THE private firm bidding to take over Caledonian MacBrayne’s ferry services is pledging to tackle the issues which frustrate island communities such as frequency of cancellations, limited timetables and standard of vessels.
The publicly owned CalMac is facing a challenge from Serco Caledonian Ferries Limited, an offshoot of the multinational Serco, which already has a company running publicly subsidised lifeline services to Orkney and Shetland.
The Serco bid is opposed by RMT members, who launched a ‘Keep CalMac Public’ campaign last year.
The next contract will run from October 2016 for up to eight years and attract up to £1 billion of public funding.
Jonathan Riley, Serco’s bid director, has toured the island communities and has now written to residents in a bid to present his company's plans for the service.
Mr Riley said: “The main concerns which stood out overall were the apparent worsening in service cancellations, overall reliability, resilience, communications, mismatches between demand and vessel capacity and the level of local engagement.
"While service cancellations are often unavoidable due to Scotland’s weather, I and the team at Serco intend to ensure we bring our wider experience in the maritime sector to fully assess the causes looking at our operational management approach to improve reliability.”
On Islay the Serco team said the service would have to better respond to the seasonal variations in demand from tourism and agriculture and the requirements of the whisky industry.
On Arran the local community wanted a longer sailing day to accommodate those who commuted to the mainland for work.
He said: “On Mull, we talked with many people representing businesses and residential communities who expressed concern around the link-span at Craignure and its capability to deal with replacement vessels that come onto the route during the busy summer season ... has been introduced.”
On Tiree there was a wish for the island to have a link with Mull reinstated, and serious concerns about the island's infrastructure now that Road Equivalent Tariff, which bases fares on the equivalent distance on land, is in place, resulting in a “a swell of cars” visiting.
The team spent a week in Lewis, Harris, North Uist, South Uist and Barra.
On South Uist they heard concerns about the much interrupted winter trial service between Lochboisdale and Mallaig service.
Residents of Barra, meanwhile, said they would like more summer sailings.
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