Rob Edwards

Highland agency under fire for ‘bad practice’ over mountain railway

from Sunday Herald, 28 February 2010

One of Scotland’s leading enterprise agencies will this week be accused of “unacceptable bad practice” for wasting up to £27 million of public money on the doomed Cairngorm mountain railway.

The Scottish Parliament’s Public Audit Committee will launch a scathing attack on Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) for failing to properly control spending on the controversial funicular railway, which has been repeatedly baled out by taxpayers’ money.

In a report, a copy of which has been leaked to the Sunday Herald, the committee will also criticise HIE for continuing to offer an “open-ended commitment” to funding the funicular. It will demand new controls to ensure that more major cost overruns are not incurred in the future.

The funicular railway, which runs nearly all the way to the summit of Britain’s fifth highest mountain near Aviemore, has been plagued with problems since it was first proposed in the early 1990s (see below). Lack of visitors has meant that it has struggled to make money.

There were many years without enough snow for skiers. But even when there has been plenty of snow, like this winter, the railway has been forced to close because it cannot cope with adverse weather.

The funicular has been shut down for 19 days since the start of this year, frustrating thousands of would-be skiers. This weekend it is closed again, with roads, car parks and buildings submerged under huge piles of drifting snow, after falls of up to two metres.

How Scotland’s peat bogs could help save the planet

from Sunday Herald, 28 February 2010

They’re muddy, vast and flat, but they could have a crucial role to play in preventing climate chaos.

The black peat bogs that blanket two million hectares of Scotland are the key to cutting the pollution that is warming the globe, according to expert new research.

A major programme to restore the nation’s peatlands could save a massive 2.4 million tonnes of carbon a year - more than all the planned reductions in emissions from the transport sector. This would enable the Scottish government to meet its ambitious targets to cut pollution.

Peat bogs store a huge amount of carbon. According to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), which brings together governments, environmental groups and scientists, Scotland’s bogs contain over three billion tonnes of carbon.

The problem is that landowners in the past have cut long drainage ditches through the peat for forestry plantations and agriculture. As the peat dries out, the carbon that has been locked up for thousands of years leaks into the atmosphere.

Council accused over Trump school sponsorship

from Caledonian Mercury, 23 February 2010

Aberdeenshire Council has been accused of breaking its own rules on commercial sponsorship by allowing Donald Trump to fund sport and nature activities at a local primary school.

The US property tycoon has helped pay for a football strip bearing his name and a climbing wall for Balmedie school. The school is near where he plans to build his controversial £1 billion golf, hotel and housing resort. 

Trump has also involved children from the school in planting grass on the sand dunes where the proposed golf course is sited. This is despite claims from environmentalists that the grass will ruin the dunes.

“I'm very angry that well-intentioned young people and teachers have been misused for a publicity stunt for the Trump Organisation,” said the Green MSP, Robin Harper.

“If Aberdeenshire Council didn't realise what they were doing they should be ashamed of themselves, but they have been engaged in this controversy long enough to know that this should not have been done.”

The scandal of the £122m not spent on greening the UK

from Sunday Herald, 21 February 2010

A massive £122 million of public grants meant to help cut pollution and save energy across the UK have been unclaimed, resulting in tens of thousands of households, businesses and other organisations missing out on chances to reduce their fuel costs.

The UK government has been accused of “shameful incompetence” and a “catalogue of failure” for allowing such a huge underspend on such crucial funding schemes. Poor promotion and the wrong criteria for giving grants are blamed.

The Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) in London have released figures showing underspend figures for three key “environmental transformation” funds in response to a freedom of information request by the Liberal Democrat Party. Over the last three years, 80% of the £152 million budgeted has not been spent.

The LIbDem Scottish spokesman, Alistair Carmichael MP, attacked the Labour leadership for failing Scotland on jobs and the environment. “Gordon Brown claimed these funds would create jobs and develop green technologies, but now we find the vast majority of the money never reached the people who needed it,” he told the Sunday Herald.

 

“This kind of incompetence is shameful when we have rising unemployment and a pressing need to cut emissions. Real investment in renewables would help to create employment and reduce Scotland's carbon footprint.”

Revealed: the crisis of confidence within Scotland’s wildlife watchdog

from Sunday Herald, 21 February 2010

The government agency tasked with protecting Scotland’s precious wildlife and landscapes is in deep trouble, according to internal documents obtained by the Sunday Herald.

Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) has suffered a severe and escalating crisis of confidence and has lost the support of its staff. There is growing concern that nature conservation is slipping down the agenda of senior managers and Scottish ministers.

The latest survey of SNH’s 900 staff reveals that only a third of them had confidence in the organisation’s future, or its top management. And only a little over a half thought that their employer deserved their loyalty.

Although SNH managers insist that things have got better since the survey, insiders and critics say that the malaise infecting the agency has actually got worse. The leadership shown by the SNH board was described by one former board member as “insipid”.

Plague of 'super lice' threatens wild salmon

from Caledonian Mercury, 16 February 2010

Wild salmon and trout populations in Scotland are under threat from a plague of ‘super lice’ at Norwegian fish farms, angling groups have warned.

Salmon farms in Norway have suffered from a huge rise of infestations by sea lice, which are becoming increasingly resistant to pesticides. The lice spread to wild fish, weakening and killing them.

Scottish anglers fear that the super lice will spread to Scotland’s fish farms, then deplete the nation’s vulnerable wild stocks. The prospects for wild salmon and trout are “deeply worrying”, they say.

Norway is the world’s biggest producer of farmed Atlantic salmon, producing around 865,000 tonnes a year. Scotland is second, with about 133,000 tonnes a year.

But the Scottish government wants to expand production by about a third - a prospect that is greeted with alarm by the Sea Trout Group. The group was set up by the Scottish Anglers National Association and the Salmon and Trout Association in 1997 to campaign for more controls on fish farming.

MoD in breach of information law on nuclear weapons

Exclusive, 15 February 2010

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has broken freedom of information law by delaying a response on the safety of nuclear weapons, according to a new ruling from the UK information tsar.

The MoD has been rapped by the Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham, for taking more than five months to reply to a request for six reports on nuclear weapons safety.

Graham has ruled that even in complex cases responses should always be made with 40 working days. The MoD, he said, had breached section 17(3) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 “by failing to provide the complainant with its public interest determination within such time as is reasonable”.

But in other cases the MoD is taking over 14 or 15 months to respond to requests for information on the safety of operations at the Clyde nuclear submarine bases. This has led to accusations that it is trying to hide inconvenient truths.

Failure to ban snares splits SNP

from Sunday Herald, 14 February 2010

The refusal of Scottish Nationalist ministers to abide by party policy and ban the snaring of wild animals has sparked growing discontent within the ranks of the SNP.

One party official has resigned in disgust, others are known to be unhappy and several SNP MSPs have signalled their opposition. Snaring, they say, is cruel and inhumane, sometimes forcing innocent animals to slowly strangle themselves.

Snares are thin wire slip nooses used by gamekeepers to trap foxes and other animals to try and prevent them killing pheasants or grouse. The aim is to ensure that there are plenty of birds to be shot by paying visitors.

But animal welfare campaigners say the traps inflict pain and death on other animals that get caught, like badgers, mountain hares and household pets. It is impossible to police their use, they argue.

Following pressure from members, the SNP’s national council agreed a motion in December 2008 calling on ministers to review their decision not to ban snares. But this has been ignored by the government, which instead has just published new rules tightening up on the use of snares, but not outlawing them.