PICTURE the scene. It's the weekend of the Isle of Bute Jazz Festival in May 2008, and five hundred people are waiting to board MV Bute at Wemyss Bay.
With room for 450 passengers, the ship should be able to take almost all the expectant travellers, perhaps leaving five minutes late as a result.
Instead she sails on time, with only two hundred people on board and the rest left, angry and frustra
ted, to wait for the next sailing.
Welcome to life according to the 'performance driven regime' under which Bute's ferry services will operate from later this year.
That's the picture which was painted by Caledonian MacBrayne chairman Peter Timms at a meeting in Rothesay on Monday - and it's fair to say those present were shocked at the implications of the new contract which will be awarded under the tendering regime imposed by the Scottish Executive and the European Union.
Mr Timms, along with senior CalMac, met the island's three Argyll and Bute councillors and representatives of Bute Community Council and Bute Ferry Users Group in the first of a series of 'stakeholder consulation' meetings throughout the company's network.
"Harsh, unyielding and inappropriate" was how Mr Timms described the planned performance regime, which will see CalMac fined for every time the ferry sails late for reasons within their control.
