E-petition to promote Scotland’s Burns heritage
An e-petition was launched today on the Scottish Parliament’s website to urge the Executive to act to save priceless artefacts relating to the Scottish poet Robert Burns.
Burns is Scotland’s national bard. Taught in all schools, there is also Burns Night every year – where guests eat a traditional Scottish meal of neaps, tatties and haggis and celebrate the work of Burns.
Alloway & Doonfoot community council – in whose district Burns lived – are behind the petition.
Chairman of the council, Peter Watson, is calling on the Executive to place Burns and his legacy “at the heart of its culture and tourism policies”. He called on the Executive to “assume responsibility for bringing together all interested parties to ensure the flagship assets of our Burns heritage are properly restored and developed in good time for the major events planned for the 2009 homecoming year, marking the 250th anniversary of the birth of the national bard.”
Their campaign has gained the backing of SNP MSP for the South of Scotland, Adam Ingram.
Speaking today, Mr Ingram said: “The current state of Burns cottage and museum at Alloway is a national disgrace. The failure to realise the potential of our Burns heritage in both cultural and economic terms is a massive source of frustration to the local community and indeed to the country at large.
“Given that the Scottish Executive announced over three years ago that development of the Burns icon would be central to its efforts to promote heritage tourism we are entitled to demand that the gap between reality and rhetoric should be closed as a matter of urgency.
“The last thing we need to see is fragmentation of the Burns National Heritage Park. The time is ripe for control and management of the Park to be passed to a body like the National Trust for Scotland and for investment plans to be underwritten by the Executive itself.”
The petition can be viewed here
