Trustees fined more than £11,000 over near-drowning in leisure pool

Five councillors and a business owner have been fined a total of £11,825 after pleading guilty to health and safety breaches that saw a disabled swimmer almost drown in a leisure centre pool in East Ayrshire.

Ryan Deans, 25, had to be resuscitated after being submerged for almost two minutes before the alarm was raised at the Galleon Centre in Kilmarnock in January 2023.

Councillors Iain Linton, Clare Maitland, Barry Douglas, James Adams and provost Claire Leitch were trustees of a company which provided leisure facilities at the centre at the time.

Another trustee who also pleaded guilty, Manpreet Bawa, is not a councillor.