News from Linlithgow Business Association

Enterprise minister shows Linlithgow the future road and sets the burgh fair for the journey. LBA correspondent Simon Walton was there to wave them off.

It seems like it's been twenty years in the planning, but when Enterprise Minister Jim Mather stood up to address his audience, all that planning was made worthwhile. Nearly seventy delegates took part in the first ever general meeting of all the Royal Burgh's civic, council and voluntary bodies - to lay out their visions for Linlithgow for the next twenty years.

Hosted at impressive conference facility at Sun Microsystems Scottish Campus in Springfield, and organised jointly by the LBA and West Lothian Council, Jim Mather delivered his participatory address - and invited the community to take the next steps in bringing forward the many enthusiastic and imaginative plans for Linlithgow.

With collaboration a recurring theme, it was fitting that guests were invited from neighbouring communities - including South Queensferry, Bo'ness, Bathgate and Falkirk. For the first time, many bodies - who are encouragingly active in the town - were able to meet in open forum, and express their challenges, desires and proposed solutions.

Across Scotland, groups as diverse as local councils to national tourism organisations have already begun the processes mapped out by the Enterprise Minister. Drawing on the experience of hosting several dozen similar events, Jim Mather quickly established a rapport with the delegates, and steered the conversation onto strategic aims. "Leave your single issues at the door", was the initial instruction. The room responded favourably, offering up a three-hour catalogue of proposals, actions and solutions - all carefully scribed by Jim Mather - who joked that delegates would receive a spell checked version in due course. "Make no mistake", said the minister, "standing still is not enough to take this or any other community forward in these decades of change".

Drawing on the national visions of development and an arc of prosperity across the nations of northern Europe, Jim Mather made relevant examples of how Linlithgow can play a full part in the future of Scotland, and bring lasting prosperity to the burgh.

Nest steps though are down the community at large. As David Tait said in this vote of thanks, "The future benefit of this meeting is not in an abiding memory of a morning well spent, but in the action we now take up in united effort to make all these diverse ambitions a single, unified and welcome reality. Linlithgow's greatest strength is its diverse and willing collection of civic-minded bodies, now is our chance to work together and realise the great potential of Linlithgow's next twenty years".