THE chair of a tenants and residents’ group in Troon has been hailed at Holyrood after winning a top award.

Frances Carson, chair of the Muirhead Tenants and Residents Association (MTRA), won the Alan Ferguson Champion Tenant or Resident of the Year prize at the Tenant Participation Advisory Service’s 2022 conference and national good practice awards in recognition of her efforts helping the community during the pandemic.

Frances’s community spirit made her the subject of a motion at the Scottish Parliament laid down by the area’s constituency MSP, Siobhian Brown, and signed so far by 11 of Ms Brown’s fellow MSPs.

The motion says that the now-leader of the town’s community council “steered her group through the Covid-19 pandemic and provided a lifeline to residents in crisis; [and] further understands that Frances ran a food bank from her home and organised volunteers to help families unable to feed themselves”.

At the same awards ceremony, held in Clydebank last month, the MTRA was named as runner-up in the Group Champion of the Year category.