Powering up with Forth Ports

You know, one of my all time favourite organisations is Forth Ports PLC - well next to Clydeport perhaps. I just love it when a former namby-pamby public body, probably employing thousands upon thousands of wasters and burdens on the state, turns into a rapacious property developer on the back of land assets generously gifted from the public purse. Custodians of the river no more! There's money to be made and beautiful developments to create!

Now you know I had previously mentioned Forth Ports in connection with Leith Docks which I correctly identified as an Epicentre of Dynamic Growth. Well things have been moving on apace since then. Much to the concern of green Wellington-ed nimby conservationists and stoppers-of-good-things-happening Greener Leith, Forth Ports have a devilish plan to build a couple of power stations slap bang in the middle of residential developments on Leith Waterfront. Mixed Use Development at its best! What a proud moment for Edinburgh! Power stations are the cathedrals of the future, enabling our kettles and electric blankets, so having one on your doorstep is just about the best thing ever.

But wait for it....the power station will be fuelled by biomass! Yes - that's one in the eye for the climate police! So the residents of the nearby houses can watch thousands of tons of biomass materials (or trees as they are more commonly known) arriving on trucks day and night. It's a bold move but a necessary realignment with a green agenda which is all some people want to hear about these days.

All power to you Forth Ports - here's to your Batterseas of the future.

I'm back - so is Sir Fred!

Hello - I'm back from my spell in the wilderness. My last posts on November 15th hinted at the onset of a depression which is now sadly normal for me in the darkest hours of the miserable Scottish winter. Particularly bad this year as I was snowed in for a week between Christmas and New Year. Just as well I couldn't get out or I might have thrown myself in the loch - except it was frozen over I'm told. Anyway, moving forward into 2010, I hope to ease myself back into a series of long overdue posts dealing with all my favourite subjects and of course some news about our lovely wee Auchterness.

First of all, and I know it's an old story to all you news-hounds out there, I want to welcome back Sir Fred Goodwin to the land of the living - where he belongs. I was horrified at the treatment he received last year from the press and from the criminal fraternity who targeted his modest house in Edinburgh with bricks and dog's doings. Honestly, to think that Scots have so little respect for people with money and power is completely beyond me.

In my long experience as a manager, it has always been the staff who are to blame when things go wrong. Sir Fred Goodwin will be completely blameless for what happened to RBS - mark my words. Personally I blame the tellers and counter staff for this fiasco - and my bank manager too - he must take some of the blame for pulling me up about me going £107.65 overdrawn when his own company was up to its neck in bad debt. Clearly the incompetence and double standards of lower order staff brought this pillar of Scottish finance to its knees. But thankfully, that great Scottish firm RMJM - who I have praised in the past here and here - with its worldwide profile have thrown him a lifeline.

Make no mistake, RMJM have a genuine high flyer here who can step up to the plate and eat as much historic architecture as Leningrad has to offer. Quite rightly, Gazprom are proceeding with the electrifying proposals drawn up by Fred Goodwin and it will soon be obvious to all except the naysayers, conservationists, communists and other dissidents that he is right to plough through historic envionments and thrust a great tower into the skies next to the Hermitage. That's just progress - people should accept it or go back to ploughing fields with oxen.

You know, I'm deeply jealous of Fred and his team. Progress is a way of life for them but here in Auchterness, the McTaggart family can't even have people round for dinner in case the house sinks further into the bog with the extra weight. I'm sure this sort of thing is making Auchterness unattractive to incomers. We must act soon and commission Sir Fred and his dynamic team to produce a vision for our community. I will speak to the Board next month. In the meantime, look out for more cutting edge opinion from Auchterness.