Disruption to the disposal of sofas and soft furnishings … and Reform’s big fan boob

Dumbarton Notebook by Bill Heaney

Three chairs for the Council — and a couple of sofas thrown in, or more likely thrown out along with an odd mattress perhaps! Read the following and weep. The “give me ten good reasons why nothing can be done” club continues to flourish here.

One of the most astonishing revelations for me from the parliamentrary election was that two lame duck councillors in West Dunbartonshire were part of the Scottish Labour team backing Dame Jackie Baillie’s campaign to retain the Dumbarton seat in the Scottish Parliament.

Really? How Jackie worked that one out, I have no idea. Lame ducks are lame ducks by any other name. Mercifully for Jackie it all worked out in the end for her.

Martin Rooney, whom the seven times winner of the Dumbarton constituency seat chose to be her election agent, hasn’t actually got any form for winning anything. Closing things though, such as Balloch Library, Martin and his sidekick David McBride excel at.

As for Michelle McGinty. She was the councillor well to the fore some years ago, along with education director Terry Lanagan, who came up with the idea to relocate Our Lady and St Patrick’s Secondary school down by the wet and windy riverside at Posties Park.

Thankfully the public didn’t agree with their non sensical plan, but Michelle wouldn’t take No for an answer.

And, in the end, Councillor McGinty and her Labour colleagues subsituted an equally poor alternative proposal and gave planning permission for the new school to be located at the top of Bellsmyre.

To the great dismay of most of the parents and pupils, especially those in the deprived West End, where record absentee statistics are being recorded for pupils from Castlehill, Brucehill and Westcliff.

It mattered not to Michelle and Martin though since their eyes lit up when they heard the price the council was getting for the old school, which was already falling into disrepair on the Cunningham Graham monument park on Cardross Road. That tranche of money would fill in another bit of their budget black hole.

Houses, houses, houses. The vision of our councillors doesn’t seem to stretch beyond that. And it’s not social housing.

Maybe it’s high time Jackie Baillie and the decimated Labour constituency party started thinking amenities, amenities, amenities and town centres for Dumbarton and the Vale that reflect the once proud history of this area instead of being left to degenerate into a neglected dump.

No wonder Jackie Baillie was in tears and filled with anxiety the day before the election. She must have known that if she had to depend for her re-election on Labour’s record at council level she was stuffed.

Her Labour council colleagues have steadfastly refused to take any responsibility for the state we are in here and keep trying to pass the hospital parcel of mismanagement and neglect to the SNP opposition, who are naturally relutant to take it up.

Although the SNP too, especially in the time of Jonathan McColl’s council leadership, have a sin to answer for. Yes, that’s you, Jonathan.

Which takes us back to the disruption to the disposal of sofas and soft furnishings, which is to become yet another area of public service the long suffering, ten per cent council tax hike paying public will have to do without in DIY Dunbartonshire.

The council have sent out a circular to residents, which says: “Unfortunately, our contractor responsible for disposing of sofas and other soft furnishings is experiencing issues with their machinery, meaning they can’t currently accept this type of waste.

“While we hoped this would be resolved quickly, we’ve been advised that there is no timescale for when the service will resume.”

Responses from the public to this strange proposal have been along the lines of “We’ll soon have a sofa on every street corner here.”

The council circular adds: “As a result, until further notice:

• Our two recycling centres will not be accepting this type of waste

• We are suspending all special uplifts, including any new requests.

• Residents awaiting a special uplift for this type of waste can request a refund; the collection will be paused until this issue is resolved.

“We’re sorry for the inconvenience this may cause and will provide updates as soon as we have more information. Thank you for your understanding.”

It’s a big presumption to make that the residents here are “understanding”.

Personally, I neither understand nor sympathise, and most of the people I meet in the street and the supermarket don’t either.

They would appreciate some fresh ideas and input from young members of the community who, having missed the opportunity to capitalise on the fact that the voting age has been reduced to 16, will make their voices heard and votes count come the next local government elections.

The votes for Labour at last week’s Scottish Parliament election amounted to no more than the death rattle for a once great political party that put people first.

It is said that if you always do what you always did, then you will always get what you always got. The world has changed, and certainly not for the better.

Bringing in Yesterday’s Men, such as Gordon Brown, and clinging on to the likes of that other lame duck, Keir Starmer, won’t cut it.

It will not deliver solid government for Labour unless young people in this region take responsibility and rally round the flag.

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Reform UK’s media relations are abysmal. When I tried to get some info on a candidate called Andy White who was standing for them in Clydebank, I drew a blank.

I was attempting to establish whether their Reform candidate was the same Andy White who was once the Labour leader of West Dunbartonshire Council.

And if it was, would this mean that he would be standing against his sister, Marie McNair, the former West Dunbartonshire councillor, who was campaigning to retain her seat for the SNP in Clydebank?

The spin doctor, who was on the phone to invite me to a Reform UK rally in the plush environs of a country club near Bishopton, told me I was special.

That they weren’t inviting local media journalists, only scribes from the nationals. I was to be an exception to that naive rule.

I pressed her for the information – that is what journalists do – about the would-be Andy White MSP, and it was at this point she hung up the telephone.

That takes us to this afternoon, when I tried to get to the bottom of the White story and ended up with the lowdown on boobs.

Former West Dunbartonshire Labour leader Andy White (right in the picture) was canvassing for his sister Marie (centre) to retain the Clydebank seat for the SNP.

Scrolling through items which had arrived over the holiday weekend, I found this in a relatively new news and features platform called The Bell.

It said: “OnlyFans model — who boasts about her ‘big, blue, glow in the dark stap-on named King Billy” — has some fairly spicy views, having posted on Friday (excuse the language): “Glasgow Southside and Edinburgh Central, I hope you enjoy your immigrant detention centres! Fxxxxxx cxxts” — a reference to a Reform campaign promise to build removal centres solely in Green-voting constituencies. Linton had strong words for the people of Edinburgh for having elected Lorna Slater too, describing the city as “full of retards”. Linton is something of an official Rangers mascot, known to some for her “half-time tits”. It’s not all in poor taste; in 2021, Linton opted not to bear all out of respect for footballing legend Walter Smith. ‘Sorry if anyone is disappointed, but it doesn’t feel right today,’ she told her followers. “

Rangers must be dismayed by this and also by the outcome of that other big event of the weekend, which we won’t go into here. Journalists are not supposed to intrude into private grief.

One comment

Jim Bollan says:

May 11, 2026 at 1:52 pm

Bill,
Dianne Abbot Labour MP was right when she effectively said the day after the recent elections, changing the Labour Leader will make no difference, what is needed is a radical change in policies.
Starmers right wing Labour Party and their refusal to implement a redistribution of wealth towards the working class has paved the way for the racist Reform Party to gain a foothold in UK politics.

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