Issue 62

One of the prime aims of the festival that celebrates the name of Arran’s Robert McLellan is to nurture new talent in the arts and nowhere is this more evident than in the annual poetry competition that is now in its tenth year. During the last few years the competition has established itself as one of the major literary prizes in Scotland and the 2016 competition is now in full swing.

One of the notable features of the competition is that the prize giving, usually the first main event of the festival, features a reading by the judge and is attended by most of the prizewinners. Many of the entries are international and this has meant that in recent years the poets that have come to Arran to receive their prizes have been from the Irish Republic, Italy and the USA as well as from all over Britain.

The judges are always top line poets. Both Simon Armitage and Scotland’s new Makar Jackie Kay have filled the post recently. This year judge, the poet, translator and short story writer David Constantine, follows this trend. He is a very fine poet – his latest collection Elder received rave reviews. He also sprang to prominence recently as the author of the short story that provided the basis for the acclaimed film 45 Years which attracted an Oscar nomination for one of its stars, Charlotte Rampling.

David will be presenting the awards at a special McLellan Festival event on the Isle of Arran on 26 August. As in past years, in addition to a first prize of £1000 there will be smaller prizes for two runners up and six commended poems. If you haven't entered already you have until 19 June to do so. Full details including a downloadable entry form are available here.

Alternatively you can just contact one of the organisers, Cicely Gill and David Underdown.

The film to be shown on May 8th at 8.00pm is Leviathan, directed by Andrey Zvyaginstev (Russia 2014 - Cert 15).

This is a sober and compelling tragic drama set in contemporary Russia, in which a fisherman fights back when a corrupt mayor tries to seize possession of his ancestral home.

Do join us in Corrie and Sannox Village Hall for this fascinating film. Everyone is welcome.

COAST have asked all local candidates and leaders of the main political parties for their views on effective marine management and the inclusion of coastal communities on marine decision making groups. Despite the commitment and achievements of grassroots communities like COAST, we are still not recognized as a legitimate stakeholder by some. This is the case of the Clyde Forum, now transforming into the Clyde Regional Planning Partnership, from which COAST have been excluded despite repeated requests to join their steering group.

The next Scottish Government needs to urgently address effective management of Scottish seas for the benefit of all. Our seas are, after all, a public asset and a national resource. The closed-shop mentality of Scotland’s Inshore Fisheries Groups (IFGs) is largely responsible for dividing communities instead of bringing them together as became obvious at the Holyrood demonstrations earlier this year. We can look elsewhere for good practice in marine governance, the IFG English equivalent, Inshore Fisheries Conservation Authorities, include a diverse and representative selection of marine stakeholders.

Industry-led marine management (including fisheries management) contradicts some of the main objectives of the Land Reform and the Community Empowerment (Scotland) Bill. These are to progress community ownership, strengthen community's voices in the decisions that matter to them and improve the processes of community planning.

COAST will be asking Marine Scotland about effective compliance, monitoring and public information and participation for the South Arran MPA. We envision a collaborative and adaptive approach in which communities, industry, scientists and government can plan, work and learn together while harnessing the potential benefits of our Marine Protected Area for nature and people.

Arran Community Land Initiative (ACLI) are supporting and encouraging low carbon living on Arran in the year ahead with the help of a grant from the Climate Challenge Fund (CCF). Enhancing projects already in progress on the 80 acres of Community Land in Whiting Bay, this grant will help us build on the momentum gained in our first year, grow the project and expand the reach into the wider community.

Following the “Save Hear to Help!” protest which was held on Wednesday 9th March at Brodick Ferry Terminal, the service has managed to secure funding to continue.

The news came too late for our last edition, but the dates for the next two clinics at Lamlash are on Tuesday 24th May and Tuesday 28th June.

The full list of all the clinics in the whole of Ayrshire until the end of June can be found here.

Nurdles are small plastic pellets about the size of a lentil. Countless billion are used each year to make nearly all our plastic products but many end up washing up on our shores.

Spills and mishandling by industry can mean nurdles end up at sea. Our planets oceans are now accumulating nurdles in worryingly large numbers.

Unlike large pieces of plastic marine litter, nurdles are so small that they go largely unnoticed. However scientists are becoming increasingly concerned about their effect on our delicate marine ecosystem.

Seeing the pictures of the collapsed half-finished Kolkata overpass took me back very vividly to some time I spent there in a small hotel just by that very roundabout.

Trade unions are calling for strong action on climate change, with policies to support workers affected in the switch to a low carbon economy.

Speakers from the STUC, PCS and UNISON called at the Scottish TUC’s Annual Congress for this fair switch to a low carbon economy. The meeting was organised by UNISON and Stop Climate Chaos Scotland.

UNISON Depute Convener Stephen Smellie said: “Climate change is a key issue for trade unions as the world seeks to stop the planet heating above looming dangerous limits.

“We urgently need policies in place to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celcius, preferably 1.5 degrees, in order to halt catastrophic climate change.” 

A motion for debate at the Congress in Dundee noted that the deal agreed by world leaders in Paris in December did not include sufficient enforceable policy actions by governments to achieve this. Stephen Boyd, STUC Assistant Secretary, said: “Addressing climate change can deliver significant economic, social and environmental benefits to Scotland.

“Planning for a just transition means we involve all parts of society, sharing these benefits and supporting those whose jobs are affected, with education, training, skills and workforce development also crucial to delivering effective action.”

Cheryl Gedling, Acting-Vice President of PCS, said: “Our union was part of the official UK trade union delegation to the Paris climate talks, lobbying for support for a just transition and we supported the massive climate, justice and jobs marches in London and Edinburgh in December.

“Through initiatives such as the one million climate jobs campaign backed by PCS, it shows we can both cut carbon emissions and create jobs by investing in renewable energy, such as building wind turbines, in retrofitting homes to make them more energy efficient, and running an integrated transport network on clean fuel.”

Stop Climate Chaos Scotland Board Member Mike Robinson said: “The Climate Day election online debate saw the five political parties represented in the current Scottish Parliament questioned on their climate policies and plans for the next five years.

“The Paris agreement reinforced the fact that a safe, affordable future demands a more urgent and concerted effort to make homes warmer, transport greener and heat and electricity production renewable. And we need all politicians to be more accountable for the long term impact of decisions affecting all our lives.”

From Patricia Gibson MP, North Ayrshire & Arran

Following the Panama Papers leak, which lifted the lid on the elaborate tax avoidance techniques employed by wealthy individuals – including a number of world leaders – the Prime Minister was forced to issue a statement about his own financial affairs.

Initially, when questioned, Downing Street said Mr Cameron’s affairs were “a private matter.” The next day when asked if he had previously invested in his Father’s offshore company, he said that he “owned no shares”. Later that afternoon, the statement was expanded to emphasise that “the prime minister, his wife and their children do not benefit from any offshore funds”. By Wednesday, another statement said the Camerons will not benefit from offshore funds “in future”. On Thursday the Prime Minister was forced to admit he had, in previous years, benefitted from the offshore trust in question.

Given several opportunities to clarify his financial arrangements, the slippery way the Prime Minister chose to handle the situation raises an issue of trust. If he can’t be relied upon for a straight answer on this, on what other matters might he obfuscate? On top of that, the way he dismissed his £30,000 in offshore shares – as if it were small change – only goes to show out of touch with reality he really is.

Containing 11.5 million documents, it will be months before the Panama Papers can be fully digested and we gain a clearer insight in to the murky accounting arrangements of the super-rich. However, it should be remembered that this leak – the largest in financial history – only relates to one company based in Panama. What of other masters of the accounting dark arts operating in other offshore havens, such as the British Virgin Islands? Clearly these recent revelations are only the tip of the iceberg.

In recent years, many people have become wearily resigned to an assumption that wealthy companies and individuals can operate above or around the law.

Only two years ago, after being exposed in a tax avoidance scandal, Starbucks reported its first ever fall in UK sales, after 17 years, when customers boycotted the chain. The result? Starbucks completely altered its tax arrangements to pay £10million a year in tax – substantially more than the total of £8.6million paid in total in the preceding 14 years!

Likewise, tax dodging wealthy individuals should be subject to the law through investigation, exposure and enforcement.

In order to achieve this, it is essential that the UK Government works in partnership with other governments. The first step is having a robust set of tax laws in which loopholes are minimised and closed if detected. The SNP Government has already done so in preparation for the devolution of income tax. At UK level, authorities must be properly equipped to investigate wealthy elites, many of whom employ teams of accountants to make their money difficult to trace.

At Prime Minister’s Questions last Wednesday, SNP Westminster Leader, Angus Robertson MP, asked the Prime Minister why a mere 300 HMRC staff were investigating tax evasion by the super-rich, worth up to £70 billion when as many as 3,250 DWP staff are chasing benefit fraud worth £1.2 billion.

Whilst abuse of the benefit system should obviously be tackled, given the sums involved, surely it would be a more fruitful use of time and resources to crack down on those who are fabulously wealthy but chose not to pay what they owe?

To put things in perspective, the £70 billion in UK tax avoided every year is equivalent to more than double the entire Scottish Parliament's budget. Clearly, UK finances would quickly improve and the mountain of debt decline, if all with the means to do so paid their fair share.

Previous governments have failed for decades to adequately address this matter. It is time to walk the walk and not just talk the talk when it comes to dealing with both tax avoidance and tax evasion.

In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote, Penguin Modern Classics, £8.99

Capote is best known for Breakfast at Tiffany's, popular through its film version starring Audrey Hepburn. In Cold Blood is a very different book. Based on the true story of a Kansas farmer who, together with his wife and family, was murdered in 1959, it's a relentlessly gripping tale of how two young men who kill have been fired by a desire to do something – anything – to prove, at least in their own minds, that they are capable of an extraordinary act.

Published in 1965, In Cold Blood was an instant bestseller. Re-published as a Penguin Classic, it remains a compulsive read because of its unflinching stare at a mental state that any normal person is going to find alarming, pitiful or downright repellent, according to their own views and experience. In our own age where terrorism has a terrible attraction for inadequate and discontented people, this seminal book is newly becoming a 'must-read'. It's not fiction. It travels in close-up through the lives of two young killers through their background, their loves, their deepest desires and their terrible inadequacy.

Capote's day job was as a journalist with the New Yorker, and he writes with the punchy clarity of a good press man. His account of the careful murder of four members of the Clutter family is meticulous, but the book holds together because of a simmering anger about the way psychologically damaged people can get dragged through a criminal case with no real understanding of what is going on. Unputdownable. And thank God for Britain's gun laws.

Alison Prince

Selected by David Underdown, who also writes the commentary.

East is in a no-trump contract. South having led the ♦A, North/South to make nine tricks.