ONE of the UK’s most senior politicians has confirmed he will look into the environmental and financial fall-out of East Ayrshire’s opencast restoration debacle.

Matthew Hancock MP, Minister of State for Business, Enterprise and Energy at the Department of Energy and Climate Change, was contacted by local MP Sandra Osborne over the onging issue.

And Mr Hancock - who was appointed to his new position in David Cameron’s Cabinet reshuffle last month - says he will explore avenues to try and assist.

Speaking last week, he said: “I have been made aware of some of the challenges East Ayrshire and certain other Scottish Councils are facing as a result of the events last year in the opencast sector in Scotland and understand that much good work has already been done, particularly in terms of resurrecting and sustaining operations at viable sites and creating ongoing employment opportunities as a result.

“I appreciate also, however, that there are particular challenges around the environmental implications of unrestored sites, and that proposals were put to my predecessor by Ministers from the Scottish Government asking for a financial contribution towards the likely costs of those.

“A number of factors affecting the coal industry more broadly have impinged on the process of giving full consideration to those proposals. I fully appreciate that there are issues of significant concern for local communities at play here and I am, therefore, happy to continue to explore whether there might be any scope to assist.

“I have asked my officials to brief me further on the details of this matter and will revert to you and other relevant colleagues when I have formed a firmer view.” Mr Hancock was responding to a letter sent by local MP Sandra Osborne who has continually called for central assistance to help dealing with the missing million to restore former sites. After hearing the response from the Cabinet minister, she told the Chronicle: “I am obviously disappointing that there is no firm commitment so far but he is a new Minister so I suppose it is fair enough that he wants to take time to look into it.

“I remain hopeful that they will come up with something and I will continue to press both the Westminster and Scottish Governments as I have been doing from the start.”