FERRY SERIOUS.

Posted byiainlawson27Posted inUncategorizedTags:, , , ,


This article first appeared in the Herald newspaper a few days ago.

MINISTERS have been accused of wasting millions over major changes to plans for the launch of vessels at the centre of Scotland’s ferry fiasco.

Plans for the introduction of the ‘green’ vessels at the centre of debacle have been thrown into chaos as it can be revealed work on the £5m project has not started – while part of it has been scrapped altogether.

And concerns have been raised over a move to take one of the new ferries away from the Skye triangle routes altogether to serve Arran – despite a major £40m project to upgrade harbours in preparation for its arrival.

John Daniel Peteranna of the South Uist Business Impact Group, which organised a major demonstration about the state of Scotland’s ferries in June was shocked by the developments and said: “It is more evidence of incompetence, incompetence and incompetence over ferries.”

Scottish Government-controlled Caledonian Maritime Assets Limited (CMAL), which owns the nation’s ageing ferry fleet signed off on the contract for two standalone liquefied natural gas (LNG) stations for two long-delayed and over-budget lifeline ferries in early April, 2020.

The project handed to Danish supplier Kosan Crisplant involved designing and installing Scotland’s first LNG bunkering facilities at Uig on the Isle of Skye and at the North Ayrshire coastal town of Ardrossan.

They were due to be completed in July, 2022, to enable the vessels Glen Sannox and Hull 802 to be fuelled with LNG which Kosan Crisplant said at the time was cleaner than any other fossil fuel.


But CMAL has confirmed that work has still not started on the project and were unable to say when they would be completed.

The latest completion date given by the Danish supplier for the tanks is the “beginning of 2025” – well after the latest dates for the delivery to Scottish Government-controlled ferry operator CalMac of the much-delayed and over-budget vessels Glen Sannox and the so-far unnamed Hull 802.

Its last update from September 2022 said that the bunkering facilities would “strengthen the sustainable profile” of both Uig and Ardrossan.

Former transport secretary Jenny Gilruth told former justice secretary now East Lothian MP and Alba Party deputy leader Kenny MacAskill in December that the LNG infrastructure was scheduled to be in place in time for the arrival of the first dual fuel vessel.


Now he has been told by the present encumbent, Fiona Hyslop in a letter that there is currently a review of the associated infrastructure requirements for LNG and until complete was unable to even provide an idea of the costs.

He said: “No costings but more importantly still nothing done. this is years now and we’re supposedly months before it comes into service. Yet no LNG infrastructure.

“It just shows how insane the duel fuel system is.”

But Highland Council has now said that the bunkering facility at Uig on the Isle of Skye is now no longer required as Hull 802 is no longer planned for the Skye triangle routes to North Uist and Harris. It has been confirmed it will now serve with Glen Sannox on the Arran route.

But work is already at an advanced stage to prepare for Hull 802 with a delayed multi-million pound project to upgrade the harbour at Uig. The plans also involved upgrading the ports of Lochmaddy on North Uist and Tarbert on the Isle of Harris.

The council had said the infrastructure improvements were needed to “optimise operations” to prepare for the new vessel.

Transport Scotland said it was “wrong” to suggest the works on the ports on the Skye Triangle “are wholly associated with the introduction of the new vessels”.

In the last update David Tydeman, chief executive of the nationalised Inverclyde shipyard firm Ferguson Marine said he was optimistic that Glen Sannox should be available to passengers in spring 2024.


The delayed second vessel, only known as Hull 802 which which was supposed to be online in the last reschedule in the autumn of 2024 having already been delayed to the end of March 2024, is now pushed back to November, 2024. The contract backstop was stated as being at the end of December 2024.

Both vessels were due online in the first half of 2018, with one intitially to serve Arran and the other to serve the Skye triangle routes to North Uist and Harris, but are at least five years late, with costs soaring from £97m to nearly £350m.

The Scottish Government’s Transport Scotland agency said there were plans for both vessels to be served by an LNG tanker until a permanent arrangement is secured.

CalMac has meanwhile begun moves to use Troon rather than Ardrossan for the services to and from Arran from the summer of 2023.

The move came as it emerged that as of September, last year, plans to upgrade Ardrossan to allow it to take the much-delayed Glen Sannox, had not even been put out to tender to allow contractors the chance to bid to do the work needed.


It was understood the hold up is because of complexities around how the £40m estimated cost would be divided between the Scottish Government quango Transport Scotland, the harbour owner Peel Ports and North Ayrshire Council.

Mr Peteranna of said: “You couldn’t make this up. It is at the very least a waste of public money and more evidence of a lack of local knowledge and experience.

“I find the whole thing incredible.

“It seems they think it is okay it is just taxpayers’ money so it doesn’t really matter.

“The decision to shift the ferry away from us hit us hard. It is what has been keeping some people going.”

A ferry user group official said that the latest developments continued to show how  “poorly planned” the ferry project has been.

“It has all gone from fiasco to farce, although I doubt even Monty Python would find all this very funny,” he said.

Both Glen Sannox and Hull 802 were hailed as a step towards a greener future for Scotland’s state owned CalMac ferry fleet as they were to be the first UK-built ships capable of running off LNG and marine gas oil.

LNG was seen as significantly cleaner and would help to reduce emissions to meet ambitious Scottish Government targets.


They are the latest twists in the ferry scandal which has seen claims that the disastrous £97m contract to build two lifeline vessels was rigged in favour of Ferguson Marine run by Jim McColl, who rescued the yard in the summer of 2014 in a move partly brokered by former First Minister Alex Salmond, who kept the entrepreneur abreast of businesses that needed saving.

The shipyard firm went into administration again in August, 2019 – just over a year after a second Scottish Government bailout loan amidst soaring costs and delays in the construction of the ferries. Ferguson Marine was nationalised with Scottish Government-owned ferry procurer CMAL blaming each other for what went wrong.

The Herald on Sunday has previously revealed problems that the delayed Hull 802 may not even be able to operate to Skye as planned from October this year because the port works were not expected to be complete till the following December.

The harbour development on Skye’s Uig that had been talked about for five years and was supposed to have finally been completed in 2021 was not scheduled to be completed till December this year.

Transport Scotland confirmed in September, last year, that the works had added £6m to the estimated £38m cost of the project. It said the original finish date of March, 2023 was shifted after the original plans to start work on the Uig pier in October “were not acceptable to island communities”.

The original closure of the Uig pier between October last year and March was expected to disrupt services to Harris and also North Uist in the Western Isles – causing major concerns for many islanders.


Transport Scotland previously said the original finish date of March, 2023 was shifted after the original plans to start work on the Uig pier in October “were not acceptable to island communities”.

The original closure of the Uig pier between October and next March was expected to disrupt services to Harris and also North Uist in the Western Isles – causing major concerns for many islanders.

A Transport Scotland spokesman said: “The works on ports on the Skye Triangle, such as those at Uig, include the replacement of life expired infrastructure, improving resilience and maximising the range of vessels that can use the ports.

“It is wrong to suggest these works are wholly associated with introduction of the new vessels.

“The plans for the Ardrossan harbour redevelopment include an LNG storage facility that is being taken forward as part of these plans. The vessels will initially operate from Troon where new facilities have been put in place to support this. Vessels are to be bunkered by LNG tanker until a more permanent arrangement is secured.”

A CMAL spokesperson said: “LNG facilities will be constructed within the Ardrossan Harbour redevelopment project, which is led by Peel Ports Group, owners of Ardrossan Harbour. As these will be part of the overall programme of work, we do not yet have a timescale for construction of the bunkering facilities.”

A CalMac spokesman added: “We are progressing plans to bunker LNG at Troon and the next multi-agency meeting to discuss the details is taking place at Troon in September.”



“It has all gone from fiasco to farce, although I doubt even Monty Python would find all this very funny,” he said.

Both Glen Sannox and Hull 802 were hailed as a step towards a greener future for Scotland’s state owned CalMac ferry fleet as they were to be the first UK-built ships capable of running off LNG and marine gas oil.

LNG was seen as significantly cleaner and would help to reduce emissions to meet ambitious Scottish Government targets.


They are the latest twists in the ferry scandal which has seen claims that the disastrous £97m contract to build two lifeline vessels was rigged in favour of Ferguson Marine run by Jim McColl, who rescued the yard in the summer of 2014 in a move partly brokered by former First Minister Alex Salmond, who kept the entrepreneur abreast of businesses that needed saving.

The shipyard firm went into administration again in August, 2019 – just over a year after a second Scottish Government bailout loan amidst soaring costs and delays in the construction of the ferries. Ferguson Marine was nationalised with Scottish Government-owned ferry procurer CMAL blaming each other for what went wrong.

The Herald on Sunday has previously revealed problems that the delayed Hull 802 may not even be able to operate to Skye as planned from October this year because the port works were not expected to be complete till the following December.

The harbour development on Skye’s Uig that had been talked about for five years and was supposed to have finally been completed in 2021 was not scheduled to be completed till December this year.

Transport Scotland confirmed in September, last year, that the works had added £6m to the estimated £38m cost of the project. It said the original finish date of March, 2023 was shifted after the original plans to start work on the Uig pier in October “were not acceptable to island communities”.

The original closure of the Uig pier between October last year and March was expected to disrupt services to Harris and also North Uist in the Western Isles – causing major concerns for many islanders.


Transport Scotland previously said the original finish date of March, 2023 was shifted after the original plans to start work on the Uig pier in October “were not acceptable to island communities”.

The original closure of the Uig pier between October and next March was expected to disrupt services to Harris and also North Uist in the Western Isles – causing major concerns for many islanders.

A Transport Scotland spokesman said: “The works on ports on the Skye Triangle, such as those at Uig, include the replacement of life expired infrastructure, improving resilience and maximising the range of vessels that can use the ports.

“It is wrong to suggest these works are wholly associated with introduction of the new vessels.

MY COMMENTS

Thanks to my friendship with Professor Alf Baird this blog was warning about the looming crisis over the ferry scandals long before the rest of the media caught on. It’s open season these days made much worse by the stupidity of the Scottish Government in stubbornly refusing to accept they and CMAL got this hopelessly wrong. The bill to taxpayers continues to rise exponentially with the public being forced to cover ludicrous price increases and replacement costs for what will be outdated, inefficient vessels that are much more costly to run and operate than the catamarans that Scotland should have opted for. There is no virtue in being stubborn when it is so obvious you are on the wrong road entirely.

I am, as always

YOURS FOR SCOTLAND.

BEAT THE CENSORS

Sadly some websites seek to censor what their readers have access to read. This is particularly true of sites whose existence is primarily to support the views of one particular party and they seek to block articles which do not slavishly support that particular doctrine. My readers have worked out that the best way to defeat that attack on the freedom of speech and thought is to share my articles widely, thus defeating any attempt at censorship. My thanks for this.

SALVO AND LIBERATION

Are playing a crucial role in taking Independence forward. This site limits donations to Yours for Scotland to a maximum of £3. We do not need more as all we seek to do is to cover the costs incurred in running the blog therefore once this is secured each year all further donations are forwarded to Salvo and Liberation. My thanks for all who choose to support us in this way. It is appreciated.

SALVO MERCHANDISE

https://www.ebay.co.uk/str/salvoscot

41 thoughts on “FERRY SERIOUS.”

  1. Almost nobody holding the purse strings, that is the politicians, has ever worked in a business. In project management there is a golden rule. Once the specification for the work required to produce the desired outcome has been finalised and costed, for labour, material, other inputs it is signed off. After that point there are no changes made at all, ever. The project can be completed on time and on budget. The golden rule is that no changes are made after the project is signed off by the parties. Any bright ideas that come along, and they do, become a different project.
    No changes whatever, ever. It could not be simpler. Ignore the golden rule and you get this kind of debacle.

    Liked by 18 people

  2. A total debacle:

    The islanders are in purgatory.
    The taxpayers money is being utterly wasted.
    The Herald and the mainstream media are having a field day.

    What a mess.

    (PS Iain – it looks like the Herald article loaded has been duplicated on your blog post).

    Liked by 12 people

  3. It is difficult to believe other than the recent record of Scottish Government failure and incompetence is by design and intended to remove any credibility from Westminster’s administrative body in Scotland.

    The complete fiasco that is the ferry scandal is but one of a long list of Scottish Government failures that would not have taken place had Scotland been able to adopt Direct Democracy where the People of Scotland would be the ultimate authority.

    Many of the “green” policies pushed on the Scottish Government by their association with the Wacky Party would never have been considered in a Direct Democracy because politicians would be aware that those policies would be challenged by the people.

    We regularly hear from politicians that ” the People of Scotland are Sovereign” but of course without Self-Determination and Independence that sovereignty is just a nice phrase for them to utter at appropriate moments.

    Listening to what the People of Scotland are telling them would be at least a start. The proof of what they tell us will be seen in their reaction to the Stirling Directive.

    Liked by 15 people

  4. Can I point out a ‘ferry serious typo’, Iain? The entire article is shown twice. If you search for ‘MINISTERS’ the 2nd one is the start of the repeat.

    Liked by 3 people

  5. There’s nothing the “Scottish” press like better than a “Scotland bad” story. Remember the days when they had to hunt around for them rather than getting them served up daily on a plate?

    Liked by 11 people

  6. So these rather expensive elephants will probably be delivered before their refuelling facilities have been built? The consequence of that is that the poor wretched tax payer is going to have to hire a GPL tanker (or two!) to loiter at each terminal between filling up operations. But are these two (white?) elephants so poorly designed that they cannot do a day’s work without refuelling twice?
    I doubt that there is an overall project manager for this debacle, but being a government project he would neither be disciplined for not getting it half-right at any point, nor would he be sacked. Far more likely would be promotion to another job he could FURBAR!
    The important question I want to ask is:
    In these times of prostrating ourselves to the great god of net zero, how many years will it take, if ever, for these two dual fuel elephants and their entire infrastructure, to be “greener” than conventional diesel vessels to CMAL deisgns? And compared to a fleet of smaller vessels?

    PS – @arthor49
    I suspect that this ferry cock-up would have been perpetrated by CMAL/CALMAC/Transport Scotland whatever system of government was in place. After all, Transport Scotland cannot even manage sensible connections between Oban ferries and Glasgow trains!

    Liked by 12 people

    1. Dumbest, most entitled, arrogant, authoritarian, lazy and incompetent government Scotland has ever known – and that says something when we consider what is sitting in Westminster!!!!

      And this collection of diddies can set our tax rates and make our laws – beyond belief!!! This arrogance and incompetence is Sturgeons legacy – time to take the gloves off and demand accountability. Wheesht for Indy has to stop – these buffoons are destroying the case for independence.

      Liked by 11 people

    2. Sad but true. The level of incompetence is unbelievable and, along with others here, makes me suspect an element of design I that.
      We must get ourselves out of this corrupt and incompetent mess as soon as possible.
      My hope now is that the various events, rallies and marches in Septmeber can be well supported and discuss on forcing the current Scottish government to agree to make the next election about leaving the Union and putting that imo practice if they get a majority. If SNP candidates and the controlling hierarchy are not prepared to design up for that in a Manifesto Pledge, they need to be told that they will not get our votes.
      If enough of us say that,I hope they

      Liked by 4 people

  8. CMAL at the root of all the problems, bolstered by a Scottish Government stuffed with inexperienced people, advised by clueless Civil Servants, SPADs and Interns. Wrongheaded, stubborn, without vision or real world experience and that is only if you believe there was no deliberate wrecking policy.

    Liked by 15 people

    1. And lazy people – don’t lets forget lazy – any effort at knowing their briefs could have avoided this. But then, maybe it is deliberate … either way they need to be gone yesterday.

      Liked by 8 people

  9. There is it seems no E d to the utter chaos that this SNP government are wreaking on our communities.

    Corruption, yes corruption, and utter incompetence are the hallmarks of our devolved government.

    ( Surprising really that they are not redpevifying the ferries to run on heat pumps. A joke maybe, but I would not be surprised if they tried.)

    But it’s not just lifeline ferries serving dependent island communities.

    Heating of homes is another fiasco where ordinary folks are going to be absolutely brutalised on the lunatic policies of virtue signalling.

    So rock up folks and spend an average of £15k to install a heat pump.

    And in rural Scotland where the installation costs are even higher due to a combination of remoteness, ground conditions,climate, and am electricity service that can be often interrupted in winter, folks will just have to suck that up too.

    But that is the reality of our useless government.

    And if you want a further example of Stalinist vindictiveness the SG is considering banning folks from selling their homes if it is not energy compliant by 2025.

    Yes that’s right. The SNP are considering legislating to stop people selling their homes. The brutal fascist fist is here. No doubt about that.

    Anyway, they are going to be out very soon. Like the fishing communities they wanted to destroy, the SNP and their demented green loon ball chums are all going to be out.

    Watch this space!

    Liked by 12 people

    1. I hate to say it but you are spouting rubbish, my family lives in England and every time they come up they tell me how much better off we are, in fact they wish they could live here but unfortunately not all of their partners agree, I would agree the SNP isnt perfect but put against Westminster Gov. I would say we are truly on the winning side, if you hate it so much why not go live down there

      Like

      1. They have similar problems in England outiwth London and the southeast but they don’t have the remedy that we have in Scotland.

        The Scottish government is making the best of what allowance they get from Westminster. In Scotland we have very different spending priorities where we help alleviate the punitive policies and UK legislation that are so damaging to the People of Scotland.

        Despite the efforts of the Scottish government, 25% of our children are living in poverty and this is simply a continuation of the deliberate impoverishment of Scotland and its people that has gone on for centuries. No comparable country in Europe has had such a huge number of people emigrating to hopefully improve their lives than Scotland and of course that includes forced migration.

        Since 1955, when Scotland last sent a majority of Tory MPs to Westminster we have had 10 Tory governments foisted on us and Scotland has paid the price of their corruption, asset-stripping and theft of our resources – including our people.

        Our children living in rural areas when they grow up cannot afford to live anywhere near to their families due to the artificially created inflation of house prices by people selling up down south and using that to move here and banking the difference. That huge influx of people arriving from England every year makes it increasingly difficult to achieve the self-determination and independence that Scotland so desperately requires.

        Had Scotland been an independent country that adopted a Direct Democracy government similar to that in Switzerland where the issue of second homes is covered in Article 75b of the Federal Constitution of the Swiss Federation the people would decide on that issue as it was “Adopted by popular vote on 11 March 2012”.

        The people of Switzerland get that option to control what happens at all levels of government and if we had Direct Democracy many of the crazy policies pushed by the Wacky Party would never have seen daylight!

        Liked by 2 people

      2. I hate to say it but YOU are spouting rubbish. Because something is worse in another country, it doesn’t mean the original country is doing okay! That’s just silly. The SNP have made a total dog’s dinner of the ferry fiasco & they are the ones that put this contract in place. THE BUCK STOPS WITH THEM. No the SNP ISN’T perfect, not by any means. It has been proven to be corrupt, to have MPs/MSPs that have NO KNOWLEDGE WHATSOEVER about contractual agreements & is playing fast & loose with taxpayers’ funds.

        As for ‘if you hate it so much, why not go live down here’ – this is OUR home, OUR country &

        Liked by 1 person

      3. Ooops!

        we want to make it better. We are Scots and we are going nowhere. Don’t like SNP being held account? That’s YOUR problem, not ours. We’ll vote for a party that has making Scotland a better place to live, their priority. We’re not ‘wheeshting for Independence/SNP’ any longer. You may as well get used to that.

        Liked by 1 person

  10. It seems to me that this Scottish government “ couldn’t run a ménage” – in Govan the word was pronounced like “ minodge” – took me some time to realise it was a disparaging phrase .

    Liked by 11 people

  11. This whole fiasco of a political party strikes me as having Westminstrs grubby plants sewn all through it. Time they were gone and the Sovereign people of Scotland made them accountable for their actions. Time for Salvo and Liberation Scotland to hold their feet to the Fire. The unionist spies and collaborators are doing a fantastic job of Splintering support for Freedom.
    MacIntyre Kemp is dividing the YES movement with his stupid Yes for EU nonsense. We are being sold the lie that the Spaniel is King of Scots (which he isn’t).
    Wikipedia has him as King of the United Kingdom. Also untrue.
    We are being treated as fools and expected to blindly accept these lies.
    TIME FOR SCOTS TO WAKE UP!!!

    Liked by 13 people

    1. Remember the Golden Age when Scotland’s run by the Scottish Office? The boss was Secretary of State for Scotland. He was a wee bit like the Viceroy of India. All decisions were made by him and his office. As he mostly had no particular axe to grind, many decisions were practical and objective, and most were sane. Not all decisions were liked but that’s normal.

      Liked by 6 people

      1. In the Scottish Office it was required that office holders were in some way qualified for the office they held and could demonstrate competence in their role in order to keep it – all that is required in this SG is to have the ear of the Diddie-In-Chief.

        Liked by 4 people

  12. Scotland needs this terminally-gangrenous, heavily protected administration and its clientele gone! Replacing it with a Labour administration is unlikely to make much noticeable difference, however. Ideally, we need a much younger, more hungry, more savvy cohort of nationalist politicians, and a party enthused by national ambition in which to accommodate them.

    Liked by 10 people

    1. Agree we need shot of this cancer – but it is not aged related. It is stupidity, arrogance, entitlement and sheer pig headedness that is the problem. I think Salmond said he had never met more graceless people. I think he could well add to that list.

      Liked by 7 people

  14. Well, a £15m 100-car capacity catamaran is now working very well on the Arran route, doing the work of the long delayed £50m (now costing £150m+) Glen Sannox. For that £150m we could have built 10 such catamarans, sufficient to replace the entire CalMac ‘major’ ferry fleet, and still have one boat spare!

    And there would have been no need to waste more money on deepening and lengthening piers, or installing LNG tanks to cater for monohull ferries that consume twice the fuel of catamarans. Plus, the catamaran offers an additional saving of £5m+ a year on operating costs = total of £125m+ per boat (at today’s prices) over the 25-yr operating lifetime.

    Whit can we say aboot oor clueless colonial administrators other than: ‘A telt ye so’ and so we did Iain:

    HOW TO END THE MADNESS

    The ‘madness’ we are witnessing is colonialism and the ‘colonial mindset’, for which the only remedy is liberation.scot!

    Liked by 14 people

    1. I hope the Stirling Directive push on September 19th will have some effect on changing the SNP position, otherwise they are finished and the danger is that the Unionists get a majority.

      Liked by 5 people

  15. The Ferry debacle continues unhindered by the politicians of ALL parties who represent the Island communities off the west coast. Corruption has surely trumped incompetence to the extent that on the Isle of Skye neither Forbes or Blackford have deigned it opportune to campaign publicly on behalf of their constituents to enforce change at the helm of the respective bodies which continue to squander finite resources regardless.

    The notion that LNG can be seen as a ‘green’ energy source on what is generally inshore rather than long distance ocean going sea transport can be put into perspective when it is understood that currently the bulk of LNG supply comes generally from Qatar into the UK through the Isle of Grain facility on the Thames estuary, thereafter by road and rail to the point of use.

    We should remind ourselves that the LNG production facility at Glenmavis was shutdown on the basis of non profitability in favour of Avonmouth. Another Scottish based asset removed by a decision taken outwith Scotland!

    Liked by 12 people

  16. An LNG facility, that could well have proven to be one of the most profitable moves ever made for an independent Scotland.

    Considering the volatility in current LNG markets (strikes in oz, U.S. corruption and sabotage of Israeli supplies), and the huge spike in demand of our European neighbors (30% + last year), the removal of Glenmavis is beginning to look like yet another catastrophe of colonial mismanagement.

    Liked by 11 people

  17. I have travelled to to Skye for many years.

    Served now by a bridge at the Kyle to Kyleakin crossing islanders fortunately do not now have to rely on a ferry to cross over from the mainland. However, they do have to rely on a ferry to gain access to any of the outer isles.

    The ferry fiasco and lack of lifeline service is therefore a huge issue not at all understood by the central belt Scottish Government. It is far from their minds and frankly they do not care. But the island communities care.

    On a recent trip to Portree for a funeral the lack of lifeline ferry service became all too clear in that after attending the Monday morning funeral many in attendance wanted to go over to Lewis for another funeral on the Tuesday. However, due to the ferry problems and the lack of capacity this was not possible. All the ferry slots for vehicles were full and it was not possible for them to drive up to Uig and make the crossing.

    But this is the rotten stinking cold fare that the SG serve up to these communities. These island communities are being choked in so many ways. And it is the same communities who were going to have their fishing livelihoods destroyed by closing fishing grounds all around Scotland.

    And it the same communities who are going to be forced to install heat pumps reliant on expensive electricity that can be prone to outages when winter storms blow our western seaboard. And it is the same communities who will potentially be restricted from selling their homes from 2025 onwards should they not be energy compliant.

    Like the clearances of over a hundred years ago the central belt SNP charlatans now treat Scotland’s rural communities with the same disdain and utter disregard as the absentee landlords. But the SNP will not prevail for much longer. Skye want rid of them, as do most of the highlands and islands.

    Angus MacNeil is already out of the SNP. He is popular and good MP for his community. Fergus Ewing and Kate Forbes are also popular and look very much to be on the same trajectory out of the SNP. But as we have said before, the SNP or at least the cabal that now controls the SNP are not by any means the mechanism to independence or good devolved government.

    But, thinking about rural Scotland isn’t it so utterly bizarre how dismissive and hostile the SNP, or should I say the SNP central belt bubble can be to the people living in the rural areas. They are to mix words absolutely away with the ferries.

    Liked by 13 people

  18. A manifesto from all and I do mean all of Scotlands politicians.
    Scotlands great leap backwards.
    How they all every one of them played their part doing their best to destroy Scotland.

    Liked by 8 people

    1. Much as I am sickened by the SNP “leadership” the most sickening thing of all is listening to “unionist” politicians reveling in the missteps and misfortunes of Scotland. It seems they cannot debase themselves – and us – enough! Whatever they believe in, if indeed their beliefs extend beyond their own fortunes, it is not union.

      Liked by 9 people

  19. Thought for a long time now that Calmac are working for Westminster, too many mistakes, usually Calmac changing their mind about things too often

    Like

  22. They already announced that hull 802 was being taken off the Skye route almost a year ago when they signed the contract for the 4 hulls being built in Turkey as two of those are now pencilled in for the Sky Triangle, which will now become normal sailings rather than the triangle route Iain,

    Liked by 1 person

Comments are closed.