News / “Highly questionable and potentially dangerous”
SHETLAND Islands Council is to join the growing list of organisations condemning government plans to close ten of the UK’s 18 coastguard stations as part of a modernisation and cost cutting drive.
Of the remaining eight stations only two would operate full time. The station in Lerwick would either close, with the loss of 22 jobs, or be downgraded to a day-time sub-centre.
The SIC has now convened a special meeting to discuss its formal response to the consultation, although council convener Sandy Cluness has been outspoken against these plans since they were first published in December, leading a delegation of conveners to meet shipping minister Mike Penning last month.
The government also plans to drop the contract for the emergency towing vessels stationed around the UK, remove the Nimrod maritime patrol aircraft, and review the fire fighting at sea capability.
The move has created an outcry across the isles where every community and almost every family has a close relationship with the sea.
Councillors will meet on Tuesday to discuss their response. There is likely to be unanimous support for the view that “the downgrading or closure of MRCC Shetland (is) a highly questionable and potentially dangerous prospect”.
SIC harbour master Roger Moore and environmental liaison officer John Mouat have spent the last few weeks drawing together a report that covers all angles of the threatened closure, including its socio-economic impact.
They said that losing the coastguard staff employed in Shetland would result in the loss of £750,000 leaving the local economy. Losing the emergency towing vessel would withdraw a further £275,000.
Quoting a series of telecom outages during 2010, they question the assumption that centralising the coastguard service would increase resilience.
“Bitter experience has shown that centralised call centres do not deliver the best service and have, at times, placed individuals in greater harm.
“The NHS 24 call centre has regularly tasked medical response to the wrong settlements of similar names and occasionally to the wrong island groups.
“The FiReControl system for England and Wales, which effectively proposed centralised call centres, has cost the public purse £435 million with ongoing costs even though the system has now been scrapped.
“Comparisons to air traffic control centralisation only highlight the need for local stations.”
They added: “The removal of 22 experienced and qualified coastguard officers will result in a reduction in resilience for Shetland. It would leave the islands particularly vulnerable to communications failures between here and the mainland.
“The current station provides many benefits to the local community and marine users. The ability to talk directly to local Coastguard officers to get advice and to respond to Traffic Reports (TR’s) is much valued and potentially helps to stop accidents happening in the first place.
“The loss of the station would be detrimental in this regard, especially for leisure and small boat users that do not have sophisticated equipment onboard.
“The station also allows a liaison officer from other blue light services to be present e.g. the Greenpeace incident with the Stena Carron where a police officer was located in the Coastguard station.
“The local knowledge that the station officers provide in tasking local assets to allow emergency services to reach the more remote islands, in all weathers, cannot be over stated.”
Earlier this week, MCA managers were left in no doubt that their proposals were not welcome when they hosted a public meeting at the Lerwick town hall, which was attended by more than 100 people.
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