The boss of ferry company NorthLink has threatened legal action if the new terminal at the Caithness end of the Stromness-Scrabster service is not ready on time for the official handover date of October 1.

NorthLink chief executive, Mr John Horton, has expressed disappointment that there could be a delay in the completion of the new pier at Scrabster, but he added that the shipping company had not been officially told about a setback on the project by the port authorities.

Mr Horton’s comments came in response to a statement issued yesterday by Scrabster Harbour Trust who said that they were advised last week by Mowlem Marine, who are carrying out construction of the new terminal, that their contract was likely to overrun.

When asked to comment on rumours that a more likely finish date for the Scrabster terminal might be the beginning of 2003, a spokesman for the harbour trust said: “We’d rather not set a new completion date because it might turn out wrong anyway. All we’re prepared to say is that we’re trying to recover some lost time and get it finished as soon as possible.”

Mr Horton issued a veiled threat about invoking a penalty clause if the Scrabster terminal was not finished according to the agreed schedule.

He told The Orcadian: “We have not been officially told by the trust that the project will be late. We have a contract with them stating that they would be able to deliver the facility on time. We have asked for a formal statement from the harbour trust to tell us what measures they are putting in place to deliver the new terminal. We are still waiting for that. Once we have that, we will be in a position to know what we have to do and then we will need to consider our options. If it is true, that the terminal won’t be ready for the handover date, then it is very disappointing, not only for NorthLink, but for all users of the service -because whatever option we choose, the service will not be as good as having the Hamnavoe on the Stromness-Scrabster route, in terms of its size and speed.”

Mr Horton explained the knock-on effect of a delay in having the new Scrabster terminal available for use.

“The Hamnavoe cannot use the existing pier at Scrabster. Luckily, we arranged to charter a Caledonian MacBrayne vessel Hebridean Isle or the Isle of Arran to operate on the Pentland Firth service until October 28.

“We signed that deal 15 months ago because we were aware that the delivery date for the Hamnavoe was very near to October 1. But the CalMac vessel does have other duties to go to, so we can’t keep it beyond the end of October without upsetting other plans.”

Chairman of Scrabster Harbour Trust, Mr John Young, says in his statement: “The Trust and our consultants Babtie Group are very disappointed that the contractor (Mowlem Marine) has not been able to keep on programme. While this was a challenging project due to the tight timescale required by the Scottish Executive in line with the start of the new ferry contract, we are pushing as hard as we can for the contractor to complete their contract as soon as possible and to have a berth available for NorthLink. Our priority, as always, is to maintain continuity of the lifeline service to Orkney.”

The resident engineer at Scrabster on behalf of consultants Babtie, Mr Eric Macaulay, further explained the current situation: “We are investigating with the clients (Scrabster Harbour Trust); the contractors and the Scottish Executive, various contingencies to speed up progress on building the new quay. This might involve bringing in extra resources, but nothing has been decided yet.”

Mr Macaulay added that the contract for the new Scrabster terminal had been broken up into a series of packages for ease of supervision and monitoring.

He denied that workers from Scrabster had been sent over to finish off the new terminal at Hatston because of the delay in the Caithness project.

Mr Macaulay said: “There is no sign of that. It is a different company anyway.

Mowlem have the contract to build the new quay at Scrabster, whereas it is R. J. McLeod, who are doing the Hatston project, along with Harbour and General. Unless folk are confused about the fact that R. J. McLeod did win the earlier contract for the reclamation work at Scrabster and were responsible for building the access road out to the new terminal.”

brian.flett@orcadian.co.uk