Those deciding on a licence to transfer millions of tonnes of crude oil between tankers at the mouth of the Cromarty Firth, owe it to local people to visit the area before deciding.
This is what the Chief Executive of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) will be told in a telephone call first thing tomorrow morning from Fergus Ewing, Cabinet Secretary for the Rural Economy and Connectivity who is the local MSP for Inverness and Nairn.
Over 100 constituents, mostly from Nairn, have made representations to him about the Cromarty Firth Port Authority's application to the Southampton-based MCA to transfer up to nine million to tonnes of crude oil a year, between tankers at anchor in open water just outside the Cromarty Firth.
It is one of the most important areas for dolphins in Europe and close to other designated conservation sites. There is great concern locally that any oil spill would herald an environmental disaster ruining local businesses. But the port authority insists it takes its environmental responsibilities very seriously.
Mr Ewing wrote to the Chief Executive of the MCA, Sir Allan Massey before Christmas and will talk to him on the phone at 9am tomorrow.
Mr Ewing , speaking as a constituency MSP, said "I believe that the MCA should send senior representatives to the Highlands in order to hear the views of my constituents and others on this issue, and be willing to engage with them."
He said he would be asking Sir Allan that this meeting be arranged prior to any decision being taken.
Meanwhile the campaign group Cromarty Rising and supporters from Nairn are due to stage a demonstration outside the Scottish Parliament tomorrow. They want to to persuade MSPs to outlaw the controversial ship to ship oil transfers in areas of high conservation value across Scotland.
Mr Ewing's SNP MSP colleagues Kate Forbes and Gail Ross are already opposed to the oil transfer plan as is the Green Party MSP John Finnie.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here