Local Scottish Labour candidate, Carol Mochan was a guest speaker at the Scottish Opencast Coalfields Alliance conference in Glasgow on Saturday 23rd April.
She said
'The theme of the day was 'Opencast restoration: how can we make it happen?' The emphasis was on communities learning from each other and on seeking solutions to the ongoing opencast restoration crisis when the coal industry is in terminal decline and neither UK, Scottish nor local governments have delivered on proper restoration of opencast mines.'
Other speakers included Professor Russel Griggs, Chair of the Scottish Mines Restoration Trust and representatives of Hargreaves Services and East Ayrshire Council. A panel of candidates from all the main parties offered their views and answered questions. The afternoon sessions looked at the local community experience with input from John Young (Patna), Greta Roberts (Mining and Environment Group Ayrshire) and Jerry Mulders (East Ayrshire)
Carol moved a motion at last year's Scottish Labour Party conference in support of restoring the 'orphaned' opencast sites which received unanimous backing. On Saturday she stressed that there is no point in arguing about how we got to this position. She said,
'We need an active Task Force which does more than offer expert advice, useful as this may be. This should be backed up with Scottish Government money to begin the job of renewal. Renewal should provide employment for local people repairing the damaged environment - new investors will not come to the area until it looks attractive and there exists a vision and a plan for the future. There should be ongoing support for affected communities to develop alternative businesses to opencast which has a limited future. The SNP run Scottish Government should be treating this as a national crisis and putting up emergency funding to work in partnership with the local authority to deliver on that vision after consultation with the communities about what should happen.'
She said
'The theme of the day was 'Opencast restoration: how can we make it happen?' The emphasis was on communities learning from each other and on seeking solutions to the ongoing opencast restoration crisis when the coal industry is in terminal decline and neither UK, Scottish nor local governments have delivered on proper restoration of opencast mines.'
Other speakers included Professor Russel Griggs, Chair of the Scottish Mines Restoration Trust and representatives of Hargreaves Services and East Ayrshire Council. A panel of candidates from all the main parties offered their views and answered questions. The afternoon sessions looked at the local community experience with input from John Young (Patna), Greta Roberts (Mining and Environment Group Ayrshire) and Jerry Mulders (East Ayrshire)
Carol moved a motion at last year's Scottish Labour Party conference in support of restoring the 'orphaned' opencast sites which received unanimous backing. On Saturday she stressed that there is no point in arguing about how we got to this position. She said,
'We need an active Task Force which does more than offer expert advice, useful as this may be. This should be backed up with Scottish Government money to begin the job of renewal. Renewal should provide employment for local people repairing the damaged environment - new investors will not come to the area until it looks attractive and there exists a vision and a plan for the future. There should be ongoing support for affected communities to develop alternative businesses to opencast which has a limited future. The SNP run Scottish Government should be treating this as a national crisis and putting up emergency funding to work in partnership with the local authority to deliver on that vision after consultation with the communities about what should happen.'