A Bus for Rosy Pt1

A couple of years back I had an operation to remove a large birthmark from my leg, after outpatient treatment at Aberdeen hospital, I had to go to my local doctors practice in Fochabers to have the dressings changed.
The day arrived when I had the good news that I would never would have to go back for fresh dressings.
As i was leaving the Practice i saw a gentleman sitting outside the nurses station, looking really fed up. I asked him what was the problem, he said he was fed up with coming to the practice 3 times a week to have his leg ulcers dressed, I asked him where did he live he said Garmouth a small village about 4 miles from Fochabers, he said that the problem was he had to catch a bus from Garmouth that run only three times a dayn to Lhanbryde that was 5 miles in the oposite direction, in Lhanbryde he had to connect with the bus to Fochabers, sometimes the appointment with the nurse did not coincide with the bust connection, sometime his appointment was two hours after the connecting bus from Garmouth. Then he has to make sure he got the connection for the last bus back to Garmouth. I asked him what time was the last bus he said 5 oclock at Lhanbryde and if he missed the connection he would have to find someone to take him home or get a very expensive taxi ride home.
I asked him why did the district nurse did not go to see him, his replied the Practice thoughtit would be cheaper if he came to the practice.
i was concerned about the elderly gentleman, and started wondering how many elderly poeple in Garmouth suffered the same journey to Fochabers.
As I am Chairman of my local Community Forum i raised it at our next forum meeting, it was agreed that I should attend the next meeting of the Amenities commitee which I did, I told the story about the elderly gentleman, and everyone knew of him and others like him, what the villagers would like would be a doctor to visit the village and hold consultations there.
they told me this was the practice until a few years ago then suddenly stopped.
a few days later I approached the doctors about setting up a practice once a week in Garmouth, the doctor advised me the practice was looking at this but to get the funding they would have to have another half of doctor, I left it at that.

At the next forum meeting I raised the issue again and reported back what I was told. We discussed at length what would be the best way forward and decided on a Community Transport reveiw and maybe set up a seminar and a workshop with the community of Garmouth and outlying villages to engage with the Transport providers to see what could be done.

Milnes Area Forum is part of a Moray Community Council wide area Forum network and to hold the forums together we have the Moray Forum that represents the Forums within the Community Engagement Group. Every month we the Forums meet up and discuss problems affecting us and decide together the way forward as a unit.

After a general discussion the Moray Forum said the would like to run the project with us, we would set up a steering group invite interested parties from several vulunteer bodies use their expertise and start planning a Moray wide Transport Seminar and Workshop for all the elderly of Moray the support was tremendous.
Five of us from the Moray Forum formed the backbone of the steering group at the first meeting we had 15 sitting around the table tossing around ideas on how the seminar would be run who would be the speakers etc,
The Steering Group met about 6 times, we got funding from the Scottish Goverment and the Moray Council transport manager promised us cheap rates for transporting poeple from all over Moray to the Seminar which was going to be hald at Lhanbryde.
We discussed writing up a report to be presented to the Moray Council with our findings and rechomendations.
The great day arrived September the 24th 2011 arrived the Seminar was going to run from 11am to about 3pm. As we waited not knowing how many people would turn up we had promised and expected about fifty. We had Councilors there MSPs we had top people from the Volunteer section attending, but all we wanted was the most important poeple the elderly from the villages and hamlets of Moray we waited in antisipation.