News / Final effort to save free music tuition
COUNCILLORS in Shetland will be left in no doubt about what the isles’ young musicians think of plans to charge for music tuition when they hand in three petitions at Lerwick Town Hall on Wednesday morning.
The group is likely to be led by local fiddler Maggie Adamson and Shetland’s most famous musical son Aly Bain.
The isles’ many talented musicians were horrified when Shetland Islands Council decided in February they could no longer afford its widely-admired free musical education for all pupils.
An attempt by SIC culture spokesman Rick Nickerson to halt the move failed narrowly by 11 to nine votes.
Now a Facebook group with around 3,200 members, an online petition with more than 1,400 signatures and a paper petition, said to have more than 1,200 signatures, will be handed over to SIC services committee chairman Gussie Angus.
The committee meets on Thursday when councillor Nickerson will ask for a review of music tuition in the hope savings can be made without the need to introduce charges.
Campaigners have argued that the council’s schools services claim that bringing in charges would save £130,000 a year was unrealistic.
They also believe the move will undermine the council’s ambition to build on the success of the isles’ creative industries, a sector with huge growth potential according to the SIC’s own economic development unit.
Mr Nickerson said that according to his own calculations it was more likely that the move would save between £45,000 and £60,000.
Pupils who receive free school meals and those who are doing higher musical education would not have to pay the £160 annual charge. Pupils would also get a free trial period.
“I will be asking for a full review of the way music tuition is delivered to prevent irreparable damage to the music service,” Mr Nickerson said.
The petitions will be handed in on the same day Aly Bain, Phil Cunningham, Catriona Macdonald and many others celebrate the music of the late Dr Tom Anderson MBE in a tribute concert in the Clickimin Leisure Complex to mark the 100th year since his birth.
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