Peatstack - April 2008

Have you looked outside recently - unbelievable! Wall to wall sunshine and a steady forecast for a day or two. What's more, it coincides with the Peatstack taking a little time away from the coal-face, and this unique combination of events can only mean one thing at this time of year, it's time to go turfing! For a Peatstack, this is, of course, a strange (unique) process of self-renewal.
Sadly, over the years, cutting the peats has become an increasingly isolated process, and I wonder this year who will be with me out on the moor - maybe one or two others, and that's it, probably.
Given the price of oil you'd think the peat banks would be heaving with cutters but I doubt it. For many scunnered with the peats in childhood, the idea of cutting peat is now a nightmare they can do without. Time is always a factor, it does mean a considerable commitment, even if just cutting a little for the sitting room grate on a cold winter night. For the Peatstack all of this is full of promise of a great early summer spent in the open, and with a good supply of free fuel at the end of it!
But also, many have given up their Rayburns and open grates and have built homes without an open fire, just radiators. The Peatstack can't help but think that such decisions are not just a bid for warm, comfortable life free from the drudge of peat cutting, but also on some level an attempt to cut off the past, to put faith in the new and modern world, and this of course runs contrary to the very origins of crofting. Odd that we now show faith in the apparent certainties of the modern world - with oil being the stuff of war and of poverty closer to home, surely a return to the past is not far away.

Power Station refused - at last, the decision has been made and, thankfully, it's the correct one. The proposed wind-fired power station would have been a disaster for the island, its environment and economy - and I for one am very angry at the way in which the pro-environemnt argument is always seen as an obstacle to progress in the Outer Hebrides, when the opposite is true, if only the Comhairle and HIE would think drag themselves into the C21.
The Comhairle got it wrong - again - HIE backed it, all the powers that be wading in with their cheque books and promises of jobs galore. Doubtless they'll blame those amongst us who think the environment should be protected, and indeed embraced as the key to a strong economic future for the islands.
The Peatstack blames the Comhairle and the then government for this mess. This scheme should never have been given the green light to develop even a proposal - it should not have been encouraged by votes at the Comhairle and should not have been turned into some Great White Hope for the future economy of these islands. It was an attempt by a very large company to make profit from the unique environment of the islands. The jobs were only ever really in the construction phase, they would soon disappear and we'd be left with the biggest wind-fired power station in Europe, on one of Europe's rarest habitats and most endangered environment.
But that's the problem, the pro-environment argument is constantly painted by the Comhairle and the industralists as the enemy of so-called 'progress', and that is not right. Its time that the Comhairle asked us, the residents of thes eislands, what we want for the environment, adn then they should set out to deliver that not make this a constant matter of reaction and struggle.
The Peatstack ahs called for this before and will do so again - we need a fuel policy for the Outer Hebrides, encompassing the opportuntites of real community owned wind power establishments, wave power and self sufficient all on a sustainable scale; we need to address fuel poverty and the resources we have in these islands, and we need to think and plan for the future - not for the short-term.