The township of 12 people
which sells four million
cans of beer a year
Scotland
in the
heat
SR’s remarkable growth as an independent magazine is based largely on word of mouth. Here are examples of our journalism:
* SR played a leading role in the successful campaign to save St Margaret of Scotland Hospice
* SR campaigned for greater transparency in Scottish public life and won a landmark judgement from the Scottish information commissioner which has led to a transformation in the information available about executive salaries and pensions in public bodies
* Having discovered elderly people still living in a near-derelict block of flats in Glasgow, sometimes without a water supply, SR campaigned to have them decently re-housed. With the help of Scotland’s housing minister, Alex Neil, we succeeded
* SR continues to campaign – so far without success – to broaden the range of appointments to national organisations beyond a self-perpetuating elite
Our national narcotic is
doing so well that there’s no
need to send warships
Peter MacAulay
I
Passed through Achany on Sunday. A delightful corner of Sutherland, even if nowadays a bit tainted by its links with Sir James Matheson of opium fame, or perhaps notoriety. Matheson and his buddy, Jardine from Lochmaben, made vast fortunes in China in the 19th century by flooding the country with opium, with the full support of the British government. Lord Palmerston, the foreign secretary, even sent the fleet to war against China on their behalf. The Brits won and the trade flourished, to the extent that Matheson was able to pay more than £500,000 for the island of Lewis in 1844. Quite a stash of money back then.
Opium of course causes untold misery. A bit like ethanol, which kills far more people in Scotland than opium does. Yet these days we proudly export our own national narcotic – whisky – in fabulous quantities, and not just to China. The news of record sales has been treated uncritically by our media, as we would expect. They talk of a ‘surge’ so great that exports to Asia are in danger of drying up. Supply may not be able to meet demand.
Sales during the first nine months of 2011 ‘soared’ by 23% on the same period in 2010. A Scottish cabinet minister describes whisky as ‘an international success story’. But has anybody sought the views of those who queue up, trembling, at third world detox clinics? The omens are not good for Brazil, where imports are up by 50%. The city of Recife is reputed to have the highest per capita consumption of whisky in the world.
But the secretary of state for Scotland sees much greater sales potential there. He’s been to Brazil to lobby for lower taxation; lo and behold, Brazil’s trade minister is now re-examining the issue, ‘in a creative way, to seek a solution’. So no need for us to send the warships, then.
The value of Scotch whisky exports last year was around £3 billion. The Scottish whisky industry is earning £125 every second. Sir James Matheson of Achany would surely have approved. As F Scott Fitzgerald may have put it, so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
II
It’s a fair bet (assuming there’s any such thing – are the odds not always stacked in the bookies’ favour?) – that some SR readers have never crossed the Kessock Bridge. Certainly not between 8am and 9am, when it’s bumper to bumper southbound for a couple of miles. It used to be bumper to bumper for just a few yards, which became half a mile, then a mile. Oh, for those halcyon days when the queue was only a mile long.
February 2013 is looming. That’s when resurfacing will begin because, after 30 years, traffic has taken its toll. Actually there has never been a toll, because the Kessock Bridge was built just before bridge tolls became fashionable up north. Thirty thousand vehicles a day cross the bridge, and it feels like they all cross in the hour before 9am.
How long should it take to resurface a bridge? Probably a couple of hours on a good day, but don’t underestimate the power of Transport Scotland to get things done. Work will begin on 11 February and finish on 13 June – 16 weeks. But that’s only the half of it. They’ll repeat the process between February and June, 2014, this time for 20 weeks.
That’s nine months to resurface a bridge. In 1982 Sir Max Hastings retook the Falklands in less than a third of that time. So why is the work being split in two? Tourism, dear boy, tourism. Our Highland economy is hooked on it. Tourism is the goose that lays the golden egg. Or perhaps it’s the golden calf. Or even the Holy Grail. In any case hallowed be its name.
III
Rosie 47 in Monaco will forever live on in the Parthenon of great names. If gongs mean anything at all these days, surely the next gong – for entertainment – will go to Mr Harry Redknapp. Not only did he take on the Revenue and win, he done it in style.
In recent times we’ve had names every bit as unusual listed as the owners of large Highland estates. To name but a few – Earl of Cawdor’s Marriage Settlement Trustees; Lord Laing’s 1961 Settlement Trust; Viscount Chelsea’s Settlement Trust EFF; C Steel and Trust of Maud A Clark’s Grandchildren; M A R Cayzer Will Trust (Rossanne’s Fund).
These were all of course completely above board and without stain or blemish, and all done in full consultation with the Revenue. No need to nominate any of them for a gong (for genius), for it seems a fair few of them already had a gong anyway.
Just as football clubs have to pass the ‘fit and proper persons’ test in terms of ownership, is it not time to review the criteria for ownership of vast acreages? Would a settlement, whether marriage, 1961 or EFF, pass the test? It ain’t half mysterious.
