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After more than two decades in charge, the headteacher of Killermont Primary School in Bearsden is heading off for a well-earned retirement, and a replacement is required. So far, so normal.

As of last week, the standard process for all of this was well underway, with dates already in the diary for short-listing and interviews, and the parent council prepped to contribute.

Again: so far, so normal. Until it wasn’t.

On Tuesday this week, that same parent council sent out an extraordinary letter raising their “serious concerns over the process to appoint the new headteacher.”

What were those concerns? Well, the night before (Monday 20th May), they had been advised that Greg Bremner, the East Dunbartonshire Director of Education, had decided to halt the recruitment process, disregard the existing applicants, cancel interviews, and appoint a current council employee as the headteacher.

No more discussion. No more process. Just an imposition.

The school would take what it was given by one of the local authority’s top bureaucrats – the kind of person who always knows best.

Unsurprisingly, the parent council weren’t happy. As well as contacting parents and carers, they also wrote to Bremner complaining about his “refusal to undertake a robust process to properly identify the best candidate for the role”. They also raised the “unfairness to candidates who have applied in the expectation of a fair and transparent process”, and the........

© Herald Scotland