Calmac would an absolute disaster to operate an international route from Rosyth.
Calmac Ferries Ltd are owned by David McBrayne Ltd who are owned by the Scottish Government ministers.
Therefore Calmac Ferries Limited are owned by the Scottish Government with their management and staff effectively being Scottish Government civil servants.
The Calmac bosses do as they are told by the Scottish Government Transport minister and when the SG Transport minister says ‘jump’ they reply ‘how high’.
What about the NEW Calmac ferry that is now five years behind launch schedule ?
Scotland used to build the largest and best ships in the world, now we can't even build a Ferry !
The latest information about the MV Glen Sannox in in another topic I set up last night.
I received a tip off about four years ago that the main problem with the New Calmac ferries the Glen Sannox and Hull 802 is that they are being powered with an unproven propulsion system to pander to Patrick Harvie and the Greens.
Remember Micola needs their votes to get her annual Scottish Government budget and other controversial bills passed.
The engines are LNG and diesel powered. LNG tanks are being installed at Ardrossan and Uig on Skye at a cost of £8 million however that will probably increase in price due to inflation.
It has recently been reported that the ferry crossings between Ardrossan to Brodick and Uig to Tarbert/Lochmaddy are too short to obtain any benefit from using the LNG powered engines.
The bosses at CMAL never learn by their mistakes.
At the first virtual meeting in January 2021 for the new Calmac Islay ferry Jim Anderson the Chief engineer stated that their preference for the new Islay Ferry was for it to be powered by LNG but they could not source a new LNG powered engine anywhere in the world.
You would have thought that after the Glen Sannox and Hull 802 fiascos they would have learnt their lesson but sadly not.
There is a simple reason for that.
In September 2017 I received a ‘tip off’ that Jim McColl the owner of Ferguson’s Shipyard at that time was paying off skilled Scottish workers and replacing them with cheap foreign workers from Eastern Europe who were bussed in before their working day and bussed home after the end of their working day.
You get what you pay for!