Glasgow couple honoured for 40 years of service to community
The city's Lord Provost Jacqueline McLaren, the Lord Lieutenant, said Anne and Stuart McKenzie had made 'such an incredible difference to the lives of so many whilst remaining humble, passionate, inspirational and compassionate.'
Anne and Stuart were awarded the BEM in the King's New Year's Honours List for 'four decades of selfless service and commitment to improve the lives and life chances of generations of Glaswegians.'
The couple are part of the Nan McKay Hall management committee, and have run an assortment of activities and events over the years, while both working full-time and raising a family.
Stuart and Anne McKenzie (Image: Newsquest)
At the time of the announcement, Anne told the Glasgow Times she was 'in shock' but added: 'This is a huge honour. I'd do anything for the people of Pollokshields, I'd fight for them, and I have fought for them - for funding, for support, whatever they need.'
The couple, who have two sons, Greig and Mark, and three grandchildren – Caitlyn, 25, Oliver 20, and Elliot, 17 - helped to ensure the centre remained open during the pandemic.
Over the years have run everything from dances and daily lunch clubs to youth clubs and health and wellbeing services.
Anne trained as a personal foot care clinician, and Stuart as a footcare volunteer, to fill gaps in local provision, and their groundbreaking clinic has supported more than 1000 local people.
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Glasgow Times
a day ago
- Glasgow Times
9 high rise demolitions that reshaped Glasgow's skyline
After the demolition this weekend, Waddell Court will be the only remaining tower block in the Gorbals. The sight of a multi-storey building collapsing under a controlled explosion is nothing new to the city; this is the second in 2025. We thought what better opportunity to look back at the demolitions that have reshaped the city's and local communities' skylines? Read on for our full list: Red Road Flats Red Road Flats being demolished (Image: Mark Gibson) The Red Road flats were demolished in October 2015. Four of the six Red Road multi-storey flats in Glasgow were brought down in a single blast, with two remaining partially upright due to an apparently unforeseen difficulty. The top half of two of the buildings remained standing at a slight angle after the bottom halves were destroyed. Up to 2,500 people were kept from their homes surrounding the site due to the failed demolitions. 9 high rise demolitions that reshaped Glasgow's skyline (Image: Archive) When they were built between 1964 and 1969, the Red Road flats were the highest in Europe, at 292 feet (89 metres). They were at the centre of controversy when Glasgow 2014 chiefs were criticised for planning to demolish the Red Road flats as part of the Commonwealth Games opening ceremony. They eventually ditched the proposal to blow down five of the six remaining blocks live on television amid fears of a public protest. Wyndford Towers Wynford towers being demolished (Image: Robert Perry) The Wyndford flats, built in the late 60s, were demolished in March of this year by Wheatley Homes, to make way for almost 400 new homes. The four 26-storey buildings at 151, 171 and 191 Wyndford Road were blown up using explosives on March 23, 2025. The fourth block, at 120 Wyndford Road, was dismantled manually by experts. We reported how onlookers cheered as the high-rises disappeared into clouds of dust at noon. Some of them arrived hours earlier to secure a good view of the explosion, others stopped on their walks to observe. Queen Elizabeth Square Demolition of High Rise Flats in Queen Elizabeth Square, 1993 (Image: Newsquest) The Queen Elizabeth Square towers were blown up in a controlled explosion in September 1993. Helen Tinney, 61, was part of a large crowd watching the 22-storey flats' demolition when she was struck by a piece of flying debris. Mrs Tinney died in the Victoria Infirmary after collapsing at the scene of the blast. We spoke to Alex Mclean in 2016, who stayed in Queen Elizabeth Square from when he was born in 1965 until around 1983. He said: '(We) played on corridors until a certain time when we were called in … Corridors two, four and eight were strict and not much play allowed … Great at New Year, most flat doors open and walk-in parties. (Image: Newsquest) 'Chap door runaway was great. (We used to) start at number nine and work our way downstairs to the bottom. Some crafty tenants realised and got the lift to three or four and waited on you coming down and kicked yer a**e. Used to stand on concrete vent on outside of verandah, 14 stories up. Fearless, couldn't do it now! "Most neighbours all looked out for each other and minor disagreements were forgotten … (That) changed when long-term tenants moved out and strangers moved in.' Queens Court, Toryglen Queens Court Toryglen (Image: Newsquest) The tower block immortalised in a Sony TV advert, Queen's Court in Toryglen, was demolished in 2007. The flats, built in 1968, had been empty before award-winning director Jonathan Glazer shot the advert, spraying 70,000 litres of coloured paint 100ft into the sky and over the high-rise. It took just under 10 seconds and under 70 kilos of explosives to blow down the multi-storey tower block made famous by the Sony Bravia TV advert. The high-rise block at 24 Crossbank Road, Toryglen, was demolished to 12,000 tonnes of rubble and was once home to Simple Minds star Jim Kerr. Sighthill Sighthill before the redevelopment of the area (Image: Archive) Sighthill is located in the North of Glasgow and was established in the 1960s. The area was bordered by a dual carriageway and a railway line. The housing scheme featured 10 tower blocks. Some of the tower blocks were demolished in the early 2000s, and the remaining blocks were demolished in 2014. We spoke to Julie Magill in 2016, who lived in Sighthill between 1979 and 2000, from the time she was born until she was 21 years old. She said: 'I enjoyed playing in the blocks because you felt like you were out, but you were still inside, it was like having a massive play area. We used to play with balls under the bottoms of the flats until those were blocked off. I remember the wind whipping through the bottoms and nearly knocking you over when I was little. 'Initially everyone seemed to be the same, families out working hard and keeping the blocks and landings nice. Over time you noticed a lot of drug addicts and alcoholic types moving into landings and the place did start to go downhill. 'I think it's a pretty common feeling among a lot of my peers from the flats that it is ok for those of us who lived in the scheme to talk it down but to get annoyed to hear it from anyone else. Who are they to judge it? I wouldn't change the fact I lived there, I think it helped shape the person I am today.' The area has been redeveloped, and it features a mix of housing types, including owner-occupiers, mid-market rent, and social housing by Wheatley. (Image: Sourced) We reported last month that a new master plan has been submitted, adding even more homes to an already large proposed Glasgow scheme. Papers detail that after a review, applicant Keepmoat is bidding to build 1164 homes as part of the latest phase of the Sighthill Transformational Regeneration Area (TRA), as opposed to the previous 826 planned. The work would continue the £250million project and focus on the connectivity of the North Glasgow site, including on foot, by bike and by car. Documents reveal that this latest wave of housing would be located at the site bound by Pinkston Road, Pinkston Drive, Sighthill Park and Fountainwell Road. Sandiefield Road Towers The 24-storey blocks at 170 and 200 Sandiefield Road were demolished in 2013 (Image: Newsquest) The Sandiefield Road towers were demolished in 2013. Two 24-storey blocks at 170 and 200 Sandiefield Road in Gorbals, Glasgow, were stripped on the inside before the controlled demolition using 229kg of explosives. The towers were completed in 1971. They stood 69m tall and contained almost 400 flats. Mitchellhill Mitchellhill, Castlemilk being demolished (Image: Newsquest) On Sunday November 27th 2005, the skyline of Glasgow was dramatically changed for ever with the simultaneous demolition of the Five 20 Storey Mitchellhill Flats in Castlemilk. The flats, built in 1965, took approximately 300 Kilos of explosives and were levelled in just 22 seconds. We spoke to Jackie Muir in 2016, who lived in the Mitchelhill Flats in Castlemilk from 1963, at the age of one, until 1992. She said: 'The times we spent there were the best of my life, happy memories. We only had two rooms and a living room, and there were five of us kids, mum, and dad. 'I remember my brothers playing 'dreepy', where they would climb the balcony at side of flat and dreepy down to the next one. What were they thinking of? We … went in and out of each other's houses, no doors locked in those days. (Image: Newsquest) "Only thing I hated were the lifts – I used to shout eight flights up to our windows when I got older so my dad would come down in the lift to get me. I was the happiest I've ever been living anywhere else. The sense of community spirit and friendliness was second to none … I would go back to living there again in a second.' Norfolk Court Norfolk Court before demolition (Image: Archive) Designed by George Bowie, Chief Architect at Crudens (the company that also built Sighthill), the two blocks at Norfolk Court were approved in 1970 and completed in 1973. The towers were demolished in 2016. Norfolk Court was a fixture on the city skyline since the 1970s and once housed more than 270 families. One of its most famous former residents was comedian and broadcaster Des Clarke. (Image: Kirsty Anderson) Stirlingfauld Place The multi-storey flats at Stirlingfauld Place in the Gorbals are demolished (Image: Newsquest) The two Gorbals tower blocks were razed to the ground in 2008, with hundreds of people gathering to watch the dramatic event. The blocks in Stirlingfauld Place were once home to up to 2000 people in the 552 flats. They were built between 1970 and 1973 at a cost of £1.8 million but it took £1m to demolish them. A series of loud bangs in the area at 9.50am marked the end of the high-rise flats and the ground shook as the 23-storey blocks fell to the cheers of the crowds.
Glasgow Times
a day ago
- Glasgow Times
Glasgow's Caledonia Road flats to be demolished tomorrow
The towers from 305 to 341 Caledonia Road are owned by New Gorbals Housing Association (NGHA), which decided to bring them down to make way for social rent homes. The buildings will be demolished by way of controlled explosion, with the works being led by the demolition contractor, Dem-Master. (Image: Images taken by Gordon Terris, Newsquest) We previously reported that New Gorbals Housing Association said saving the blocks was 'unsustainable and unaffordable' due to the inability to bring cladding up to acceptable safety standards without spending a large amount of money on structures with a limited lifespan. The strategy for new homes was agreed between NGHA, Glasgow City Council and the Scottish Government. READ NEXT: Glasgow's Caledonia Road flats to be demolished - everything we know (Image: Images taken by Gordon Terris, Newsquest) An exact time has not been provided for the demolition, but it is understood that the explosion will take place in the afternoon. Locals on social media have speculated that the demolition will take place around lunchtime. Anyone from the local area can observe the explosion from a safe distance. To support this, a large exclusion zone will be in place, covering areas such as the Southern Necropolis and the Gorbals Rose Garden. The demolition process will be loud and is likely to result in dust and debris in the area. However, those who wish to watch the demolition can do so from vantage points at Richmond Park or nearby allotments. (Image: Images taken by Gordon Terris, Newsquest) It is set to be a sad day for many who lived good lives in the towers, some for many decades. Earlier this year, the Glasgow Times spoke to a number of residents who either live in the area or previously lived in the blocks - and they were torn. READ NEXT: Glasgow Gorbals residents share thoughts on Caledonia Road demolition One man said the demolition was a great way to make the Gorbals more modern, while a local woman said the removal of the flats should improve the area. Another man agreed, saying that the demolition is a great idea to build new homes in the area. However, some people felt saddened by the plans. One man, who has lived in the area "all his days", said it was a great shame to see the blocks coming down. The demolition will not only mark the end of an era but will also bring further change to the Gorbals skyline, as after the explosion, Waddell Court will be the only remaining tower block in the area. (Image: Demolition of flats at Stirlingfauld Place in the Gorbals. Nick Ponty Staff.) This follows the demolition of the Sandiefield Road towers in 2013, the Norfolk Court towers in 2016, and the Stirlingfauld Place towers in 2008. The Queen Elizabeth Square towers were blown up in a controlled explosion in September 1993. Helen Tinney, 61, was part of a large crowd watching the 22-storey flats' demolition when she was struck by a piece of flying debris. Mrs Tinney died in the Victoria Infirmary after collapsing at the scene of the blast. (Image: Demolition of flats in Queen Elizabeth Square in Gorbals) (Image: Demolition of flats in Queen Elizabeth Square in Gorbals) For more information on New Gorbals Housing Association, visit
The Herald Scotland
3 days ago
- The Herald Scotland
Inside the Torness nuclear power protests, 50 years later
Yet, the plant, first mooted in the early 1970s by the South of Scotland Electricity Board (SSEB), has long been a lightning rod of controversy. Anti-nuclear activists waged a futile battle to prevent the station from being built, with thousands of campaigners famously occupying the site in May 1978. Pete Roche is one of the founders of the Scottish Campaign to Resist the Atomic Menace, or SCRAM, a radical group who fought against the construction of Torness. 'I came to Edinburgh from Birmingham in 1974 to study ecology,' he tells me. 'I started going to Friends of the Earth meetings. That's when I first heard about the plans to build a nuclear power station. 'The public inquiry lasted seven days, and in the wake of that, a group of us decided to form SCRAM in 1975." Police remove a protester from a bulldozer in November 1978. (Image: Newsquest) 'I was supposed to go to the inaugural meeting but ended up in a car crash. Perhaps it was divine intervention…' Roche laughs. 'I'm only partly serious', he quips. 'We decided to camp for a weekend on the site in April 1976 - the campaign was still quite small. Then, we returned to the same field in 1978 and had a much bigger protest. More than 5000 people attended. 'We wrote to every organisation listed in the back of Peace News, slowly building up the anti-nuclear movement in Scotland,' Roche recalls. 'SCRAM had quite a sympathetic hearing in East Lothian. I would routinely cycle out from Edinburgh and help facilitate community meetings in all the small villages.' In 1978, a group of campaigners occupied 'Half Moon Cottage', a 'ramshackle and bleaky exposed' building on the site of the proposed station. Roche tells me: 'I stayed for around two weeks, but others stayed on longer. When the board wanted to start construction, they got harassed by the cottage people so they went down to demolish the cottage and arrested the activists.' Activists vowed to do everything in their power to stop the plant from being built, and would regularly throw themselves in front of bulldozers to prevent construction. A strong police presence stopped 200 Scottish students entering the Torness site. May 1980 (Image: Newsquest/Duncan Dingsdale) A November 1978 report, published in The Scotsman, states: 'The power game took a nasty turn when anti-nuclear protestors packed into pits, threw themselves in between the tracks of huge bulldozers and scrambled into mechanical shovels at Torness.' Roche looks back on those heady days with fondness. He remarks: 'We had a very active phone tree at the time. I remember we got 400 people there to block JCBs from digging sewage pipes. 'They started work at four in the morning but we were there to stop them.' A 1983 pamphlet entitled 'From Folly to Fiasco' illustrates the strength of feeling among campaigners. One excerpt reads: 'Controversy surrounds the Torness nuclear power station being built, just 30 miles from Edinburgh. Scene of numerous direct actions, Torness is a monumental example of corporate obstinacy. 'At every stage, independent voices have spoken out against the reactor on the grounds of excessive cost, surplus generating capacity, job losses in the coal mining industry, and the unsolved problem of radioactive wastes. 'Conventional protest, sound argument, and majority public opinion have, so far, proved fruitless.' Read more from Josh Pizzuto-Pomaco: 8,000 jobs boost in Peterhead after £1bn energy transition investment Edinburgh University staff to strike today as 1800 job losses threatened Glasgow 'tourist tax' approved as visitors face 5% tariff from 2027 Dr Ewan Gibbs, who lectures on energy politics at Glasgow University, says the protests were a 'significant moment' in Scottish energy history. He tells me: 'At the time, the prevailing distinction between nuclear weapons and nuclear energy was being challenged. There was a growing environmental movement against the nuclear industry throughout the 1970s. 'The SNP were anti-nuclear power while Labour and the trade union movement was divided. They were able to draw on a cohort of young people, mainly university graduates, who had increasing suspicion about nuclear power.' 'Their opposition was partly apocalyptic but also more practical, as fears over the impacts of nuclear waste and radiation grew. 'Of course, it's interesting to see how much the environmental movement has changed since Torness. Right now, it is driven by carbon. But this was not always the case. In the 1970s, coal miners and anti-nuclear campaigners were allies.' Demonstration at Torness. May 1980. (Image: Newsquest/Duncan Dingsdale) Gibbs argues that the relationship between Scottish nationalism and nuclear energy 'flows through Torness'. He notes: 'Torness shapes the energy policy of modern Scotland. We've had a nuclear moratorium for years now, which is very much seen as an SNP policy, but was actually shaped by Jack McConnell's Labour government.' Asked why he joined SCRAM, Roche, who would go on to work for Greenpeace, says: 'My reasons have probably changed over the years. I was motivated by fears of radiation at first, but then I started to engage with all these groups and I began to realise how autocratic the nuclear process was. It wasn't the sort of government I wanted.' Ultimately, the campaign could be dismissed as a Quixotic remnant of a bygone era. Activists didn't stop the bulldozers. Torness was built, and still stands today. Since 1988, the plant has produced 290 TWh of zero carbon electricity. Station owners EDF Energy proudly state this is enough energy to power every home in Scotland for 29 years, and that the use of the plant has avoided 101m tonnes of carbon emissions. Torness rises over the East Lothian coast. (Image: EDF) Yet, the 'Torness Alliance' casts a shadow of radicalism which remains relevant today, as Just Stop Oil and pro Palestine activists block roads, throw paint, and march in the streets. SCRAM will celebrate the 50th anniversary of its founding this autumn, at an event in Edinburgh. I'm told an archival film will be shown. Greying activists in the twilight of life will come together to remember a time when the world seemed on the brink of collapse, and all that stood between nuclear armageddon was a group of radicals camping in a field near Dunbar. Indeed, the legacy of these men and women will live on, long after the reactors of Torness power down for the last time.
