Orkney MSP Liam McArthur MSP has attacked Ofgem plans that could undermine local renewable schemes.

The electricity regulator is proposing to impose charges for using the National Grid, based on a generator’s location. 

Mr McArthur lodged a motion in the Scottish Parliament today, calling on the Scottish Executive to make representations to the UK Government to ensure that Scottish renewables projects are not put at a disadvantage and to consider a reduction in business rates for renewables generators.

The Scottish Executive is to analyse the impact of the Air Discount Scheme (ADS), before deciding whether to apply to Europe for consent to continue the scheme.

In a letter to Orkney MSP, Liam McArthur, the Transport Minister, Stewart Stevenson said he hopes to make an announcement on the scheme’s future before the end of the year.

Commenting, Mr McArthur said: “The analysis of the ADS should not take long as it has clearly been a resounding success.”

Current chair of NHS Orkney, Mrs Jenny Dewar, is to remain in the position an extra month until a replacement is found.

Mrs Dewar’s term of office is drawing to a close.  

A stolen 4x4 vehicle was crashed through garden fencing and abandoned in Kirkwall in the early hours of Wednesday morning.

The collision, at Inganess Place, occurred at 5.50am.

Members of the NHS Orkney board have agreed in principle to the merging their human resources department with the personnel department of the Orkney Islands Council.

Only one post will disappear, through the retirement of the head of personnel services.

The report came before NHS Orkney board members outlining the proposal as part of the Efficient Government initiative.

Responding to representations from Northern Isles MSPs Liam McArthur and Tavish Scott, the Secretary for Rural Affairs & the Environment, has confirmed that Orkney’s agricultural shows are to be exempt from regulations that threatened their future.

The Animal Gatherings (Scotland) Order will not apply to shows where livestock are not to be bought or sold.

The Princess Royal paid a brief visit to Hoy on Tuesday as part of a tour of lighthouses of northern Scotland.

Princess Anne, patron of the Northern Lighthouse Board, arrived in the county on the NLB ship Pharos and visited the Longhope Lifeboat memorial, the Scapa Flow Visitors Centre and the lifeboat museum.

A group of Icelandic scholars are due to arrive in the county at the weekend to take a trip back in time.

Twenty-three people from the Arni Magnusson Institute for Icelandic Studies in Reykjavik, are set to visit Orkney¹s prehistoric and historic sites, as well as Saga-related buildings and landscapes, in a programme devised and led by Julie Gibson, Orkney Islands Council¹s archaeologist.

The institute owns many priceless manuscripts, including the Flateyjarbok, written about 1390, which contains the Orkneyinga Saga.

Up to 2,000 people from Orkney are to be recruited onto a major new study, which aims to identify the genes which cause the common bone-thinning condition, osteoporosis.

Families from the North Isles and the West Mainland are being recruited by a team of researchers from the University of Edinburgh, led by Dr Jim Wilson, who hails from the county.

The new study will piggyback on an existing research project in Orkney - Orcades - which has involved 1,400 volunteers, and is looking at genetic influences on heart disease and diabetes.

Strike action - which could have seen disruptions at Kirkwall Airport on Monday next week - has been averted.

The planned action has been suspended by trades union, Unite, following talks last week.

Unite, which represents airport fire fighter, leading fire fighter and engineer grades at Highlands and Islands Airports Limited (HIAL), had previously advised that its members would strike for 24 hours on Monday, and every subsequently Monday, following a ballot on the company¹s two per cent pay offer for 2006-2007.

A yacht that broke down off Eday on Monday was escorted back into Kirkwall by the lifeboat.

The 52-foot Moonrise, with eight people on board, had been at anchor in Fersness Bay, when it suffered electrical failure.

An 84-year-old man was knocked down by a car at the Shore Street zebra crossing in Kirkwall on Saturday about 4pm.

He was taken to the Balfour Hospital for treatment to minor injuries and discharged the following day.

Kirkwall police are appealing for witnesses to the incident.

During the early hours of Sunday the hyperbaric chamber in Stromness was broken into.

Two males were detained by police nearby and will subsequently be reported to the procurator fiscal.

Preliminary test suggest that the body found on the Calf of Flotta last week is indeed that of missing Stromness man Alec Moar, according to police.

A statement from the Northern Constabulary, issued at the weekend, states that definitave confirmation will not be available until further tests had been carried out.

Many of the smaller items from the collection of the late Norrie Wood, of Graemeshall, will be auction in Kirkwall next week.

The larger items were sold by Edinburgh auctioneer Bonhams earlier this year, but on Wednesday and Thursday next week, Orkney Auction Mart will sell antiques, collectables and books from the collection.

The first part of the sale will include lustreware, clocks, glassware, plates, scent bottles, toby jugs and small pieces of furniture. On the Thursday, 380 lots from the Graemeshall library will be sold, along with ten Daniell aquatints.  

The next annual meeting of the “Tupperware Club” is scheduled to take place next Sunday in Eday.

This year’s event will take place at Eday’s newly-opened pub - Roadside - and is in aid of the Eday Lifeboat Guild.

The party starts at 1pm and will continue until late with “music, good company and good food”  

For those wishing to attend, the ferry for Eday leaves Kirkwall at 9.20am, returning at 7.55pm.