Could this have been avoided?

Work continues throughout the summer to draft guidance and regulations so that communities can begin to take advantage of different parts of the Community Empowerment Act . The section that deals with the transfer of public assets will inevitably be contentious. The Act has been predicated on the assumption that public bodies will respond favourably to requests but even if they don’t, the community can still appeal to Ministers. One wonders whether the Act might have avoided this long running Council vs community stramash in deepest Perthshire?