AGENDA

APRIL PUBLIC MEETING OF TIREE COMMUNITY COUNCIL

7 pm 15 April 2026

Online and streamed on the Tiree Community Council Facebook page

Zoom link:

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/88972623657?pwd=tIInHSAxYzed5dZbyLEiQOKAVWIhIR.1

Meeting ID: 889 7262 3657

Passcode: jrHrb1

1. Welcome
2. Apologies
3. Current election period
4. Declarations of interest
5. Minutes of last meeting
6. Matters arising (not covered later)
7. Correspondence: including Planet Youth
8. Meeting report: including Climate Action Group meeting
9. Transport update: including the lack of a community bus
10. Tiree library re-instatement
11. Tiree dental service
12. Consultation on Local Development Plan 3
13. Mortuary
14. Broadband and R100
15. Telephone boxes
16. Recent planning applications
17. AOCB
18. Date and format of next meeting

Good news, the LOTI has been fixed. The less good news this has delayed Tiree getting the Clansman back. We do not know till when.

The full announcement is below. Bits that are of interest to Tiree:
“MV Isle of Mull will continue to operate on this route, as MV Clansman is required on the Little Minch and cannot yet be released back to Argyll.”

“We may swap MV Isle of Mull and MV Lord of the Isles on Thursday to allow gas to travel. ”

“With MV Lord of the Isles unexpected but welcome availability, we’ve urgently reviewed services across the network through to Thursday 9 April inclusive. Due to forecasted weather and berth availability, Lord of the Isles could reach in time, she’s not departing the Clyde until Monday. Therefore, any changes do not take effect until Tuesday.

MV Isle of Mull will continue to operate on this route, as MV Clansman is required on the Little Minch and cannot yet be released back to Argyll. Colonsay services delivered by Islay vessels will continue as timetabled. We may swap MV Isle of Mull and MV Lord of the Isles on Thursday to allow gas to travel. This will be confirmed along with plans for Thursday 9 April onwards early next week. Some sailings may be locked as traffic is moved, but we’re working to complete this and unlock them as soon as we can.

I know that your islands continue to be served by vessels that are not ideal for the run and apologise for the ongoing disruption and uncertainty this causes.

Finally, Storm Dave does pose a risk over the weekend, and our website and app will have the latest service information.

Here is a route-by-route view of deployment until Thursday 9 April
“

Update from Calmac. The bits Tiree is interested in:

“We are working on a plan that would allow us to improve services on the Outer Hebrides, Coll, Tiree and Colonsay from the middle of next week.  “

“Redeploy MV Clansman to Oban-Coll/Tiree/Colonsay, which she is much better suited to than the currently deployed MV Isle of Mull “

The message in full:

“We are working on a plan that would allow us to improve services on the Outer Hebrides, Coll, Tiree and Colonsay from the middle of next week.

Until then, our plan for Easter weekend is:

·       MV Glen Sannox will, subject to successful trials, return to service on Troon-Brodick on the afternoon of Thursday 2 April

·       MV Isle of Islay will remain on Kennacraig-Port Askaig 

·       Current deployment plans will remain unchanged 

 

We do not expect to be able to move vessels sooner due to the weather. From Tuesday, should weather improve, we intend to send MV Glen Sannox to Oban-Castlebay to carry out berthing trials and, subject to these being successful, putting her in service for Barra. We will also redeploy MV Isle of Islay to the Uig-Tarbert/Lochmaddy route. 

This will allow us to:

·       End the Uig-Tarbert/Lochmaddy/Castlebay shared service and restore services on Barra and the Little Minch to what they were planned to be

·       Redeploy MV Clansman to Oban-Coll/Tiree/Colonsay, which she is much better suited to than the currently deployed MV Isle of Mull 

·       Redeploy MV Isle of Mull to Oban-Craignure and enhance services on that route

It does mean that Islay will be a single-vessel service with MV Finlaggan, and Arran will be a single-vessel service with MV Caledonian Isles until MV Alfred returns from overhaul to operate Troon-Brodick. 

It also assumes MV Isle of Arran and MV Lord of the Isles, our two major vessels currently off with technical issues, remain unavailable. 

This deployment plan would remain under review, and would be in place until MV Hebrides returns to service from planned annual maintenance, which is scheduled for Wednesday 15 April

We’re working today to confirm details of this potential deployment plan and will share full, detailed information tomorrow. “

MINUTES

MARCH MEETING OF TIREE COMMUNITY COUNCIL

7 pm 11 March 2026

Online meeting using Zoom and streamed on the Tiree Community Council Facebook page

1. Present: Gerard McGoogan (chair), Dr John Holliday, John MacCaskill, Frances Khetrat and Tim Arkless. Cllr Kirsty MacFarlane (Coll CC); Cllr Andrew Kain (Argyll and Bute Council: ABC).
2. Welcome: the meeting was recorded. Recordings are deleted after the minutes are approved. Due to the upcoming elections, this meeting needs to be non-party-political.
3. Apologies: Cllr Willie Hume.
4. Declarations of interest: GMG and JH declared an interest in item 12 due to their directorships of Solar.
5. Minutes of last meeting: these were approved without change as a true record. Proposed JMC, seconded TA.
6. Matters arising: GMG still aims to ask about the numbers of successful Tiree applicants for the Business Resilience Fund. Figures should be available in a couple of weeks. ABC has allocated an additional £20k to fund community councils. It is not yet clear how this sum will be divided up. A number of customers have got £400 compensation (and some up to £600) from their ISPs for the internet outage following Storm Amy. GMG has not yet contacted the Trust about the bike stands and the community garden. He will do this.
7. Correspondence: the Community Led Local Development fund for 2026-2027 is now open for expressions of interest. The fund will be open from 20 February to 2 April.
8. Meeting reports: it has been a busy month. GMG and JH met Olivia Brown, Settlement Project Officer for ABC. She will write a report for council with recommendations for increasing the population of the island. GMG, JH, Phyl Myers and Ann MacDonald met Laura MacDonald, Douglas Hendry and Jim Lynch regarding the upcoming Local Governance Review, examining how a devolution of power might work. JH and GMG met Jenni Minto, MSP; there were no major issues. GMG had met with the Western Isles Climate Hub. GMG had met with the Cross-Party Group on Islands and the Scottish Islands Federation. Since the elections are so close, there are fewer new developments to report on.
9. Transport updates: JMC has been chasing the CalMac Area Manager to find out what is happening on the Tiree run after 14 April. Making advance bookings is therefore very difficult. Stephen is coming to the next TCC (virtually) and Tiree Transport Forum (in person) meetings. He will also provide a briefing on the company’s new policy on the carriage of electric vehicles on the ferry. There is still no information on this summer’s planned in-port maintenance programme in Oban. The new MV Isle of Islay is starting berthing trials, including Tiree. This vessel has a deeper draught. Transport Scotland is holding an engagement meeting on Tiree this coming Monday. We hope for a good attendance. KMF pointed out that Tiree and Coll have a shared service, and the two islands need to continue to work together. The Tiree pier office/marshalling yard project is still out to tender, with no news of when it might start. This month has seen bad weather with many cancellations. KMF also pointed out the number of CalMac weather alerts. These can cause cancelled bookings in the hotels. The minutes of the meeting in January regarding the Oban air service are now out, and we will publish them. JMC stated that our engagement with Loganair has deteriorated. We are still waiting for agreement of banked flights for 2026, and the first event is in early May. The winter second Saturday flight was dropped from the schedule without notifying us. JMC will contact Loganair and Transport Scotland about this. We need confirmation that the scheme to put passengers up when flights are cancelled has been reinstated. There are conflicting signals about this. JH will write to Loganair. The Loganair CEO is visiting Tiree in April. KMF is going to write to Fiona Hyslop to ask for a meeting about the deck space pilot and to explore a possible ‘Samso’ system to give islanders preference in certain circumstances. JMC will also write to support this meeting. The Highlands and Islands Travel Scheme, designed to reimburse patients’ travel costs still has serious problems. JH met one patient recently. JH will look into this matter and approach the Health Board again.
10. Argyll and Bute Council budget, including Tiree Library: AK reported that this year’s ABC budget had protected services as much as possible. Next year’s budget will be tougher, unless the financial situation improves. LiveArgyll has been given an additional £150k by ABC. It has been reported in the press that Islay and Tiree Libraries have been saved, but possibly just for one year. Moving the Tiree library into the school depends on building work. ABC has also given the Tiree food bank (Solar) £6k.                 
11. Broadband and R100: Openreach and Tiree Broadband hope to set up a drop-in session in An Talla in the near future for those who are not yet connected.
12. Telephone boxes: three more islanders have expressed an interest in doing up phone boxes. TA has identified a company that buys old phone boxes. GMG will contact SSEN Transmission to enquire about their disconnection.              
13. Planning: there were no planning applications to consider this month.
14. Argyll and Bute Councillors’ reports: AK had already made all the points he wanted to make.
15. AOCB: there was concern about the cost of heating oil on Tiree. There have been recent price rises due to the war in the Middle East, creating national concern. We have made enquiries, and the cost of heating oil on Tiree has roughly doubled in the last fortnight. The Scottish Islands Federation surveyed island CCs today about this matter. The Tiree Trust has also been in contact with us. Fuel poverty is already a big issue on the island.
16. Date and format of next meeting: the next meeting will be virtual and on Wednesday 15 April, deferred a week because of the school holidays.

Dr John Holliday 13 March 2026

Please note the Deck Space Pilot Scheme on the Oban/Coll/Tiree ferry service has now been expanded out from the original 7 days in advance of a vehicle booking request to 14 days in advance. 

Please find attached the minutes from January’s Airport Consultative meeting.

Airport Consultative Minutes 21st Jan 2026

Community needs assessment Tiree drop-in engagement session

AN TALLA – TIREE COMMUNITY HALL Monday 16th March 2026 15:00-19:00

Please find attached a poster about this planned community engagement events.

Transport Scotland have been looking closely at what data tells us about how services operate, how people use them, as well as the challenges, and we’ve built an initial picture of the transport connectivity issues the community faces.

These drop-in sessions are your chance to:

•         Tell us whether we’ve understood the issues correctly
•         Share your first-hand experiences of using ferry and other transport services
•         Highlight anything we’ve missed
•         Discuss what better connectivity would mean for your community

As these are these are drop-in sessions members of the community can attend at any time, within the allotted slot, and stay for as long or as little a period of time as they wish.

Liz Jack  (Ferries Strategy Programme Manager, Transport Scotland)

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/83388073334?pwd=RWhXo2MMfI3jhJyZgulaA7xbmUfkjl.1

Unfortunately due to unforeseen circumstances we will need to cancel tonight’s meeting as we do not have a quorum. We will try and reschedule for next week.

Apologies