SCOTTISH Secretary Michael Forsyth will open the #23m Skye toll
bridge, breaking the tradition in which members of the royal family
perform such ceremonies.
Mr Forsyth will ''supervise'' the opening in ''mid-October'' which
will be performed by a local primary pupil who will have won a
competition organised by the bridge builders Miller/Dywidag. However,
the Minister's involvement in the ceremony will anger many islanders.
The Government decided some time ago that its flagship of private
sector road building should be opened by a Conservative Minister rather
than a member of the royal family.
A Buckingham Palace spokeswoman said last night that she had no idea
if a member of the royal family had been asked to perform the ceremony.
''You will have to ask those who are organising it,'' she added.
When asked why Mr Forsyth had been chosen, a Scottish Office spokesman
said: ''Because he was invited by the bridge builders.''
A spokeswoman for Miller Dywidag and the Skye Bridge Company, which
will operate the bridge and collect the highest tolls in Europe of more
than #5, agreed: ''We did invite Mr Forsyth. As long as I have been
associated with the project it was always going to be a ministerial
opening.
''It has been a Scottish Office show from the start. They would have
decided if they wanted a member of the royal family.
Mrs Kathleen MacRae, treasurer of the Skye Bridge Appeal Group, last
night said:''There is a very limited number of people who could perform
the ceremony without the words sticking in their throats. But I am sure
Mr Forsyth will have no difficulty in justifying the imposition of this
high toll bridge on the people of Skye.''
She added: ''He is always going on about the extra taxes that other
parties are proposing in their policies, so maybe he could tell us why
he is so much in favour of the extra taxes that everybody here will have
to pay.''
It is traditional for major bridge projects to be opened by a member
of the royal family: for example, the Forth road bridge was opened by
the Queen; the Tay road, Kingston, Kessock, and Dornoch bridges were all
opened by the Queen Mother and the Erskine bridge was opened by the then
Princess Anne in 1971.
Bridge to Bute -- Page 7
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