Tributes after long-serving councillor dies aged 79
Books of condolence have been set up at the council offices in Barrhead Main Street and at Eastwood HQ for members of the public to pay their respects.
Betty was first elected in 1999 and was Provost of East Renfrewshire Council from 2003 to 2007.
She received an OBE from the Queen in the New Year's Honours List of 2011 for services to East Renfrewshire and Malawi. She had first travelled to the African country in 2007 and set up a charity - the Betty Cunningham International Trust - which built a health clinic and nursery schools.
READ MORE:
Council Leader Owen O'Donnell, who signed the book of condolence at the Council's Eastwood HQ, said: "Betty's passing has left me with a great sense of grief and sorrow which will be shared by the wider Labour family, council staff and colleagues, the many lives she touched in Barrhead and East Renfrewshire and much further afield in her beloved Malawi. This all still feels so raw and a time of personal grieving. We will have time in the days and weeks ahead to more fully celebrate her life together.
"Social justice and the sense of what is right and wrong was ingrained in Betty's DNA. She was a ferocious fighter for the people of Barrhead and beyond and would leave then Prime Minister Tony Blair and First Minister Jack McConnell trembling in her wake! She had the biggest heart but was also great fun and someone you wanted to spend time with.
"Betty was no prouder than when she received the Lifetime Legend award at the LGIU awards last year. This was a fitting award and well-deserved tribute to mark her career.
"My thoughts and prayers remain with her family at this time who graciously welcomed me into their home so I could say my final goodbyes in the hours before Betty passed away. Betty will remain an inspiration for us all."
Steven Quinn, Chief Executive of East Renfrewshire Council, said: "As a new chief executive spending time with Betty as she took me around Barrhead (or Borrheid as I was often corrected), it was incredible to witness at first hand her passion and dedication for her community and the work she had done to support so many people. Betty was always thinking of others and took a special interest in helping people who were facing challenges in their lives.
"It was a privilege to get to know and work with Betty. Her death is a massive loss to her community and to East Renfrewshire Council. My thoughts and prayers are with her family, friends and colleagues at this difficult time."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Herald Scotland
3 hours ago
- The Herald Scotland
Trump explains why Egypt was not included in travel ban
In introducing the partial or complete ban on travel from citizens of 19 nations on June 4, Trump cited the Boulder, Colorado, attack that took place at an event raising awareness about Israeli hostages. The suspect in the case, Mohamed Sabry Soliman, is an Egyptian man who entered the U.S. on a tourist visit that he overstayed after applying for asylum, federal officials say. More: Trump's travel ban is his fourth attempt. See how list compares to 2017 Yet, the travel ban that Trump unveiled days later did not include Egypt, raising questions about the timing and purpose of the ban, which the president's critics say unfairly targets African and Muslim-majority nations. Trump requested that the State Department and other national security officials put together a list of countries for potential visa restrictions in an executive order just after taking office. But nothing came of it for months, until the Boulder attack, which he blamed on the previous administration. "We want to keep bad people out of our country. The Biden administration allowed some horrendous people," Trump said in the Oval Office, as he touted his deportation policies. Egypt has acted as a central mediator alongside the United States and Qatar in the conflict between Israel and Hamas, helping to establish a ceasefire and secure the release of prisoners and hostages. The United States had conducted joint training exercises with Egypt since 1980 and considers the Arab nation that has been ruled by Abdel Fattah El-Sisi since 2014 a regional partner. The Egyptian embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
NBC News
9 hours ago
- NBC News
Those from the countries on Trump's travel ban say they're confused and angry about what comes next
Anger and condemnation broke out as families, attorneys and immigrant advocates absorbed the blast from the latest bombshell delivered by the Trump immigration — a travel ban that stops or restricts people from 19 mostly African, Asian and Caribbean countries from entering the U.S. While the Trump administration said the travel ban is meant to keep Americans safe, critics lobbed accusations of discrimination, cruelty, racism, inhumanity and more in response. Meanwhile, the news also elicited confusion over what will happen once the ban goes into effect on Monday. "This travel ban is a racist, bigoted and xenophobic and deeply un-American attack on human rights — it's like persecution. We have fled dictatorship, violence, hunger,' Adelys Ferro, executive director of the Venezuelan American Caucus, told NBC News from Miami, a city with a large population of immigrants from several of the countries on Trump's list. 'This administration clearly has something against immigrants, and it has something against us in particular,' said José Antonio Colina, a former Venezuelan army lieutenant who fled to Miami in 2003 and heads the exile organization Veppex. 'We are double-persecuted. We are persecuted by the tyranny of Nicolás Maduro and we are persecuted by the administration of Donald Trump.' A 38-year-old Haitian green-card holder in Miami who was too fearful to allow her name to be used said she and many others in the community feel 'confused and scared' over the travel ban on Haiti. She said most of her family lives there, including her sister and father, who is sick. 'They come all the time to visit and now I don't know if they will be able to,' she said, adding she heard there were exceptions to the ban but wasn't sure. There are some exceptions, including for people with lawful permanent residency, spouses and children of U.S. citizens, those who are adopted and others. 'But if you are a spouse of a permanent resident, forget about it,' said Doug Rand, former director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services during the Biden administration. It will also impact other relatives, such as adult children and siblings of lawful permanent residents, people who won the diversity lottery or were sponsored by a U.S. employer and are from the listed countries, 'people who have been waiting for years and done it the right way,' he said. In Havana, a queue of people outside the American Embassy learned the news of the travel ban and suspensions as they waited for their visa interviews. 'I had been waiting nine years for this moment,' said one young woman in line, who declined to be identified by name for fear it might affect her visa chances. She and others said the suspension means not being able to visit family or escape dire circumstances in Cuba. 'If they don't grant visas, Cubans will starve, given the situation, they will starve,' said Ismael Gainza, a retired Cuban. 'I see that measure as bad, I see it as bad because the situation is tough and we have to survive.' Trump's proclamation issued Wednesday night bans people from 12 countries from traveling to the U.S. The countries are: Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. In seven more countries, travel to the U.S. was suspended but not banned. They are Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela. Shahzeen Karim, managing attorney at Hafey & Karim law firm, said that although she's in the immigration law space, she holds 'Republican views' on the topic, agreeing there's a need for a stricter immigration policy and more thorough screening. 'I know the White House presented some explanations as to why each of those countries, but I can't help but feel very targeted, being a Muslim immigration attorney,' Karim said. 'The countries are majority Muslim unfortunately.' Challenging the ban could be 'an uphill battle' Immigration advocates said that, unlike Trump's previous travel ban, which caught them off guard, they expected the president would enact a similar policy in his second term. Trump's 2017 ban immediately barred Muslims from entering the country, leaving some stranded at airports or unable to board flights. But like his previous ban, the impact of the current ban taking effect next week will be felt by people trying to bring together families, those who landed a job in the U.S., who had tours or visits planned, who planned to study here or were looking forward to a cultural exchange. It took three tries for Trump, in his previous administration, to come up with a travel ban that the U.S. Supreme Court would accept. Lower courts nixed the first version and the administration kept revising it until the high court accepted its third version in June 2018. Immigration and civil rights groups opposed all three versions. Raha Wala, vice president of strategy and partnerships at the National Immigration Law Center, said that challenging the latest ban 'will be an uphill battle' because the Supreme Court decision is the law of the land. Edward Cuccia, an immigration attorney in New York City, said that blocking the latest ban could be tougher now than in 2017. 'Trump got smarter this time,' he said, explaining that the mix of countries makes it harder to argue that the ban is discriminatory. Also, the implementation won't be as abrupt and the argument that the singled-out nations do not vet the documents of their citizens well may hold up in court, according to Cuccia. Even so, the implications are vast for the people who are affected and are not a security threat, he said. 'What is this going to mean for family unification? There's a lot of countries here!' Cuccia said. 'And then, there are people that maybe had business dealings, people who wanted to do investments here in the United States or come over on temporary work visas, student visas or even just to visit … That seems to be gone out the window.' Wala called the justification for the ban — that visa overstays present a national security threat and the inability to fully vet visa travelers in those countries — a 'fig leaf.' If there is a gap in vetting, 'that's worth taking a look at,' he said, but added that 'all kinds of people overstay their visas — and just because someone overstayed their visa and committed a crime, we just have to get away from this guilt by association concept.' For Wala, the newly announced ban cannot be separated from the president's previous policies and statements. "This ban started as the president saying he was going to have a complete and total shutdown of Muslims in the country. And he also said he wants to ban folks — and pardon my French here — from s---hole countries," Wala said. In Miami, Colina said he was glad the ban would prevent officials of Maduro's regime in Venezuela and their families "who always find a way" to get a visa to enter the country, "but they are a minority, and the partial ban will negatively impact the larger community and it's not fair.'
Daily Mirror
12 hours ago
- Daily Mirror
Mum in horror sewage flood with 'hundreds of condoms' gives chilling warning
When Mary Long-Dhonau's home was overwhelmed by sewage, rats and dried faeces, she vowed no-one else should go through the same hell When Mary Long-Dhonau's home was overwhelmed by sewage in the great floods of 2000, her three-year-old son had just been diagnosed with autism. "He lost his toys, his playroom," Mary, 61, a former professional soprano, says. "I lost boxes of my children's memories, hospital memorabilia, little handprints, the first drawing of Postman Pat. "I had planned on wrapping them all with a big red ribbon and giving it to them when they turned 18. But everything got flooded and dumped into a skip." Her 11-year-old son's bedroom was deluged with drain water. "I had to get the fire service to pump us out." Mary didn't live on an official floodplain. The worst of the flooding had come from a local sewage works swamped as the River Severn overflowed. "Outside my gate, I had more condoms than I have ever seen in my life," Mary says, "We were joking, at least we practice safe sex in Worcester – but it was hundreds and hundreds of them. "It took nine months to put our house back together. I remember walking the streets on cold evenings because my son couldn't tolerate the building noise. It was miserable. It is just tragic having your house annihilated by filthy stenching flood water." 25 years on, with her wellies firmly on, the mother-of-five from Worcester is better known as 'Flood Mary' – after dedicating herself to fighting floods. Mary was awarded an OBE for services to the environment in the Queen's Birthday Honours list in 2009. She has met with thousands of flood victims, teaches communities to prepare and recover from flooding, and even has her own 'Floodmobile' – a house on wheels packed with flood resilience ideas and products. As rain falls across the country following the driest spring in more than 50 years, Mary has an urgent message for government ahead of next Wednesday's Spending Review. "To my absolute horror, I've learned of proposed cuts to the flood defence budget," she says. "I can't begin to describe how deeply worrying this is, not just to me, but to the thousands of people across the country who live with the daily reality of flood risk." A fortnight ago, Mary gave evidence at the Environmental Audit Select Committee at Parliament, where she gave an emotive speech on behalf of flood victims. "I have spoken to more than two thousand flooded and traumatised people – some have been flooded twice in the same year," she says now. "Imagine how you'd feel if your home had been violated by filthy, stinking floodwater, which ruined everything you'd worked so hard for, washing away your treasured memories. "Even once you return, every time it rains, the fear floods back. And now, you're told the government is considering cutting the funding, which could help reduce the risk of it happening again." The Department for Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) says the Labour government is investing record sums on flood defences. "Our sympathies are with all those affected by flooding," a spokesman said. "This government inherited flood defences in their worst condition on record. Through our Plan for Change, we're investing a record £2.65 billion over two years to repair and build more than 1,000 flood defences across the country, protecting tens of thousands of homes and businesses." With five million people in England and Wales living in flood risk areas – and people more likely to have their homes flooded than burgled thanks to the changing climate – Mary says she remains worried. She points to recent concerns about cuts aired by Baroness Brown, a member of the independent Climate Change Committee. When we caught up with the campaigner at a Flood Mary workshop in Leicester, where she was helping flooded residents, she told us what she remembers even more than the rats and dried faeces left behind when the sewage subsided, is that she felt completely alone. "When I got flooded, the only information I got was a leaflet on washing my hands if I came in to contact with flood water. I decided to do something about that." Roy Frisby, 56, tells Mary: "When we got the flood alert at 2am, I ran out and started knocking on all the neighbours' doors to alert them,' says. 'The water came so fast. My living room was like a swimming pool. "My insurance placed me in a hotel from January to December 2024. I moved back home on the 20th December only to then be flooded again on January 6 this year – and I'm back in the hotel again. "My brand-new kitchen that cost £14,500 is destroyed and has been dumped outside the house. My sofa and carpets, everything is gone." Dawn Eato, 67, says Roy was a hero for alerting his neighbours. "We received flood alerts the second time, so we knew it was coming and we moved a lot of stuff upstairs,' she says. 'But we lost electronic items and furniture the first time. I'm retired, and didn't have insurance." Council worker Chinonye Ndukwe, 50, tells Mary: "I live near the river, and we were flooded twice. The water just came in through the doors, it was knee high. It was so bad in 2024, three sofas, a fridge and a cupboard were lost, and my carpets were ruined." Lesley Edwards, 64, is there on behalf of her 85-year-old mother. "My mum has lived in her house for 64 years and 2024 was the first time she was flooded – she had to be rescued,' she says. 'She had recently had new furniture but lost it with her washing machine, white goods and carpets. She is living with me until we get her home repaired." These people's heartbreak is what keeps Mary on the road in her Floodmobile. "I don't want people to go through what I went through," she says. "I want to talk about how to plan for a flood, waterproofing your home, having plastic boxes to put your house contents in if you get flooded. "I say to people, go into your living room and move anything below waist level. You can replace your sofa, or your washing machine with insurance, but you can't replace sentimental things. Get memories out of harm's way." The flooding that destroyed Mary's property in the early winter of 2000 was the worst since 1947. 10,000 homes and businesses were flooded at 700 locations. Since then, climate change, population changes, and loss of green space has added further to flood risk, according to the Environment Agency. "Thanks to climate change, flooding is only going to get worse," Mary says. "Each flood means more damaged homes, broken infrastructure, ruined crops, and spiralling costs of repairs and damages. Entire communities can be left behind economically as they struggle to recover. "The very idea of cutting the flood defence budget is preposterous. To follow through with it would be not only reckless but heartless." And with that Mary is off in her Floodmobile to the next place to teach more people about how to keep safe and recover from flooding. "People call me a one-woman army," she says.
