News / Fears over Fetlar breakwater funding
PRESSURE is mounting to start work on a breakwater and pier for one of Shetland’s most fragile islands before European funding is lost for the second time in a row.
Work to start building the new marine facility on Fetlar was due to start in April, but has been held back by red tape.
Now councillors are worried the £3 million project could lose £300,000 of European funding if builders are not on site by the end of this calendar year.
Yesterday (Thursday) Shetland Islands Council’s head of business development Douglas Irvine said that work must commence before the end of the year or the EU cash would be lost, but confirmed that it could not start this summer.
Funding was lost two years ago because of hold ups in the project, which is seen as a key to developing the island which is fighting against depopulation.
Council officials were in Fetlar yesterday trying to resolve a dispute with a local farmer over the purchase of land in the area.
Delays have also been caused by a change of plan to use local aggregate rather than importing it from Unst, requiring a new environmental impact assessment and planning application to be processed.
Local councillor Laura Baisley said: “I was really hoping work could start this September but that looks like it won’t happen now.
“We lost the European money the first time because we couldn’t start the work in time, it would be awful to lose it again, but I would like to believe that we will see work going on within the next six months.”
Fetlar development worker Robert Thomson said that if everybody involved focussed their minds on completing the preparatory work, construction should be able to go ahead before the funding was lost.
The island’s population has risen by almost 50 per cent in the past year thanks to new blood moving in and former residents returning, after numbers fell to 48 last year.
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