It’s been a fantastic summer but, with our schools now back and council getting up to pace after recess, it’s full steam ahead again.

Over the quieter period, I’ve had more opportunities to get out and about in the area and meet lots of local groups carrying out fantastic work.
This was highlighted at the Auchenback Active Family Fun Day event, which is run entirely by volunteers and was a great occasion that I was delighted to be part of.

Well done to everyone involved in putting in so much hard work to make events like this take place, to the benefit of the whole community. The strength of our communities is just one of the factors that make East Renfrewshire such a popular place to live.

And with initiatives such as the I Am Me Keep Safe campaign now being rolled out across the area, it will only help to strengthen the community spirit further.

It’s also extremely pleasing that UNICEF has awarded East Renfrewshire Health and Social Care Partnership’s health visiting service the gold award for their work with the Baby Friendly initiative. This scheme provides support to mothers for breastfeeding and also focuses on parent-infant relationships to ensure babies get the best start in life.
I would also like to congratulate everyone at Giffnock Primary and Nursery Class for the excellent inspection report which has been recently received.

The school was praised for the positive ethos which is apparent across all stages. This report also reinforces the excellent work which we know takes place across all our schools.

We are committed to getting it right for every child and our model of sharing best practice across our schools ensures this excellent work, as has been highlighted at Giffnock, is shared across the area. It is not just locally that we are striving to share best practice and collaborate more closely.

The work of the Glasgow City Region City Deal is helping to bring eight local authorities across the region closer together.

As part of this work, I was delighted to attend last week’s Glasgow City Region Strategic Infrastructure Summit, which aims to strategically align projects to deliver enhanced benefits to residents across the region as part of the £1.13billion City Deal investment. By bringing together key utility providers, it allows us to better understand the investment plans and constraints facing our providers of telecommunications, water, power, gas and transportation.

This, in turn, gives all parties involved the opportunity to work together to maximise investment plans and deliver enhanced services to residents.
It’s exciting to be part of this ambitious project.

I look forward to this work continuing to push forward and seeing all the benefits that it will bring to East Renfrewshire and the wider area.