Electric ferries plagued by mishaps

A floundering fleet of accident-prone ‘green’ ferries are a “disaster waiting to happen”, it was warned last night.

Around £22 million of taxpayers’ money has been lavished on two hybrid electric vessels to work routes on the west coast.

And First Minister Nicola Sturgeon recently unveiled a £12.3 million order for a third.

But now it has emerged that, within hours of her announcement, one of them, MV Lochinvar, broke down for a third time since its launch in May, leaving it out of action for weeks and raising concerns over its safety.

The embarrassing revelation is the latest in a catalogue of mishaps which has plagued the ferries, run by state-owned CalMac.

Tory transport spokesman Alex Johnstone said: “Is this really ground-breaking technology being employed here? These ferries simply appear to be over-elaborate and vulnerable to breaking down.

“I suspect this is another public sector mistake.”

The £11 million price tag for each ferry was nearly treble the cost of a small conventionally-powered version.

The first new one off the slipway, MV Hallaig, was launched by Miss Sturgeon last year and took on the crossing between Sconser on Skye and the island of Raasay. But it broke down during its sea trials and then again on its first day in service, both times with propeller problems.

Then days later, she blew a fuse which saw it crash into a pier, leaving passengers with bruises.

Its sister ship MV Lochinvar was launched in May for the route between Portavadie in Argyll and Tarbert on Kintyre. However, it suffered power outages on two separate occasions.

Now it’s emerged that, on September 30, it was out of action again, tied up at Tarbert for three weeks suffering “mechanical failure and hybrid drive issues”.

Last month, an expert branded the scheme “a dog’s breakfast”.

Alf Baird, professor of maritime business at Edinburgh Napier University, said: “No private-sector ferry company would buy these. Only the public sector would do this.”