has been set up to progress things for large animals. They have arranged a visit from Clyde Vets 22/9. All small animal care involves a trip to Oban. Coll was also affected. GMG will send KMF the details he has
2. Tiree Library:  Paul Ashworth had written: ‘I can confirm that LiveArgyll has been in discussion with Argyll and Bute Council, and the proposed closure of Tiree Library will not be proceeding at this time.’ Jim Lynch had written: ‘In terms of timescales – the council is due to set its budget on 25^th February next year and the budget development process will start over the winter months.’ In other words, the library was effectively closed until next year. The work to reconfigure part of the school for a library had not started. We agreed to write to our ward councillors to ask that the money that had been saved by the temporary closure of the library should be released by ABC to enable the library to re-open now.
3. Changes to Argyll and Bute Council Service Point at Crossapol: this is now temporarily closed. Rona Campbell has been seconded to a new role in the Council, but is still the registrar and will issue blue badges. Everything else is online now. We agreed to write to Rona to thank her for her work in the CSP.
4. A&BC budget: an FOI has been not been submitted, to some extent because other organisations have already put in targeted FOIs which should take priority.
5. R100: an extra stage has been added. This includes Caolas, Salum, Ruaig and Baugh. The next phase is Gigabit, which will fill in the gaps left by R100. A few properties will not get fibre because of technical problems like rock or distance. Some business properties are having to take up a commercial package with their new providers. This more expensive. Two properties have been charged for connections. If this happens, contact Stephen Chambers at Openreach.. People can contact GMG if they are having problems. The public phone box in Baugh will be kept operational in some way when the island stops using copper in a couple of years.
6. Planning: we had no comments on the following:

• House in Ruaig
• Boathouse in Ruaig
• Three holiday units in Heylipol

All these applications had received a comment from Scottish Water about a lack of guarantee of a water supply. If this continues to be an issue, we are likely to prioritise our lobbying efforts on island residents’ buildings and businesses.

1. AOCB: there was none.
2. Date of next meeting: 15th October 2025.

Dr John Holliday, 11 September 2025