Letter to Muir Construction from Willie Rennie regarding Rosyth Waterfront

1.09.48pm GMT Wed 23rd Jan 2008

Dear John

I wish to thank you and your colleagues for taking the time to discuss the matter of the Rosyth Waterfront over the last 18 months and, most recently, yesterday. It is with some regret that I feel obliged to speak out on Scarborough Muir's plans as I had intended to remain silent and allow the democratically elected councillors to determine the way forward on this important piece of land. However, after the numerous allegations about the motives of the council and others I feel that the public need to know about the alternative vision for the Waterfront.

I do value your passion about your plans to open up the Waterfront and the work have you already undertaken on the site but, after having listened to a wide range of interested parties and experts, believe that it would be a mistake to redesignate ALL of the land to a higher value mixed use status in the Structure Plan. Doing so would potentially restrict the expansion of the industrial activities at the dockyard and the port.

My first priority on this issue is to maximise the number of jobs created. It would be illogical to redesignate land to a higher value mixed use status just when we are about to have hundreds of industrial jobs created through the Carriers, expansion of the port and other businesses in the area. Although the redesignation would not stop the Carriers being built it could restrict the number of additional jobs we may be able to attract to the surrounding area as a spin off from this massive construction project.

It is claimed that the Scarborough Muir project would create 6000 jobs but no detailed proposals nor evidence to support the claim has been provided to the Council.

However, I am not completely inflexible on this and do believe that elements of your plans could be accommodated. For example, some of the land could be redesiganted to mixed use now to allow some housing, retail and leisure development as long as it was compatible with industrial job creation. To achieve this Babcock, Forth Ports and Scarborough Muir would need to agree a masterplan which would determine the use of the land which could then be accommodated in the Local Plan. All parties have been urged to do this by the council for some time but nothing has been agreed. I am puzzled by this.

And once the Carriers are built, Forth Ports have expanded their operations and we have a better understanding about what the industrial future holds for the area then further land could be redesignated to mixed use. But placing hundreds of new homes, shops and leisure activities on the doorstep of an industrial site increases the chances of objections to the activities by industry as we have already seen with the objections raised to the biofuels plant.

Although I admire your passion I want to emphasise that I believe it would be reckless to restrict the amount of land available for industrial expansion at this time. It would effectively be a straight jacket which would limit Rosyth's industrial potential.

Yours sincerely,

Willie Rennie