Ferry network has seen ‘perfect storm’ amid service disruption, says Swinney

Scotland’s west coast ferry network has been experiencing a “perfect storm”, the First Minister has said.

CalMac ferry services have seen serious disruption in recent weeks, with four major vessels out of service on Wednesday.

John Swinney has apologised to islanders about the disruption on the Government-owned service, and said the issue had been raised with him during a visit to the Western Isles this week.

“I’ve heard loud and clear from people, as I’ve heard before, the importance of the ferry services and the disruption that’s been caused by the, frankly, perfect storm that we’ve experienced in the last few days,” he said.

“That’s why I’ve said that an SNP government, if re-elected, will deliver £10 million of financial resilience to businesses who have clearly been affected by the disruption to ferry services, and we’ll put that in place within 20 days of an SNP government being established.”

The country’s ageing ferry fleet has come into focus in recent years due to disruption caused to islanders, but the First Minister pointed to new ships which have been ordered, with three due to enter service this year.

“This year, we expect three new further vessels to add to the ferry network and that will strengthen the ferry network to meet the needs of islanders,” he said.

On Wednesday, CalMac issued a revised deployment plan to deal with the unavailability of four major and four small vessels.

The problems were eased when the Glen Sannox returned to service on the Arran route on Wednesday afternoon.

CalMac chief executive Duncan Mackison said: “In the coming days, our priority is to ensure that, wherever possible, every community has a service and to provide as much certainty as we can as to what that service looks like.

“The plan we’ve put in place in redeploying MV Isle of Islay allows us to restore two key routes – Barra and the Little Minch – to normality from Thursday, and we’ll draft in MV Alfred to cover Islay.

“We’ve set out plans through to next Friday, the day before MV Hebrides is scheduled to return from planned maintenance.

“Her return triggers a cascade of vessels that allows us to restore normal service levels to a number of island communities.

“Until then, we’re pushing hard to speed up repairs on unavailable vessels and I want to assure those who rely on us that we’re doing everything in our gift to improve service levels.”