Steerpike Steerpike

SNP ferries fiasco prompts rationing warnings

(Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

In the fevered imaginations of some Remainiacs, Britain’s supermarkets are permanently bare, as Brexit-related supply shortages prompt an absence of the bountiful goods we once enjoyed in the EU. But there is one place in the UK where such dystopian fantasies have now indeed become a reality. Unfortunately for the more boss-eyed of Boris’s critics, it’s nowhere in Leave-voting England. Rather such shortages are now happening on certain windswept Scots islands, where the long-suffering local residents are enduring the effects of the SNP government’s woeful incompetence.

Today’s The Herald on Sunday splashes on the news that shops on certain islands in the Hebrides have been forced to ration essential items owing to widespread ferry cancellations due to a broken down vessel. The newspaper reports residents’ complaints of food shortages being iimposed by local sellers, with islanders restricted to just a carton of milk and one loaf of bread during the most recent ferry breakdown. Scottish Government-controlled ferry operator CalMac is being held responsible for the shortages. Its ageing ship which serves these routes, MV Hebrides, is one of the oldest in the CalMac fleet and has been taken out of service three times in three weeks because of an issue with its firefighting system. Its loss led to major disruption for three days of two routes between Uig on Skye, Lochmaddy on North Uist and Tarbert on Harris.

The disruption, combined with strong winds, mean far fewer sailings have take place in recent weeks than planned. There are now serious concerns about locals getting essential goods, with islands like South Uist reliant on a daily lorry crossing to supply shops and more than 1,700 inhabitants. The Outer Hebrides Tourism group told the Herald that there is ‘no fresh food in supermarkets’ while John Peteranna of the Lochboisdale Ferry Business Impact Group complained that ‘You cannot get more than one carton of milk in each shop.

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