Leader comment: School heating bills

Keeping classrooms at a tolerable temperature so pupils and staff can concentrate has to be one of the minimum requirements in providing a decent education.

So the combination of record-breaking low temperatures and sky-high fuel bills was always going to take a heavy toll on already-stretched school budgets.

That is especially true for the many which have ageing, inefficient heating systems, which they simply can't afford to replace.

This newspaper has long argued for more powers to be handed to headteachers to control their own budgets to meet local needs – and that comes with a responsibility to balance the books.

The city's heads have never shied away from tough decisions like the recent moves to axe learning assistants, and specialist music and sport sessions.

But any sensible system has to be able to react when exceptional circumstances arise – and the recent big freeze was certainly exceptional.

The Scottish Government has already recognised that, by setting up an emergency fund of 15 million to help local authorities patch up their pot-holed roads.

That was a sensible precedent, and the city council must now follow its lead and, despite the clear challenge involved in doing so at this time, it must find the extra money that schools need to keep the heating on without cutting back on other core work.

New trams chair

The appointment of a new chairman to help oversee the troubled trams project has to be a welcome development.

The vacancy was created last November when Dave Mackay quit, calling it "hell on wheels".

Vic Emery will need to be thick-skinned and show great leadership – two qualities often missing at TIE so far – if he is to make a success where others have failed.

His CV shows promise, not least being labelled "the man who oversaw the rebirth of shipbuilding on the Clyde" during his time as managing director of BAE Systems Surface Fleet Solutions.

He has also been unafraid of other tough jobs, such as leading the sometimes controversial merger of Glasgow's central colleges, and as convener of the Scottish Police Services Authority.

But even those jobs will be cakewalks compared with the over-budget and past-deadline trams. Emery better be ready to spend more than the two to three days a week advertised for his 55,000-a-year post.