A Kilcreggan ferry users group has been formed to keep up pressure after last week’s news that the beleaguered service will finally be taken away from Clydelink.
Clyde Marine are due to take back the service in July following years of problems since Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT) gave the contract to Clydelink in 2012.
But a public meeting at Craigrownie Church in Cove yesterday heard that SPT still did not know which vessel Clyde Marine would use.
Rev Christine Murdoch said she had called the meeting to focus on the future and allow the public to have a say and put forward ideas, 48 hours after SPT’s decision.
“I happened to be on the ferry on Friday and was asking the crew how they felt – these men do face an uncertain future so they should be in our thoughts because whatever has happened with the ferry it’s not their fault, it is the way it has been managed,” she said.
“Hopefully Transport Scotland will be taking over the ferry – what will our demands and our requests be for Transport Scotland and how do we keep the momentum going?”
MSP Jackie Baillie, who last year organised a petition and a debate at Holyrood to highlight the ferry problems, thanked all the politicians and members of the public who had called for changes, as well as SPT for the contract decision last week.
“Today is great because it’s an occasion for celebration because there is a bit of light at the end of the tunnel, but it’s what we do now that matters,” she added.
“Clyde Marine doesn’t start until July – that’s quite a long time away, that’s an awful lot of ferry journeys that may or may not go well, so we need to be vigilant with the current contract.
“I know people are being issued tickets that are on scraps of paper, that’s simply not acceptable, there is a job to do in holding the current contractor to account and reporting incidents to SPT
“I am hopeful that if things go badly wrong then perhaps the new contractor might assume their duties sooner.”
She said that the Scottish Government spent ‘oodles of money’ on ferries, and its budget for ferries had increased by 150% in recent years.
“They have got lots of money available for stuff like this,” she said.
“We need to get Humza Yousaf focused on what he is going to do to transfer this service.
“He will be doing us a favour, doing SPT a favour and indeed it makes sense for it to be part of the Scottish Government’s ferries portfolio.”
Community councillor John Auld said the Rosneath Peninsula was a ‘hidden gem’ in terms of tourism and there was potential for the ferry to connect with cycleways at Gourock, and stronger contacts with Inverclyde were needed in planning the future – Inverclyde councillors Graeme Brooks and David Wilson made the long journey by road to attend the meeting.
“It is very clear to me that the past is the past, the way that the Kilcreggan ferry is going to go forward is quite simple, the community has got to make a success of it from now on,” said Mr Auld.
“The community has got to raise the passenger numbers and we as a community have got to drop the negativity towards the ferry and anything associated with it and make it a success.
“There is potential for the village and the community and whole of the Rosneath Peninsula to make a great success of that ferry because SPT have put in a terrific amount of money into supporting our community, and that is not to be sneezed at
“There are tremendous opportunities for tourism and everything else, but until then we can actually make sure we are not seen to be whingers, complainers or anything else.”
Cllr Brooks said that people on both sides of the Clyde needed a service that was reliable and there might be potential for it to b marketed to Duke of Edinburgh’s award youngsters and other groups such as Boys Brigades.
“How many people in my community use the ferry?” he said.
“Only the ones who have to use it .Wouldn’t it be great if we could encourage others to come across, to use the facilities and enjoy the space here on the peninsula.”
Nick Davies, who as chairman of Cove and Kilcreggan Community Council has taken a leading role in lobbying for improvements to the ferry, said SPT had told him that the service cost three times as much as the average bus contract and the equivalent of 50% of all the bus services on Arran.
“I think that SPT have actually done us proud in this contract by how much they have invested in order to get a better contractor,” he said.
“I am quite certain SPT would rather not be running this contract.
“Notwithstanding that the minister and Scottish Government seem to be dragging their feet, we need to keep up the pressure on the Scottish Government to take over this contract in the longer term.
“The more we can get people using this ferry service the better.”
Rona Grierson, who relies on the ferry to get to work and spent more than £2,000 on a 12-month zonecard, said: “When you are going on about cost, it has cost me a lot of money to use the ferry and the ferry not to be running.
“I bought a yearly ticket to Glasgow and for maybe 40 days it was no use this year.”
And Andrew King, who was born and brought up in Gourock then returned to live in Cove two years ago, said he was shocked by how the ferry service had deteriorated, with no Sunday sailings.
“It is fine for able-bodied people who work, but since I moved here my old dad has never been able to visit me because he can’t manage it with his sticks,” he said.
In response to a direct question from the audience, neither of the SPT board members present would say which vessel would be used when Clyde Marine took over the service this summer.
Cllr Wilson said this was an operational matter, but assured the meeting: “We are satisfied that Captain Munro (of Clyde Marine) can provide a boat that will give you an excellent service.”
Clyde Marine’s tender was for an annual subsidy of £325,000, which is a 31% increase on the most recent Clydelink contract and slightly lower than the unsuccessful tender submitted by Clyde Marine in 2012, when the Greenock company was undercut, so in terms of providing an effective service the new contract could be seen as a reduction rather than an increase in spending.
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