Senior councillors agree a £250k grant to expand a Borders business park

Members of Scottish Borders Council’s executive committee endorsed the offer of a £250,000 payment from South of Scotland Enterprise (SOSE) to bolster Galalaw Business Park, to the north of Hawick when they met via videolink this morning.

During 2020, council officers consulted with counterparts within the enterprise agency to look at ways of promoting business expansion at the site and have come up with a plan to improve road infrastructure to enable future development.

The business park opened in April 2019, with the support of a £3.6m grant from Scottish government.

And although both retail and industrial services are now operating on the estate there are still parts of the land that remain undeveloped.

One of the plans is to create an access road to join the existing main Galalaw access road.

The new road would rise up to the north to allow development plots to be developed in a variety of shapes and sites dictated by business and industrial demand.

Now it has been endorsed the plan is to start work on the new road immediately.

A report to the committee adds: “The works would be completed during the summer period of 2021 allowing for the formation of the first development plots to commence.”

Hawick and Denholm councillor Stuart Marshall today hailed the funding as a huge boost to the town and its workforce.

He said: “This funding from SOSE will be viewed as a massive boost in terms of moving forward in laying the foundations for more businesses commercial or otherwise to set up in this past of my ward.

“Given the quite depressing state of our economy at the moment the timing couldn’t be better.

“I’m delighted that this money will now be ploughed into improving the infrastructure at Galalaw and with at least one business owner already desperate to expand then one would hope that this announcement will support him too.

“At the moment there is still so much open space still very much undeveloped and the sooner that work commences the better .

“I am extremely grateful to SOSE for recognising a great opportunity to create new business and employment in such beautiful surroundings.”