How a cancelled ferry has impacted island life

Donna Young said problems affecting the west coast ferry network had added stress to her family's arrangements for an aunt's funeral

Weeks-long disruption to South Uist's ferry service to the mainland has impacted every aspect of life, say islanders.

For almost the whole of June, the island's ferry MV Lord of the Isles has been unavailable after operator CalMac redeployed it to help cover services for Islay.

State-owned CalMac has repeatedly apologised for the situation, and said Lord of the Isles would return to service from Friday - a day earlier than scheduled. The first sailing is due to depart Lochboisdale at 09:40.

New Transport Minister Fiona Hyslop said the Scottish government recognised the role reliable transport links played in supporting strong, resilient island communities.

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She said work was ongoing to add more vessels to CalMac's fleet.

But some islanders say the weeks of disruption has left them questioning the sustainability of island life.

John Joe MacNeil said he remains hopeful of service improvements

John Joe MacNeil is chief executive of Gaelic language development organisation Ceòlas Uibhist. Originally from Barra, he returned to the Western Isles after some time spent living and working on the mainland.

He told BBC Scotland: "I came home just before I turned 40.

"It was always my passion to return to the islands, to find work and be involved in the Gaelic community."

John Joe has nothing but praise for CalMac's staff and said the service was fantastic - when it was operational - and he remained optimistic of service improvements.

But he added: "People are questioning their decision to move home.

"I have friends who are asking why they've moved home because of the uncertainty about getting to and from the islands."

Alana MacInnes said the islands had so much to offer but were reliant on good connectivity

Alana MacInnes who works for Uist Beò, an online platform curating stories about the people who live and work in the local area, said the Western Isles was a beautiful and special place, but suffering due to disruption to connectivity.

She said: "We have nice people around us, with a great culture, plenty produce and renewable energies - all of which we contribute to the rest of the country and the rest of the world.

"We have plenty to give, and we're giving a lot. But we can't guarantee that output if we can't have the most basic thing, which is a way on and off the island."

Mel Butler said islanders understood there were challenges to island life, but said the disruption was exceptional

Mel Butler, who returned to living in Uist in 2020 after 13 years on the mainland, said islanders recognised there were challenges to island life and accepted they had to live with them.

"But I would say I've never seen the chaos we have at the moment," she added.

"There has always been weather disruption, but this is not having a service - we've never had that before."

She said a Uist primary school's trip to the mainland, a tradition restarted after the Covid pandemic, had required intervention from MSPs and a Scottish government minister to navigate west coast ferry disruption.

"That level of people were involved for this trip to go-ahead," she said.

The loss of the South Uist service in June also put pressure on other routes to and from the isles.

Donna Young, who lives and works in North Uist, said this situation had put added stress to arrangements for an aunt's funeral last Saturday.

"My aunty was in Glasgow so it was a case of organising for her to come home, to be buried in Uist," said Donna.

"The family just found it really difficult to arrange for that to happen."

One of the biggest challenges for the family was booking space for the hearse on North Uist's busy Lochmaddy service.

Donna said: "Luckily they did find one space but the rest of the family had to travel as foot passengers, which made it a bit more difficult because living in Uist isn't the easiest without a vehicle.

"It added a lot more to the grieving our family were going through. It just became a lot more stressful for my uncle and the family.

"They were trying to organise so much to arrange for her to come home and be buried, and for family to be able to travel - a lot of them live on the mainland.

"It highlighted the issue that the services that haven't been running have had a knock on effect to everyday life and other things happening on the island."

She added: "Last week we had three funerals on the island which impacted the community massively.

"We do have alternatives but that's not to say that there's availability, especially at last minute, like in the case of a family emergency."

Benbecula-based GP Kate Dawson said the past year had seen the most travel disruption her practice had ever experienced.

As well as issues with ferries, air links were hit by suspensions during strike action by some airport staff.

Dr Dawson said: "It's impacted on deliveries of stock to the dispensary, it's impacted on patients getting away to get treatment and it's impacted on recruitment and retention of GPs and other clinical staff."

Ms Hyslop said South Uist had faced ferry issues over a long time.

She told BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland programme: "I think there is a way we can try and support businesses. I can't tell you what that is just now. We are looking at it very, very closely."

The minister added: "We want to have strong, resilient islands. We want to make sure they can run their businesses and importantly we want young people to want to live and work there."

CalMac chief executive Robbie Drummond, who has visited South Uist in recent weeks to meet islanders, said everyone at the company was committed to providing the best service as possible across its network.

He said: "I know this has been a very difficult time for our communities with the prolonged cancellation of service and I am sorry for the issues this has caused our businesses and wider communities throughout North and South Uist.

"As many of our customers will have already made alternative plans to travel across the Sound of Barra and via Castlebay, these additional connecting sailings on the Sound of Barra will remain in place in both directions up to and including Friday 30 June."