THERE is much to admire about a CalMac ferry, not least the onboard full Scottish breakfast which must rank amongst the best in the country. The mac and cheese is pretty decent too.

Virtually every port they steam into would not look out of place on a postcard and once on board, there’s nothing better than sitting on deck gulping in the fresh sea air on a nice day.

By and large they are on time and manage to navigate the west coast swells relatively smoothly too.

All this comes from decades of experience, knowing what the majority of passengers want from the ferries.

But CalMac is at a crossroads in its long maritime history after several years of poor performance due to an ageing fleet.

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There is also lingering uncertainty about whether they will be awarded the ferry contract when it comes up for renewal in September.

On the face of it, CalMac shouldn’t get anywhere near the contract given the last few years and certainly there are many islanders who want shot of them – and pronto.

But news that ministers are looking to hand CalMac the contract permanently is actually very welcome and makes perfect sense all round.

Government officials have told islanders they are considering giving the firm the right to run services directly without any time-limiting contract at all.

This has caused alarm amongst some islanders, who to be fair, have been at the sharp end of increasing unreliability caused by a fleet which is literally falling apart at the seams.

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As a result, the ferry operator has received around £10.5million in poor performance fines in the six-and-a-half years since CalMac won the last franchise.

This is nearly eight times more than in its first nine years in charge and hardly seems to be the best endorsement ahead of the contract renewal.

But, in a bizarre way, it is perhaps a perfect endorsement of its performance and is exactly why it should be handed the contract on a permanent basis.

After all, if CalMac can provide a fairly decent service despite its rusting fleet of ancient vessels, imagine how good it could be once six shiny new ferries are delivered in the next couple of years.

Of course, once the contract is awarded then the whole structure of the ferry operations should be changed.

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It is the perfect time to do it and it’s a long overdue change. The situation endured by islanders in recent years must never be allowed to happen again.

One way to do this would be to scrap the ludicrous separation of CalMac and CMAL and bring the while operation under one body which will allow proper joined up thinking.

Ministers also need to be much tougher with Transport Scotland to ensure it starts performing much better than it currently is.

It is no coincidence that many of the biggest infrastructure issues in recent years involve transport.

Privatisation is not an option as companies will just cherry-pick the most profitable routes and leave the taxpayer to subsidise the rest.

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There is also a small but vocal minority of islanders who may wish to reassess their expectations of what the ferry service’s role actually is.

It is not a multi-million pound taxpayer-funded taxi service.

CalMac has its faults but is the best option going forward.