The Phantom Thistle Thief of Shetland strikes again! Vikings, bagpipes, separatists and someone with a tin of paint

This is an expanded version of my ‘Spaekalation’ column in this week’s Shetland Times

First of all, it’s no’ me. For years now, someone in Shetland - and everyone but the constabulary seems to know who - has, under cover of deepest darkness, been erasing the thistles on those Visit Scotland tourist destination signs. He (or she) has struck again, recently,in the North Mainland. I’ve never quite understood how Europe’s biggest oil terminal, Sullom Voe, is a tourist attraction, but there are otters in the vicinity, attracted by the smell of burning gas and, obviously, the money. Those otters just love that hydrocarbon cash.

All this erasure of Scottish iconography led me to ponder, not for the first time,  the differences between  Shetland and Scotland, and also Scotland and England. Always bearing in mind, for the sake of openness and transparency, my basic position, which is that of Albert Einstein, a little known and now almost forgotten thinker of the 20th Century:

“Nationalism,” he said, “is an infantile disease. It is the measles of the mind.”

So, those English.  Things are different down there. Here’s some legal  precedents for you: 

Should a lost Caledonian be discovered wandering within York’s ancient walls, carrying, as is so often the case, a bow and arrow, he or she can be shot with impunity, except on Sundays.  

Alistair Campbell, erstwhile spin doctor and eminent bagpiper, should be cautious regarding any impromptu pibroch performances. In 1746, a James Reid claimed his piping was merely music. A court ruled he was utilising ‘an instrument of war and insurrection’. He was duly hanged.

Then there’s  Carlisle. According to the 440-year old Dormont Book, any Scot ‘found wandering’ in the city can be whipped and thrown in jail. Mind you, any local resident can be fined, whipped and banished for throwing dead animals down city wells or leaving piles of excrement outside their house for more than eight days. Perennial social problems.

And perhaps significant ones, illustrating just how different the folk of Carlisle, imbibing of an evening in Botchergate and commuting along English Street, are from their neighbours 10 miles to the north. Cross that border, and everything changes. Because, say the separatists, the Scots are so different from the English. In Scotland, people are nicer, more community-orientated, more committed to social justice, and what’s more, most of them have never voted for a Conservative government. Something which is factually untrue. A majority of Scots (and ‘Scotland residents’, as the classic Shetland usage has it) did not vote for the current Westminster coalition. A majority of Scots did vote for the previous Labour administration, though. It’s how democracy works.

 Shetland, of course, feels different from England and Scotland. The Norse ancestry of many in the Northern Isles is a  matter of genetically proven fact. Much is made of the proximity of the Bergen railway station, and the first image that many have of Shetland and Shetlanders is a man in a viking helmet, standing with a raised axe against the background of a burning galley. We don’t do thistles. Except on those Visit Scotland notices.

The thistle is of course not an historical symbol of all Scotland, but only - and apocryphally, it should be said - of one chunk. That would be the bit that defeated the Norse at the Battle of Largs in 1263. It’s an anti-Scandinavian sign. Allegedly, the Scots forces were alerted to a party of Viking land raiders by the agonised yells when one barefoot Norseman stood on a thistle.  Or perhaps two thistles. Or, for the sake of argument, let’s say three. So much for Scandic solidarity. If it hadn’t been for those three  thistles, things would be so different. And I would’t be lisping like this…

Anyway. That Gretna border seems very far away from the recently vandalised signs pointing oil-tanker-spotting tourists  towards the Sullom Voe Oil and Gas Terminal, so central to the UK’s offshore hydrocarbon future. 

Of course we in Shetland are Very Far Away, in one sense. From the soothernmost climes of Scotland.  So much so that we have allowed the misconceived  ‘Our Islands, Our Future’ Campaign to become our talisman. Leaving aside the uneasy alliance with Orkney and the Western Isles (The Battle of Largs handed the Hebrides to Scotland, leaving the Northern Isles in Norse possession for another 200-odd years), the sight of  local politicians lying on their backs, waiting to see which government, Westminster  or Holyrood, is going to tickle them the most, is, to say the least, tawdry. There is much talk about decentralisation and local democracy, but in the torrid referendum climate, anyone will say anything. In particular the separatist Government at Holyrood has a history of making promises it  has absolutely no intention of keeping, or indeed the ability to keep. Seeing as no-one knows what the result of post-separation elections might be.

And in any case, the central problem for Shetland is quite different. There is our geographical proximity to the North Sea and Atlantic oil and gas fields, our crucial importance for the importance of renewable energy and our population’s extra special niceness. And there is the question of the Zetland County Council Act (1974).

Leaving aside any other question of local authority that the SIC’s goatee-bearded-and-pierced leader and his archipelagic cohorts may put to the Powers that Would Be, the ZCC Act is unique to Shetland and gives us development control, and therefore income control, over not just oil developments affecting our immediate coastline, but aquaculture and all the looming possibilities of tidal energy and offshore windfarms. It exists. It is on the statute books, and it is a Westminster Act, fought for brilliantly by the late Jo Grimond, and for which we have to thank all the glory and wonder of Shetland’s welfare economy. One which it seems this council is industriously trying to dismantle.

The ZCC Act, used wisely, also offers Shetland control over the kind of seaborne renewables-based future that Scotland’s other island authorities can only dream of. In an important article for Shetland Life Magazine, Kate Johnson of Heriot Watt University argues that the ZCC Act provides a model for community coastal governance not just in Scotland, but throughout the UK. http://www.shetlandtimes.co.uk/2013/04/05/shetland-a-model-for-the-future/

Of course, come a separate Scotland, the ZCC Act would cease to exist. I’m sure that Fergus Ewing has made soporific noises of reassurance, if The Pierced One has thought to ask him about it, but the track record, the mantra of the SNP’s Edinburghian Government is: Centralise, centralise, centralise.  There is no way on earth or sea the separatists want the ZCC Act to survive, no matter what they say now.

And they will say anything.

Despite the weasel whining from a tiny, deluded minority, Shetland will vote overwhelmingly ‘No’ in a referendum which has sucked cash, energy and commitment from the real political issues of today, and instead focussed attention on nothing more than a line in the land, many miles away from here.

Should a separate Scotland happen we could face a future where the prime motor in  a no-voting Shetland’s economic regeneration, past, present and future, the ZCC Act, has been obliterated or is left as nothing more than a quaint relic of times past, like the ability of York residents to shoot any archery-inclined Alistair Campbells.

What will we do then? Well, It’s unlikely to happen. But if, in, a nightmare triumph for knee-jerk, Braveheartian anti-Englishness, Scottish separation happens, there will doubtless be compulsory bagpipe lessons for all. Which might be a bit risky for those planning any trips south of the border.

As for Shetland’s Phantom Thistle Thief, what will she (or he) do? Lead a movement pleading for assimilation into Greater Norway (note to Norwegian military strategists: no bare feet this time)? There are those in Shetland who would seek exactly that, especially if it means we could start roasting puffins for food again. Or, we could ask for UK offshore status, a friendly occupation by the Welsh Guards, or some other non-tartanised regiment. After all, there’s that oil and gas…

I will ask the Phantom Thistle Thief next time I see him. Or her.

Defacers Of The Thistle strike again!

It's a Shetland thing. Whose oil did you say it was?

There and back in The Mighty Landcruiser

Tricky old trip into Lerwick - Scandinavian conditions, with hard packed snow on the roads most of the way. But the Toyota did what it undoubtedly says on its tin, thanks to the BF Goodrich All-Terrain tyres (actually, the original ones were rubbish).

Dropped Susan at the hospital, then up to North Eastern Farmers for dog and cat food in bulk. When you have a St Bernard, bulk is the only way. Tesco for basics, and then to BBC Radio Shetland. Good and very busy show, main theme being the nostalgia of smells. Some fantastic tales...you can hear it for seven days here.


Drove home alone, as Susan had to take one of the NHS Subaru Foresters up for her associate to use. Great cars, wish I still had mine. Arrived to find a blizzard and both weans (18 and 14) engaged in a sledge race. More of this tomorrow, but frankly, that's enough snow pictures.

Oh, and that's the Sullom Voe Oil Terminal, way past the frozen loch in the distance. If you really believe it's Scotland's oil, that's where the majority of it is dealt with. In other words, it's arguably not Scotland's oil; it's Shetland's...

A news story about the Sullom Voe oil terminal, and, seeing as this is a blog, what I think about it...

I did a bit of work on this last week, and while it was sent out to various news organisations, I can see why it failed to make headlines...it has a (very) disgruntled ex-employee, pictures taken several months ago, and rather too much balance for its own good. Maybe I should have gone all-out for the 'TOXIC TIME BOMB AT TERMINAL' line.

Still, the central image for me is of an entire sea-loch filled in with old buses, lorries, waste oil, chemicals and all the other shit no-one could be bothered getting rid of properly. Despite what Mr Okill quite understandably didn't see, it DID happen. I've since spoken to a very senior figure who watched those buses buried. And the incidental revelation that there was an oil spill in January into the Sullom Voe drainage system...och well. Yesterday's news, as they say. Until the chickens come home to roost. Or rather, the ducks, swans and otters don't.


A massive, 30-year-old landfill site at the Sullom Voe Oil Terminal in Shetland is under investigation after a former employee accused operators BP of deliberately ignoring 'serious pollution' in an environmentally sensitive watercourse.

In response, a team from SEPA, the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency, will visit the site this week. Terminal operators BP are set to install a new filtration system to purify groundwater later this year.

Former security guard Scott Shedden, 62, has worked at the terminal, Europe's biggest, since its construction phase in the late 1970s. He believes that photographs taken last autumn show the Burn of Crooksetter, a haven for swans, ducks, otters and rare Shetland sea trout, polluted with run-off water from the waste dump, which ceased to operate in 2002.

The photographs, seen by local SEPA officer Dave Okill, show a white scum and orangey-brown residue in the water. Last Thursday there were still signs of similar staining from one drain where it meets the burn, but the water for the most part looked clean and was healthily populated with waterfowl. Mr Okill was suffiently concerned to order a site visit.

"It's disgusting," said Mr Shedden,. "I took these pictures using an official security camera, and showed them to BP when I worked at the terminal, and they refused to do anything about it. They just said they had plans for the burn. I was there two weeks ago and things were in a similar state.

"What is running into that burn is coming from the thousands of tonnes of waste buried during the construction of the terminal. I personally dumped 55,000 litres of red lead paint there, still on pallets, and I saw two Landrovers bulldozed as well. There was thousands of pounds worth of copper wire, waste oil, vehicles and all kinds of things just covered over and left to rot."

During construction of the terminal, the sea inlet called Orka Voe was partly filled with peat and spoil from the development. The area was also licensed as a dump and according to local folklore, such was the scale of the contract that large numbers of vehicles were buried there rather than being disposed of professsionally. The Burn of Crooksetter was diverted by the work, but it has for many years been one of the jewels in BP's environmentally-sensitive crown, attracting birdwatchers and rare species in equal numbers.

"I've heard all the rumours - that there were 25 Triumph Toledos, accommodation units, fridges, washing machines and whole fleets of buses being buried there," said Mr Okill. "All I can say is that I was on site there from 1975 and never saw anything of the sort. And when the Clair (oil field) pipeline was run through that area, neither surveys nor excavations uncovered anything like that."

Mr Okill added that he and his staff had checked the Burn of Crooksetter on many occasions over the years. "I have never seen anything that would cause me concern." But having seen Mr Shedden's pictures, he said he was "a little concerned about the white substance." Previous samples had suggested that there was no problem in the burn.

"One of the best indicators of environmental contamination are trout. They are very sensitive to any levels of pollution. The fact that there has been a healthy population of Trout in the burn over the years would suggest that there are no long term problems in the area.

"Nevertheless, in the light of these pictures my staff will visit the site at the beginning on next week and carry out an inspection to see if they can find anything out of order or if there is any change in the area, and take samples to check the inputs from these pipes"

Janet Mullins, local spokeswoman for terminal operators BP, said there had been a licensed landfill site operating under SEPA guidleines until 2002. During that period there had been regular inspections by SEPA and no problem had been found. The landfill was no longer in operation. There had been regular inspections of the Burn of Crooksetter.

"These will continue over the operating life of the terminal," she said, "with all results monitored by SEPA." Any response advised by SEPA would be acted on immediately by the terminal operators. It was crucial for this to happen in order to obtain the necessary permissions to operate the site as a whole.

Over the past year, as part of groundwater monitoring, wells had been installed at the landfill to meet new requirements of the Integrated Pollution Prevention Control permit the terminal needs to operate, and which again is controlled by SEPA. "A hydro-geologist was brought in to supervise groundwater monitoring. This feedback has gone to SEPA and the Shetland Oil Terminal Environmental Advisory Group (SOTEAG)," Ms Mullins said. A new filtration system for groundwater 'leachate' will be installed later this year.

According to Mr Okill, "as for the existing licensed landfill which is in the reclaimed area, they (BP) have a notice of closure which means that they cannot landfill any more waste. We are currently preparing, in conjunction with them, a post-closure monitoring and aftercare plan, which will remain in effect until such time as the site is deemed to present no possible environmental risk; this is of course the same for all landfills."
Mr Okill confirmed that he was in discussion with BP about a spill of crude oil into the terminal's drainage system during January. This - never made public but thought to be substantial - was contained within a small waste water pool. Another very small sheen of oil escaped into the sea recently from a visiting tanker.

In 1983, waste oil was discovered in sediment on the sea bed at Orka Voe, and was blamed on contractors working on the site, although there was no evidence that this had leached out from the landfill.

Mr Shedden, who lives nearby, worked at the terminal for various contractors for almost 30 years, mostly as a painter and shot blaster. Latterly, he worked as a security guard, but lost his job last week after an investigation into alleged misuse of company fuel.He said he was concerned for the wildlife in the burn and in Orka Voe, where the watercourse reaches the sea.

"I'm appalled that BP did nothing about this despite being told about it by me and being given copies of these photographs," he said.
The giant Sullom Voe Oil Terminal processed its first crude oil in 1978, and remains crucial to the the UK's North Sea and now Atlantic undersea oil production. Its environmental reputation has always been exceptionally good.