THE Coalfield Communities Federation hopes history will repeat itself when they stage a series of road shows across East Ayrshire over the next four months. The Federation was launched 15 years ago to act as a voice for small isolated mining communities many of whom were suffering similar problems but trying to sort them out on their own.

They arranged a series of road shows and very quickly identified the lack of public transport as a key issue, which they tackled by launching Coalfield Community Transport with backing from the CRT.

Now the transport charity, based at Thistle Business Park in Cumnock operates a fleet of 15 buses, including five on contract from East Ayrshire Council, has 13 employees and clocked up 150,000 miles last year carrying 38,000 passengers from the local community.

Ian Smith, Chairman of the Coalfield Communities Federation, said: “We plan to stage a public meeting in most of the community halls in the area between now and the end of October.

“East Ayrshire has gone through some really hard times on the jobs front recently while spending cuts are making life particularly tough for those on benefits.

“We believe there a lot of local issues where we could make a difference, and we hope these meetings, many of which will feature prominent local speakers will give people the chance to air their problems. “It would be great if history repeated itself, and we come up with something that has as much impact as the community transport initiative, but we will be satisfied to help local people with local issues”.

Among the Federation’s recent lobbying successes was persuading NHS Ayrshire and Arran to invest £1.5m in boosting local dental services, when plans to for a dental unit at the local hospital fell through, and it looked as though the money would be spent elsewhere.

The Federation’s meeting schedule for local community centres is: July 17, Patna, July 31 Dalmellington, August 7 Drongan, August 28 Muirkirk IFE Wing, September 4, Auchinleck, September 17 Cumnock, September 25, Lugar, Logan and Cronberry, September 30, Ochiltree, October 9, Mauchline, October 16 Cumnock Town Hall, October 23, Catrine and October 30 Netherthird.