Our Community honours Murdo McDonald

At the Our Community AGM on 26th February 2026, it was decided to honour Murdo Macdonald by naming him as the Trust's Honorary Chair as a lasting tribute to his legacy and contributions to our community.

Murdo MacDonald passed on 7th February 2026.

Remembering his friend, current Chair of Our Community, Laurence Slavin wrote:

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Over the past week, I have been in contact with a number of past and present directors of the Development Trust, and their reactions to his death evidences how much he inspired every one of us to do better than we ever thought we were capable of.

Many many sad and kind words have been expressed by all, in itself a testament to how much Murdo did for our villages, but also for us as individuals. He was our Chair, our 'Boss' and our friend.

If just three things resonate throughout the reaction I have received from Trust directors they are:

1. He was a force of nature

2. I learned so much from him.

3. God he was fun!

There will be weeks, months and years on which we will think back on the fun times we had with 'Biggles' (he preferred 'Boss' to that one) but for now I'd like to touch on the difference he made to our communities.

Over the 16 years since Murdo pulled together the Rosneath West Peninsula Community Development Trust (RWPCDT), he had overseen the delivery or support of projects such as the Seachange Festival, the creation of Craigrownie Playpark, the Cove and Kilcreggan 10k Run, an Architectural Competition, the Community Lottery, delivery of energy reduction advice to local residents, the Rosneath Peninsula Drumming Project, and delivering the local place plan which we continue to progress. All these events were spearheaded by others but the one consistent presence, somewhere in the background, was Murdo. Bringing energy, bringing enthusiasm, no shortage of negotiation, and ...well, to be blunt having the uncanny knack of not only making it hard for anyone to say 'No' but to even have you believe he was doing you a favour and not the other way around!

Beyond the Development Trust, we should also doff our collective caps to his commitment to keeping Kilcreggan and Rosneath Primary schools open when they were threatened with closure in 2011. Some people may well remember that our local schools are only open today due, in no small part, to Murdo's unwavering commitment to resisting attempts to close them and, in doing so, putting our villages into a decline from which they never would have recovered.

What some may not realise is that it wasn't just the Peninsula schools he helped protect. Murdo chaired the Argyll Rural Schools Network, a group of dedicated parents from across Argyll who came together at pace to protect their local schools. No prizes for guessing who coordinated that whole approach. There are just shy of 30 villages across Argyll and Bute who, some 25 years later, can still send their children to a local primary school and Murdo was, once again, at the very heart of the community spirit that made that happen.

One last thing to mention takes me back to my teens. If you lived in or around Helensburgh and Lomond back then, there was one weekend you made sure you got yourself to those 'sleepy' villages on the Rosneath Peninsula. The Cove Regatta was a fabulous explosion of music, parties, folk in garden tents, and post-weekend heads that felt they had been bashed against a wall for 48 hours. All courtesy of the vision, drive and energy of Murdo.

Murdo's appetite for life is unparalleled in anyone I've ever known. He had an unadulterated belief in what could be achieved by working as a community and injecting his energy and his dedication to make a success of everything he touched.

We are a quieter, less colourful community without Murdo, and we owe it to him to endeavour to bridge that gap and carry on being the community he always wanted us to be.

On a more personal note, I just miss my friend. I know I am not alone.

Loz

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We, at the Our Community, look forward to further progressing projects focused on making our villages the best they can be.