Open Letter to Transport Minister Hyslop

Dear Fiona:

When we last met in the re-purposed Infirmary Street baths, you were Culture Minister, which shows the time since we last spoke.  This week’s news of further delay to delivery of the MV Glen Sannox (again) cannot sit well with you.

This political hot potato comes on top of a whole sack-full of then—from A9 dualling, to the white elephant of Prestwick Airport. The whole unwelcome accumulation was bequeathed by your eight predecessors flitting through brief tenures in the job en route to elevation, or ignominy. None had your experience: MSP for 24 years; government minister for 16 of them. Experienced authority must surely make its mark. Before even taking up post, you would be aware the Glen Sannox imbroglio was just the visible tip of a rat’s nest of problems with the ferry system. As ferry operator CalMac and owner CMAL fall directly under your jurisdiction, an opportunity presents itself to untangle the RoRo to the Isles.

Although Ferguson Marine bear some responsibility, they have been a reliable supplier of ferries in the past but, digging deeper, it soon appears that decisions on ferry procurement, made jointly by CalMac, CMAL and Transport Scotland appear deeply flawed. These flaws go much deeper than designers failing to anticipate MCA safety requirements of additional stairways on the Glen Sannox at this late stage.

It goes back to a decade ago when a steady investment pattern averaging a new ferry every year faltered. After MV Carvoria in 2017, few builds have entered service. This has resulted in flawed operating practice, robbing Peter to pay Paul, while an aging fleet means maintenance costs rocketing past £8m annually.

You need only look at CalMac practice of running a replacement freight ferry on the key Stornoway/Ullapool run with lorry capacity of just 6, when a capacity of 24 is required to cope—or CMAL’s late demand for dual-fuel engines in Glen Sannox—to doubt management competence at either firm.

More importantly, neither management understands either efficiency or profitability. You need not look far to find people who do. Western, Northlink and Pentland ferries (thid last able to build MV Alfred for £15m and lease it to CalMac for £9m) all make money. Even the tiny turntable ferry at Kyleakin turns a profit. After 172 years of monopoly operation, you’d think CalMac might have twigged how it’s done.

 Post-Brexit, is this contract/tender division that created CMAL still necessary? The £400,000 salary of its CEO and three directors represents immediate saving. The more useful staff would join CalMac, and an £11,000,000 annual loss avoided by closing their Port Glasgow ivory tower completely. It was Humza himself who ended the farce of contract bidding for ferry routes when he held the post you have now.

As you will appreciate, it can’t stop there. The three CalMac directors who took £300,000 in “performance” bonus during the time their company paid £10,500,000 in fines for failing on lifeline service implies they should get their jotters too. There seems no good reason why CalMac cannot turn a profitable, like other operators and cease to be a drain on your budget. Edinburgh City Council—not known for its dynamism—owns Lothian Bus, and siphons off £1,000,000 in profit annually to spend elsewhere.

Such an approach may sacrifice sacred cows, including those Sir Humphreys in Transport Scotland hold dear. But “aye been” is not a strategy. Asserting “£2bn has been spent on ferries” not only sounds directionless. Worse, it represents less investment than the one-ferry-per-year required to keep the fleet fit and modern. In the meantime, island businesses—especially tourism—are hurting badly, with knock-on effects on the economy and social demands.

A radical plan dumping CMAL entirely, restructuring CalMac under new management, tasked with a restructuring plan is essential to avoid total breakdown of  ferry services to the Hebrides. Otherwise, not only will islanders suffer increasing economic and social disadvantages, but the present wall-to-wall yellow of the political mac across the West is in danger of becoming just a memory.

Yours for Scotland

Dave Berry

Former NEC Elected Member; Former ANC Convener; Former Leader, East Lothian Council

cc: Paul McLennan MSP, East Lothian

#1081—711 words

See also the related blog of June this year Away with the Ferries