Community groups have hit back at elected officials and put the blame at their feet over a court decision that halted the building of a new Barrhead school.

Friends of the Cowan Park chairman Alan Kirkwood has asked for clarification on who elected officials are referring too when referencing community groups and SNP activists in an article published in last week’s Barrhead News.

It was also brought to light this week that at least four sites had been considered for the building of the new school, including the red ash area in the South-West of the Cowan Park.

Mr Kirkwood submitted his comments to the Barrhead News this week as the blame-game continues to heat up.

He said: “The relevant local Councillors were trying to deflect from their responsibilities by seeking to blame others. To our knowledge no objections to the school building were sent by anyone in the Town to the Court of Session, however these local Councillors are trying to mislead the public about what happened. “They have been party to creating a smear campaign blaming other people as though they caused “permission not to be granted by the Court of Session”, which is completely untrue.” East Renfrewshire Council petitioned the Court of Session in Edinburgh for a ruling on the land in the Cowan Park where the bandstand sits currently.

It had been argued by members of the community that the local authority had no right to build on the land as it was common good land and not in the possession of the council.

Council bosses hoped the court ruling would put the matter to bed for good, however Lord Tyne stated that the court did not have the powers to allow the authority to “dispose” of the common good land, which would have allowed the building of the new school.

Now council officers have been accused of failing in due diligence, and failing to complete basic checks over the ownership of the land.

Mr Kirkwood continued: “This is a smoke-screen and a diversionary tactic — they did not do the basic checks!

“These locally elected Councillors who are “mouthing off” should have made better use of their time by asking questions of Council Officers instead. “Council officers described their case (i.e. petition to the Court of Session) as being “sound”. “It was far from “sound” and now the Court has made its decision these Councillors, who are “mouthing off”, should be knocking down the doors in the corridors of power; asking questions about why it went so wrong, instead of lashing out at citizens in the Town in a desperate attempt to find a scapegoat. “Quite frankly the people of Barrhead deserve better service than this.” “These fundamental mistakes have caused unnecessary significant delay to the building of the new school, and, subject to the benevolence of the funders (SFT), could yet jeopardise the school building project completely.” Mr Kirkwood also said that the Friends of the Cowan Park group had submitted a response to the court of session in support of the new school.

However Councillor Danny Devlin this week hit back at, saying the views of the communtiy group were not inline with the views of the wider Barrhead Community.

He said: “The site in the park chosen by ERC has been technically assessed as the most suitable for a school. It is the obvious logical site for the school.

“The site has the overwhelming support of the school community (staff parents and pupils) and it seems to be consistently ignored by people who oppose the plans that the new school has a smaller footprint than the original thus allowing the old larger site to be restored to parkland for the use of local people.

“The site chosen would not disrupt other elements of the park such as football pitches and cricket wicket and the youngsters in the school would still have full use of their existing facilities.

“The council was forced to go to court after the Potobello judgement to ensure clear title and secure the funding from the Scottish Futures Trust.

“The views of FofCP are clearly not representative of the views of the wider Barrhead community and their actions are working against the interests of Barrhead as a town and in paticular are working against the pupils of Barrhead High who need and deserve a new school.” East Renfrewshire Council responded to the Friends of the Cowan Park’s latest comments, saying: “Most local people share the council’s desire to achieve the very best outcome for Cowan Park and the quick delivery of a new Barrhead High School that is befitting of young people in Barrhead.

“The council has already stated it remains undeterred and united in this aim. FoCP seem unable to grasp the complexity of the law surrounding common good and this would appear to be influencing their desire to apportion blame. This is neither helpful or justified.” They also stated that they could not build on the red ash area because the area was listed as a flood risk area by the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA).