Major update on plans for TUNNEL between Scottish islands revealed

A report also called for more to be done to enhance ferry services
LINKING UP Major update on plans for TUNNEL between Scottish islands revealed
COUNCIL leaders have issued a major update on plans for tunnels being constructed between Scottish islands.
The tunnels would permanently link four of the furthest away islands, meaning locals and tourists wouldn't need to rely on ferries.
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The tunnels would run underground and link four of the Shetland islands
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This includes Bressay, Unst, Whalsay and Yell
Credit: Getty
They would be constructed underground and would connect four of the Shetland Isles.
These include the islands of Bressay, Unst, Whalsay and Yell, which sit around 105 miles off the northeast of the mainland in he heart of the North Sea.
According to The Herald, a study is now being prepared for officials to consider and will outline the plans in detail.
A new strategy report is also set to make the case for increased investment in different travel facilities between the islands.
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This will include the harbours and ferries as well as the proposed plans for the underground tunnels.
Shetland Islands Council met this week to discuss a Strategic Outline Case (SOC) report and agreed to approve it.
Tunnelling in Shetland is, ultimately, about future-proofing our island population
Councillor Emma Macdonald
They also agreed to fund a study that would further examine the capabilities of the fixed links, both commercially and financially.
This is expected to help councillors consider the future steps that may be required to help the plans move forward.
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The report also called for more to be done to enhance ferry services for Fetlar, Foula, Papa Stour and Skerries.
Councillors have said that this is a "significant" step forward and said the tunnels would be a way to 'future-proof' their communities that are suffering from dwindling population.
Inside eerie hidden tunnels beneath busy street in Glasgow city centre
Council Leader, Councillor Emma Macdonald, told The Herald: 'Tunnelling in Shetland is, ultimately, about future-proofing our island population.
'Transport connectivity is central to creating sustainable islands which provide good homes and good jobs for our people, and which can reverse decades of depopulation.
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'The experience of our neighbours in the Faroe Islands is clear - tunnelling from mainland Shetland to our outer islands could increase their population, lower their average age, and increase their economic prospects.'
Tunnels have the potential to be transformative for Shetland's economy and our communities... I am glad that progress is being made
Isles MP Alistair Carmichael
She added: 'It's also critical that we continue to invest in a resilient and reliable ferry service to support all our islands.
'The council has today approved this latest recommendation, and as a result, this represents a significant step towards the construction of tunnels between our islands.'
Isles MP Alistair Carmichael also said that the tunnels could transform Shetland's economy and said "now is the time to deliver".
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He continued: 'We have seen a few false dawns on tunnels for Shetland – now is the time to deliver on their promise.
"I am glad that the Council is putting investment into this project to move it to the next stage.
'The Stantec report made it clear that the choice is between either investing further in the ferry service or in fixed links.
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"That means that tunnels can no longer be dismissed as the 'high cost' option relative to ferries, which is good news as we go into the next stage of development.
'Tunnels have the potential to be transformative for Shetland's economy and our communities.
"It has been a long road just to reach this point and there is still a long way to go but I am glad that progress is being made.
"I look forward to working with the Council and indeed with the UK and Scottish governments to keep up the momentum.'
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Defence Scotland: SNP told to urgently rethink 'mad' strategy as internal fears grow

Scotsman

3 hours ago

Scotsman

Defence Scotland: SNP told to urgently rethink 'mad' strategy as internal fears grow

Sign up to our Politics newsletter Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... As governments across the globe grapple with the most dangerous international landscape in a generation, John Swinney is under pressure to allow the SNP to have its first proper debate on where it stands on defence in more than a decade. The alternative risk is of his party 'falling behind' and Scotland potentially missing out on crucial investment. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The defence, aerospace and security industry is estimated to be worth around £3.2 billion to Scotland. The Ministry of Defence spends more than £2bn each year with Scottish industry. The forward section of Type 26 Frigate HMS Cardiff is rolled out from the SBOH at BAE Systems Shipyard in Govan, Scotland. Picture: John Linton/BAE Systems/Royal Navy | John Linton Despite conflict still raging on the European continent and the situation in the Middle East still resulting in lives, including children, being lost every day, the SNP has not had a proper debate about where it stands on defence policy since 2012. Instead a position to block investments perceived to be linked to munitions and an unassailable opposition to the Trident nuclear weapons system, located on the Clyde, are the SNP's flagship defence policies. UK to boost defence spending With Sir Keir Starmer's UK government committing to spend 5 per cent of its GDP on defence by 2035, the SNP has come under intense pressure to shift its long-held opposition to spending public funds on the 'manufacture of weapons or munitions', with a perception Scottish ministers are turning their back on the wider defence industry. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad It is understood Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes, who also holds the economy brief, is keen for a rethink on her government's and her party's position. The Prime Minister visited the BAE shipyard in Govan earlier this month to announce his strategic defence review, with an ambition to 'build a fighting force that is more integrated, more ready, more lethal than ever' and 'innovate and accelerate innovation to a wartime pace'. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer speaks during a visit to BAE Systems in Govan, Glasgow, to launch the strategic defence review. Picture: Andy Buchanan/PA Wire Sir Keir also stressed he was 'using this moment to drive jobs and investment', including six new munitions factories and 1,000 new jobs. The Faslane submarine facility on the Clyde will receive £250m of investment as part of a UK government boost announced in Chancellor Rachel Reeves's spending review. Row over welding investment Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Last month, it emerged the economic development agency, Scottish Enterprise, refused to support plans for a new specialist welding centre over fears it could be used to support the building of Royal Navy submarines. Ferguson Marine, which SNP ministers nationalised in 2019, has taken on contracts to construct Royal Navy vessels. The Scottish National Investment Bank, set up by SNP ministers in 2020, 'does not invest in organisations that are primarily engaged in the manufacture of munitions or weapons'. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Former SNP MP Stewart McDonald, who spent almost five years as the party's defence spokesperson at Westminster from 2017 to 2022, has warned 'the party needs to have a defence debate again'. Speaking to The Scotsman, he said: 'It hasn't had a proper defence debate since 2012 when we changed the policy on Nato. 'All of this is moving at such pace. The entire international picture is moving at such a rapid pace and if we are a party that seeks to be an independent state - and an independent state in Nato and the EU - then we should have stuff to say on this.' Former SNP defence spokesperson Stewart McDonald Mr McDonald warned 'there is a risk the party falls behind in that debate'. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad He said: 'That's a debate that is going on in capitals all across Europe. And although Edinburgh is not a state capital, the Scottish Government has a role to play as a domestic partner. SNP's 'awkward' defence stance 'We have an industry in Scotland worth many billions of pounds, employs somewhere between 33,000 and 35,000 people and it has a very awkward relationship with the Scottish Government - it has done so for a very long time.' Mr McDonald has suggested Mr Swinney should gather the major and smaller defence employers in Scotland, 'get the defence procurement minister up from London and say 'how do I marshal the resources of the government, spending, policy, legislative, to better support this industry?'.' READ MORE: BAE Systems funding provides 300 jobs boost for Scottish shipyards Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The former SNP MP added: 'At a time of heightened international conflict, Scotland's defence industry has a part to play. 'I understand there's a bit of political balancing to be done here, but I think that can be over-thought and over-egged. We do live in much more dangerous times and there's a risk we are just saying the same stuff we've been saying for a long time - and that just would not be credible to stand still politically as the entire world changes around you.' Mr McDonald branded the Scottish Enterprise ban on investments relating to munitions 'a stupid policy' and hit out at the restrictions in place for the Scottish National Investment Bank. He said: 'Defence is the one industry that has enormous growth happening in it right now and that's not likely to end time soon. So why should our National Investment Bank not invest in it? Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'It's entirely normal in every other country in Europe or the world for your national institutions to support your national interests, including your national security interests. So why is the Scottish National Investment Bank not doing that? I think that's mad.' Vanguard-class submarine HMS Vigilant, one of the UK's four nuclear warhead-carrying submarines, at HM Naval Base Clyde at Faslane | PA Asked whether the SNP needs to revisit whether it opposes Trident, Mr McDonald warned opening up that debate 'would just be self-indulgent' and 'would just say the same thing it's always said'. He said: 'I think it could better focus its attention on other parts of the defence discussion. The reality is it can't move Trident off the Clyde. 'There are areas they can focus on and have genuine positive consequences - working with industry around development of skills. The defence industry really felt that after Brexit.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Labour Glasgow MSP Paul Sweeney, who before entering politics was an arm reservist and Clyde shipbuilder, has branded the SNP's position "really frustrating'. Mr Sweeney first came up against a brick wall trying to encourage Rolls Royce to use Scotland to manufacture small modular nuclear reactors. There was opposition to such a move, even if the reactors weren't being used in Scotland where there is a de-facto ban on nuclear power stations being built due to the SNP's hostility to the technology. 'Bizarre' SNP position Mr Sweeney acknowledged the Scottish Government had previously supported defence industries in Scotland. But he has been left aghast at the decision to block investment in the welding facility. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad He said: 'I found the decision of Scottish Enterprise to indicate to Rolls Royce that they would not be able to support grant funding for the naval welding facility extremely bizarre. Labour MSP Paul Sweeney | Supplied 'It's clearly on the back of pressure over comments made by the former first minister Humza Yousaf. There was a recent debate at the Scottish Parliament by the Greens on this stuff.' Mr Sweeney added: 'It's a misnomer to conflate foreign policy issues with domestic security and defence requirements. 'There is a logical absurdity of suggesting that this is about defence exports to unsavoury regimes, when it's primarily about our domestic national security and defence in the context of a pretty fraught geopolitical situation. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'I find the context of this somewhat delusional and frustrating. I think it's fair to say there's certainly a split within the SNP about this.' The MSP insisted that BAE Systems on the Clyde, where he previously worked, 'has no involvement with any regime suspected of human rights abuses', adding 'there's no association with the Israel-Palestine issue'. Protesters form a blockade outside BAE Systems in Govan Picture: Jane Barlow/PA Wire Mr Sweeney said: 'They do not issue vessels for export to those territories - they never have. There is no obvious connection. 'It's also deeply reckless rhetoric in the context of the need to expand the Royal Navy and expand our domestic shipbuilding programme.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The Glasgow MSP warned the Scottish Government's opposition 'creates a problem for investment in Scotland that doesn't exist anywhere else in the UK'. He said: 'There's a nervousness about Scotland - there's a more volatile risk of being caught on the horns of a political argument.' Scottish Liberal Democrat MSP Jamie Greene has penned a letter to the Deputy First Minister, Ms Forbes, insisting 'the Scottish Government must also play its part in realising that economic potential' of the defence sector. Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes | PA He added: 'That means creating the right environment for jobs and investment as well as tackling obstacles that could otherwise dampen those opportunities. At the moment there are worrying gaps in Scotland's skills pipeline.' Norwegian potential Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad BAE Systems are building Type 26 frigates for the Royal Navy including HMS Belfast and HMS Birmingham in Govan. More investment could be on its way to the Govan shipyard, with the Norwegian government reportedly keen to purchase Type 26 frigates. Defence Secretary John Healey has told MPs he has 'been working hard to persuade the Norwegians' about taking on the frigates. In response to parliamentary questions, Ms Forbes, in an apparent acknowledgment of the benefits to the economy, has stressed the 'potential industrial and employment opportunities for Scotland are significant' if Norway does press ahead with Clyde-built frigates. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad She said: 'Officials from the UK and Scottish governments have held constructive informal discussions around how the bid might be best supported.' A Scottish Government source suggested SNP ministers 'want to move on it', but are wrestling with how to 'manage it within the party'. The insider added: 'Some people find it exasperating and peculiar. It's just a bit out of place now in the new reality we are in.' When the Scottish Enterprise row emerged earlier this month, Mr Swinney told journalists he was sticking to his guns. He said: 'We have a policy position on the use of Scottish public expenditure for the manufacture of munitions. We apply that consistently and that remains the Government's position.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad But speaking on the Holyrood Sources podcast this week, he opened the door to a change of heart, stating that 'issues can be reconsidered'.

Scottish Government officials accused of censoring experts who warned Gaelic will die out

Scotsman

3 hours ago

Scotsman

Scottish Government officials accused of censoring experts who warned Gaelic will die out

The creative ambiguity from Keir Starmer is now rapidly breaking down

The National

4 hours ago

The National

The creative ambiguity from Keir Starmer is now rapidly breaking down

Nobody, I think, would be at risk of mistaking Sir Keir Starmer for this kind of easy character. He doesn't even have superficial charm. But his political career demonstrates a keen awareness of the importance of telling the audience in front of you what you think it wants to hear, even if that message is wildly at odds with what you might have said a couple of days, weeks, months or years earlier. For fans, I suppose you might describe this as evidence of Starmer's strategic flexibility. To critics, it looks like mendacity. They probably amount to the same thing. These days, savvy modern political analysis tends to assume people-pleasing ambiguity is what cunning political operators should do, particularly before elections. When everyone hates you a few months later, you can wisely look back and observe 'you campaign in poetry and govern in prose'. By then, everyone will have forgotten how prosaic your campaign really was. READ MORE: Scottish manufacturing firm announces 90 jobs face redundancy Roll out a platform of policies before an election, and you are guaranteed to get yourself mired in the details, some of which are likely to be less than fully worked through. Is this scheme fully costed? Are the costings credible? Have you fully thought through the eligibility requirements? If you commit to a particular platform, it's inevitable that your policies will both generate and alienate elements of your support. Almost all policy choices create winners and losers, and the losers may not be inclined to vote for you. Imagine Labour had included winter fuel cuts or Pip clawbacks and cuts in their manifesto. The reaction, I imagine, would have been interesting. And thus the conventional political wisdom says – don't give your enemies a large target. Be vague. Don't commit. As far as possible, don't specify. Deal in vibes instead. Speak of visions and moods and abstract goals. Talk about change by all means, but don't overcommit. Maintain a tight political silhouette. Stay ambiguous. By avoiding standing for anything in particular, there is much more scope for the voters – and indeed, parts of the media – to invent for themselves the details you have failed to fill in. If you have goodwill in your favour, or at least enough antipathy to your opponents to work with, your bland features and featureless policy platform will become a cluster of hopes and expectations. Present the voters with a blank canvas, and the electorate can project their aspirations and hopes on to you, without experiencing anything so discouraging as being alienated by your actual policy ideas or repelled by the principles you actually stand for. (Image: Jonathan Brady/PA Wire) The political cynicism of the press and general public adds a whole other layer to this because if people assume you're speaking out of both sides of your mouth, they might persuade themselves that they – unlike the credulous saps taken in by your fencing and hedging – know what your real intentions are, and happily suppose these real intentions align with their own political preferences. The easiest people to lie to are always those who want to be deceived, after all. And one of the most remarkable – and remarkably prevalent – thoughts about the incoming Starmer administration was the widespread belief, especially among its supporters, that it was basically lying to get elected, on everything from the economy to welfare to immigration. On immigration, I've lost count of the number of folk of more liberal persuasions on the issue who persuaded themselves, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that this embattled Labour administration would herald a shift in official attitudes towards refugee policy and immigration. This is just one area where the creative ambiguity which lifted Labour to power is now breaking down. When you elect to appoint someone from your party's hard right as your Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, who already has a track record of crying for 'crackdowns', you know what you're getting, even if it takes 12 months for everyone else to cotton on. Liz Kendall, you might not remember, stood for her party's leadership in 2015. Steered by Morgan McSweeney – now Starmer's eminence gris in Number 10, after the defenestration of Sue Gray, killed off in classic British establishment style with the pointy end of a peerage – the Kendall campaign secured a mighty 4.5% of the vote, trundling in in fourth place, despite widespread and apparently sympathetic boosting of her candidacy in the right-wing media, claiming that the Leicester MP would be the only Labour leadership candidate to 'strike fear' into Tory hearts, presumably because she'd be advocating a policy platform most of them would recognise. (Image: Dominic Lipinski/PA Wire) Disabled people have well-founded fears about what Kendall has in mind for them. I imagine the average Tory sleeps soundly in contemplation of this pint-sized terror. This last week suggests her Labour colleagues have been tossing and turning more anxiously of late. So, it seems, has Sir Keir. In an interview published in The Observer on Friday, Tom Baldwin outlined what he characterised as the 'private trials of Keir Starmer', using the tormented metaphor that like Downing Street's front door, Starmer can only be 'unlocked from within'. Baldwin advances the dubious thesis that Starmer has always been most effective when he is making and recognising his mistakes. 'Like someone crossing a minefield, he takes steps backwards, to the left and the right, before moving forward again,' Baldwin writes, claiming this 'may look inelegant or uninspiring, but it's still probably the best way of getting to the other side'. I don't know if Baldwin has any more experience than I do of traversing a killing zone packed with unexploded ordinance, but I'm not sure the lolloping slosh he describes is a particularly sound way of maintaining forward momentum with all your limbs intact – whether you're forging through the Korean Demilitarized Zone or attempting to survive as Prime Minister for more than a calendar year. But alongside the fawning dribble, Baldwin has tempted Starmer into making a series of fairly remarkable admissions in this interview. Baldwin's thesis, essentially, is that when Starmer – a man who claims he has no capacity for introspection, no favourite book, no favourite poem, no landscape of dreams – experiences a clash between the public and private dimensions of his life, emblematised by his front door, a self-pitying truculence surges up and dominates the Prime Minister's political responses. I may have editorialised a bit in this summary – but not by much. Take the first few months of Labour's time in office, dominated by the decision to prioritise cutting Winter Fuel Allowance, Downing Street turf wars over which henchperson should be the henchperson in chief, and uncontrolled briefing about just how many freebies different members of the new government were taking from donors and firms in the form of designer clothes, new specks, sports tickets and corporate hospitality. For this expenses scandal, Starmer blames the dirty-minded people of the press for dragging his wife into it, on the shabby pretext that Mrs S (or 'Lady Victoria Sponger' as some unsympathetic platforms described her) accepted a mere £5000 worth of contributions to her personal wardrobe from Labour donors. The problem, according to Starmer, is that he 'got emotionally involved', losing his usual 'calm' because 'they dragged Vic into it through no fault of her own'. Optics, he tells us, aren't 'substance', and if you think his family shouldn't be cashing in to the tune of thousands of pounds in expensive costumes, then he seems to think you're the one being insubstantial and optical. The adults are well and truly back in charge, as some of you centrist dads used to coo. The Labour leader also seems to blame emotion for his decision in a recent immigration speech to caution us all about the imminent prospect of Britain becoming an 'island of strangers'. Starmer told Baldwin that he delivered this speech in a fog of emotion and minimal preparation after an arson attack at his family home. 'I wouldn't have used those words if I had known they were, or even would be interpreted as an echo of Powell,' Starmer says. 'I had no idea – and my speechwriters didn't know either.' Starmer admits he should have read through the speech properly and 'held it up to the light a bit more' before opening his mouth in public – a remarkable suggestion from someone whose supposedly forensic approach to politics is one of his few and diminishing virtues. As human responses to high-stress situations go, 'accidentally evoking Enoch Powell' is a new one for me.