RESIDENTS in Peebles are being invited to have their say on the small play parks they would like to see retained in the town following controversial plans to scrap them.

Proposals to axe 11 playparks across Tweeddale to help pay for a new £225,000 facility in Victoria Park caused upset among families last year.

Opposition councillors slammed the ruling administration for stating ‘we’re not closing playparks, we’re just removing the equipment’.

They also stated that they had not been given any information about the costs of maintaining the parks that were facing the axe.

Local councillors are now to be given a say on the future of small play parks in each locality.

Tweeddale councillor Robin Tatler said: “Council officers are now is discussion with local councillors to decide which parks will be closed.

"So we need to decide which ones we’d like to keep and which ones we like to get rid of.”

Peebles Community Council commissioned a survey regarding the Council’s proposals - attracting feedback from 300 members of the community.

Councillor Tatler asked which play parks residents were in favour of keeping.

But community councillor Lawrie Hayworth, said the question of retaining small play parks was not an option tabled at the time of carrying out the survey.

He said: “What people were saying in principle is they love the idea of a big park and even in Victoria Park, but what they were less keen on, in fact they said ‘we will do without the big park if we have to give up our little parks’, because they serve a very different function.

"This was the feedback we received.”

To which Councillor Tatler replied: “So what you’re saying is you want to keep all of them, regardless of their condition?”

Councillor Shona Haslam interjected, asking: “Even the horrible one at Haylodge Park?”

Mr Hayworth said: “There wasn’t at that time an expression of an opportunity to have a halfway house and therefore go back to the public and say those are the playparks that are likely to continue to be supported by the council, but those are the ones that officers believe should not be continued to be operated and maintained.”

Elected members agreed they would have a discussion and report back to the community council regarding the small play parks they think should be retained.