Mum's fury as digger rips up Largs playpark with children close by

The mum-of-three was shocked when she took a trip to Mackerston Playpark with her children to find generators and motorised diggers operating near to children.

Workers were repairing a piece of broken play equipment on Wednesday morning but failed to cordon off the area.

The mum said: "The blatant disregard for the health and safety of families and children was obvious.

"Workmen were repairing a piece of play equipment within the park whilst children were running around them.

"There were diggers moving between vans as well as generators, heavy equipment, broken play equipment and tarmac all left lying around.

"Despite this, no area was fenced off and the work was going ahead despite very young children running to and from the other equipment.

"At several points the digger was driving about. One swing from the shovel in the wrong way direction and it could have resulted in catastrophic injuries.

"On several occasions the equipment was left unsupervised as the men returned to their work van.

"I contacted the council who said there was nothing they could do.

"Later the police turned up to speak to the three workers.

"The men seemed to have no idea that it was not a great idea to carry out the repairs without assessing the risk to the families using the park.

"What makes it worse is that the men had fencing in their van that could have been used to make the site safe, but chose not to put it up.

"The park was very busy and nobody could believe what was happening."

A North Ayrshire Council spokesperson said: “Some minor works were carried out at Mackerston Playpark by contractors, who have extensive experience in their field.

“Rather than close the park unnecessarily, it was felt that the nature of works would allow the park to remain open.

“All equipment was kept to a minimum and appropriate measures were in place to ensure that the works were carried out safely and with due diligence.”