Plight of missing Allan Bryant raised in Scottish Parliament

The town’s MSP Jenny Gilruth highlighted the family’s continuing anguish as she called on Ash Denham, the recently appointed Minister for community safety, to give an update on progress of the Scottish Government’s missing person framework strategy and what support could be offered to the families of long term missing persons in Scotland such as the Bryants.

Allan Bryant Snr welcomed the MSP questions, adding: “The very fact that Allan’s continuing disappearance has been raised by the MSP must be seen as a positive and another way of keeping the search for Allan in the public eye.”

“We’ve met With Ms Gilruth a couple of times now and she has been very supportive, so we welcome anything that she can do to help our efforts.”

And Mr Bryant Snr added that the daily anguish faced by the family was proving particularly hard with the fact that so few new leads were currently emerging and the fifth anniversary of his son’s disappearance loomed.

Despite one of the largest police searches ever undertaken in Scotland, Allan, 23 at the time, has not been seen since leaving Styx nightclub in the town in the early hours of November, 2013.

“It’s proving particularly difficult at the moment to keep positive, especially as the November date of Allan’s disappearance is approaching, but we must keep on and Ms Gilruth raising our plight is much appreciated.”

The Minister confirmed that the Scottish Government had committed £142,000 to the Missing Persons charity to enhance and increase use of its 24 hour helpline and text safe facilities in Scotland. She also offered to meet with Ms Gilruth to discuss the issues she raised.