HAVING viewed the launch of the Calmac ferry Glen Rosa from the other side of the Clyde at Cardross, I stood taking in the immense structure and all the work that had gone into this huge ferry.
I know all the controversy and economy associated with the massive achievement of this launch. But there is the human story, the many households this ferry has sustained during her life so far, the many who have shared their talents and experiences in training up the next generation of shipbuilders, and it was a pleasure to learn that it was one of those trained apprentices who launched the ferry.
READ MORE: I was there for the launch of the MV Glen Rosa – here's what it was like
So looking ahead to the local economy and workforce and then further afield to the lifeline service of the Calmac ferry, we must hope that new orders are on their way very soon.
Catriona C Clark
Falkirk
HOW depressing but how unexpected: the two main TV sources in Scotland failed to celebrate the launch of a hull on the Clyde without incessant SNP-bashing.
The same moaning Minnies would have been at it if the Scottish Government had not saved Fergusons and did a Tory “UCS job” on the company.
The same moaning Minnies are completely silent about the Dreadnought submarines now being more than ten years late in commissioning, vastly over budget, and yet to have a single hull section joined together.
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The point is that by saving Fergusons, shipbuilding skills were kept on the Clyde outside of BAE Systems. Apprenticeships have been served, skills handed on, jobs created, lessons learned but in no shape or form is it the “disaster” the Unionistas would wish to ascribe to it when compared to such success stories as NHS England test and trace – billions of pounds and nothing to show for it – or HS2 – billions of pounds and it does not even reach central London let alone Leeds or Manchester.
This is a General Election year, so we should all focus on the serial fiscal failures of the UK Union in all its splendour rather than the Scottish Government splinter that is the “ferries”.
Peter Thomson
via email
SO the Glen Rosa ferry has finally hit the water. I understand that about 1000 folk came to see the big event. Had the weather been a bit better I might have joined them. I would really like to see what a
£50 million ferry, which has ended up as almost a £200 million ferry, looks like “in the flesh”. However, considering the ferry is still some way from actually carrying vehicles and passengers the bill could yet exceed £200m.
Much of the £200m is, as far as I know, still unaccounted for according to the Auditor General.
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I wonder if we will ever be any the wiser as to where this money has been spent, or are we just expected to forget about it and put the whole sorry business behind us?
There is already a campaign under way to award further contracts to the Fergusons yard. While the prospect of several hundred job losses is certainly not to be welcomed, the yard’s track record over the past six years does not inspire confidence that it could avoid a repeat of this fiasco.
Any future contract awards or further investment into the yard must come with guarantees that the price of any contracts is very fixed and very final. The total overspend on the two ferries is currently heading towards £300 million – about £60 per head of the Scottish population.
There needs to be no more of this unlimited access to the Scottish Government’s bank account. The hundreds of millions of pounds siphoned off could and should have been spent in our hospitals, schools and roads.
Glenda Burns
Glasgow
WITH unelected Foreign Secretary David Cameron making the announcement that the government in London will continue to support arms sales to Israel, there is a fundamental question about the government’s concern for the humanitarian issues that arise out of Israel’s conduct in Palestine.
I do not care about the legality of arms exports to a state whose actions present a plausible breach of the international Genocide Convention. My paramount concern is with the morality of any trade with Israel at this point in time.
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Sound moral judgement is seriously lacking among both the Conservative government and the Labour opposition. Continuing political and military support for what Israel is doing in Gaza and on the West Bank must surely be a source of deep shame for anyone who is British; I declare myself Scottish by rights enshrined in UN declarations and only ever British under duress from the government in London.
The sooner we are out of this highly immoral and extremely toxic Union, the better.
Ni Holmes
St Andrews
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