We should expect better than this

I cannot let Alistair Carmichael’s comments in last week’s Shetland Times go unanswered.

Instead of joining with others in Scotland to condemn the UK Governments to allocate only 8 per cent of the Fisheries Fund to Scotland, he is pursuing an entirely mischievous argument that Shetland has not received a larger share of the Scottish Fisheries Fund.

It is a red herring. Pun intended.

The UK fund is sub allocated via population size to each of the devolved governments. Under the current UK proposal, Scotland can never get more than 8 per cent of the total. This is unfair and another demonstration of a broken Westminster system that is not working.

In contrast, the Scottish Fisheries Fund is merit based. Shetland applied for 40 projects last year and was awarded 32. That’s 80 per cent success rate.

In fact, if Shetland continues to submit good project applications there is no upper limit as to what share of the Scottish Fund Shetland can receive. It is very much up to us.

Alistair of course knows this and is just trying to make cheap political points out of a serious issue that we should all be working together to address. We should expect better than this.

Hannah Mary Goodlad
SNP candidate for Holyrood