A MULTI-MILLION-POUND bidding war has begun for the right to host lifeline ferry services to Arran and put two council at odds.

Last week the owners of Troon harbour made an unexpected bid to lure the service away from its traditional home at Ardrossan – in return for making an investment of £8m in the port.

But now the company which owns Ardrossan has countered with an offer to plough unspecified millions into its port if it gets to keep the ferries.

The rival offers come as traffic to and from the island booms. More than 800,000 people took one of the 5,000 return crossings between Ardrossan – which, though dated, has its own rail terminal – and Brodick on Arran last year.

The local council in the Clyde coast town – North Ayrshire – has warned that losing the service, and all the extra through traffic it brings, would be close to “cataclysmic”. South Ayrshire Council, however, has championed the rival bid, from Troon harbour’s owners Associated British Ports (ABP).

ABP has offered £8m of its own cash to upgrade the Troon infrastructure, which was mothballed after the company lost a seasonal ferry service to Northern Ireland.

This, they said, would provide a state-of-the-art facility for new and more reliable dual-fuel ferries due to start plying the route in 2018. Supporters of Troon have suggested that the Scottish Government would have to pay for new infrastructure in Ardrossan.

However, The Sunday Herald can reveal that the owners of Ardrossan, Peel Ports, have indicated they, too, will pay up, provided they can be sure their port will keep the service,

Gary Hodgson, the company’s chief operating officer, said: “A long-term commitment to maintain the ferry on the fastest, shortest and cheapest route would be the catalyst for Peel Ports launching a multi-million pound investment programme at Ardrossan.

“We’re working closely with North Ayrshire Council on plans to completely transform the marine infrastructure and the passenger facilities, matching the world-class vessels which will sail the route from 2018.”

It will be up to Transport Minister Humza Yousaf to make a final decision. Both sides acknowledge that Ardrossan is nearer to Brodick than Troon. A round trip would take some 45 minutes longer from Troon than from Ardrossan – and anyone arriving for the ferry by train would have a longer journey from the station to the port.

The longer trip would also add to costs, argue supporters of Ardrossan. A round-trip for a lorry, they say, would cost nearly £30 more. It is not clear whether passengers or the government would have to pick up that extra bill.

The SNP’s flagship Road Equivalent Tariff (RET) scheme – which cut car and lorry fares to the same price they would pay to drive the distance – has seen traffic rise on the ferry by 40 per cent for vehicles. But a longer distance crossing would, by the logic of RET, mean higher fares.

ABP, however, counters that its harbour is more reliable. Andrew Harston, one of its senior managers, suggested that the people of Arran had too long “been at the mercy of the weather”.

However, executives at the ferry company which operates the route, state-owned, Calmac cast doubt on this claim. In documents seen by the Sunday Herald one states: “The weather that affects Ardrossan, affects Troon”.

According to logs from Ardrossan harbour, the Arran ferry has been cancelled 298 times since August 2015. Of those, some 126 were technical faults with the ship itself. Another 130 was because of high winds in excess of 35 knots when all vessels had to head for shelter, the port of Gourock, not Troon. Fog accounted for 16 missing sailings and “other weather” for 26.

Supporters of Ardrossan are sceptical that any of the weather events would have left Troon unaffected.

North Ayrshire Council leader Joe Cullinane hopes an upgraded ferry port could kickstart the regeneration of Ardrossan, where the unemployment level is twice the national average. He said: “We believe this equates to a national scale regeneration project.

“The removal of the ferry terminal would see the loss of this momentum, further urban dereliction in Ardrossan and the loss of at least 165 jobs in the area.”