BODY FOUND IN CLYDE
On Tuesday morning the police received a report that a body had been seen floating in the River Clyde mid-way between the Western Ferries terminals at Hunter’s Quay and McInroy’s Point in Gourock.
The corpse was spotted by a passenger on a Western Ferries vessel around 11.30am and the authorities were immediately notified with the police, coastguard and a MOD boat from Faslane quickly on the scene.
Strathclyde Police con-firmed that the body was not a passenger on the ferry, however as the man was known to be aboard the 9.20am Gourock to Dunoon CalMac ferry, investigations are ongoing.
Although the deceased man’s details have not yet been released he is understood not to be local.
A post mortem was carried out on Tuesday evening and the results showed that the man, believed to be in his 50s, did not die in suspicious circumstances.
Hugh Dan McLennan, Head of Communications for CalMac said: “We are assisting police with enquiries following the discovery of a body found in the Firth of Clyde.”
Western Ferries’ Managing Director Gordon Ross was on hand to offer any assistance that was required from his fleet of ferries. He said: “Whilst it is a very sad situation the disruption to our service was minimal. Obviously we did what we could and, as usual, we were prepared to assist the police and coastguard in any way we could.”
As is normal procedure in these circumstances, a report will be sent to the procurator fiscal.


COWAL EMERGENCY PATIENT - SEVEN HOURS TO INVERCLYDE
A COWAL doctor has blasted the Ambulance Service after an emergency ambulance transfer from Strachur to Inverclyde Hospital last week took seven hours to complete, despite the GP who attended the patient requesting an urgent transfer.
Dr Wright from Strachur Medical Practice attended the patient, who is in his 70s, at his home in Strachur at 8.30am and was so concerned that she requested an urgent transfer to Inverclyde Hospital in Greenock. She also informed the ambulance service of the acute nature of the patient’s condition.
The ambulance arrived quite promptly and left the patient’s home at 9.30am with the patient and his wife on board. Astonishingly the ambulance, under blue light conditions, diverted to Dunoon Community Hospital under instructions from ambulance control. A doctor attended him and he was taken at 11.30am to a ward where three other people were already awaiting transfer to Inverclyde.
The patient’s transfer did not take place until 3.30pm, arriving in Inverclyde’s emergency department at 4.30pm - representing a delay of five hours.
The patient’s family have written to NHS Highland asking why the ambulance transferred to Dunoon under blue light conditions and why there was such a long delay in the transfer from Dunoon to Inverclyde.
The delay meant that the patient was unable to have a scan that evening and had to be transferred to the High Dependency unit and wait until the following morning. The result of the scan indicated a blockage and tear in the bowel and he was sent for immediate surgery. After a 2-3 hour operation he remains, at the time of writing, in a serious condition in Inverclyde’s Intensive Care unit.
Dr Coull, head of Strachur Medical Practice, said: “I am desperately angry at this. For Dunoon Hospital to be classed as an acute hospital is absolute nonsense. An acute hospital should have consultants and acute facilities, which Dunoon clearly does not. This is done to save money on ambulance crews.
“My personal view is that, as we have expressed our concerns to the health board and to the ambulance service, if we have a patient who dies because of this we would class it as murder, or at least Corporate Manslaughter. It is one thing when a mistake or accident happens but this could be seen as deliberate, all to save money.
“It is completely unacceptable.”
The patient’s daughter said: “Having spoken to our local doctor about my concerns on this matter, it appears that Dunoon Hospital is designated as an ‘acute’ hospital, which surprised me greatly. My understanding is that the facilities at Dunoon are a Minor Injuries Unit and that the hospital does not have all necessary facilities to cope with acute surgical conditions. It is attended by GPs and consultants who come from Inverclyde.
“With such acute conditions time is important and it is vital that treatment be given as soon as possible. The ambulance which eventually arrived to do the transfer came from the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley. They had already taken one patient across and then returned to pick up my father. Can it really be that only one person can be transported at a time, when every minute is vital?”
A spokesperson for NHS Highland said: “NHS Highland takes any complaints about our services very seriously and our complaints department investigates the circumstances surrounding the complaint and replies to the individual concerned as soon as possible”.
Jim Mather MSP was concerned to hear of the delay and said: “We are treating this case with the utmost seriousness, given the previous experience of other local residents.
“Naturally we are sorry to learn that this patient is in intensive care after his operation. I will be taking this up with the Scottish Ambulance Service for there are compassionate, clinical and economic reasons for them to deliver a uniformly better service.
“The fact is that without a local consultant-led hospital local peace of mind and quality healthcare are dependent on a responsive ambulance service.
“Anything less than that will cause severe anxiety for patients and their families and puts lives and the local economy at risk.”
UPDATE: The patient has now been moved from Intensive Care and onto a general ward. His daughter said: “Although still sick, he is on the road to recovery. although it is still early days.”


STRONE SCHOOL MINIBUS SCRAPPED
As of the start of next term, Strone Primary school children who were picked up and dropped off by the Argyll and Bute Council minibus will now be forced to get a West Coast Motors coach, after it was decided to scrap the service to this particular school.
Parents whose children benefited from the service were notified by letter last week.
The letter stated that after a review of the transport arrangements it was decided to remove the council in-house transport from this run after a reduction in pupil numbers.
The letter also stated that children will be allocated a seat on the West Coast Motors coach, and that the bus company has been asked to pay particular attention to the younger children who will now be travelling to and from school in the larger coach.
A council spokesperson said: “The education minibus was really only in place at Strone for children living north of the Crescent at Blairmore. As there will be no primary pupils from this area at Blairmore this coming session the bus isn’t required any more as the larger West Coast Motors bus covers this part of the route.
“The majority of primary school children on school transport in Argyll travel in these large buses and there are already primary children of all ages on the main bus to Strone Primary.”
Local councillor, and grandparent to children who benefited from the service, Bruce Marshall, said: “It’s terribly sad that there are no children from Ardentinny going to Strone School anymore, but this being the case, unfortunately it wasn’t financially viable to run the minibus anymore.
He added: “On a personal note, my own grandchildren live past the crescent in Blairmore, so they will now either have to be taken to school by one of the parents, or get a taxi, but we (the council) had to weigh up the situation and this, I feel, is the most sensible option.”


KAY QUERIES FERRY USERS’ CHARTER
The Scottish Information Commissioner last week issued a ruling on a written request by Professor Neil Kay in 2006 to release details of what were termed “Users’ Charter” meetings between the Scottish Executive and Western Ferries.
Professor Kay claims that the existence of these meetings had only become publicly known through a remark by Gordon Ross, Managing Director of Western Ferries reported in the Dunoon Observer that the (then) Executive had responded positively to his proposals for a “Users’ Charter”.
According to Professor Kay, since Mr Ross had also made it clear separately that any such “Users’ Charter” would be contingent on Western being sole operator of vehicle carrying services Gourock-Dunoon, such meetings clearly had potentially serious public interest implications.
Professor Kay has also stated that Jim Mather MSP made a parallel request for information, and through questions he had asked in parliament, it had been made clear that there had been six such meetings in 2004 and 2005.
Western Ferries Managing Director, Gordon Ross, said: “There have been no secret meetings, and no skulduggery here. I am sorry to disappointment those looking for conspiracy theories, but that is the case. We are a community based company, and take these responsibilities seriously. We had discussions with the Executive to discuss service guarantees which would need to be in place in the event that the CalMac vehicle service was to go, which I think this was perfectly sensible and in the public interest.
“We are happy to talk to the new Executive on a Users’ Charter, and I have had discussions in the past with Jim Mather on this subject.
The Executive released some information on this February 2006 to Professor Kay, but withheld some information and some whole documents claming exemptions provided for by the Freedom of Information Scotland Act (2002).
Professor Kay then lodged an appeal to the Scottish Information Commissioner in March 2006 objecting to the Executive’s decision to withhold information.
In coming to a decision, the Information Commissioner looked at where the Executive put forward claims for exemptions under Freedom of Information legislation. He found that the claim for exemption had been misapplied in 15 instances; should only apply to part of the document in question in 10 instances; that the public interest overrode any claim for exemption in 7 instances, and so the information should be made public. In only 15 instances did the Commissioner fully accept the Executive’s case that the information in question should be kept secret.
Mr Ross commented: “Western Ferries has been open in everything we have done in these discussions. I will be very interested to see what information comes to light here.”