No wonder the demand by communities for the break-up of CalMac is becoming more strident. Poor reliability and lack of capacity on Clyde and Hebrides ferry services have been well reported and it is true that much of the fleet is old.

Critics point to lack of investment in the network, notwithstanding the fact that record sums have been “invested” in recent years: £163 million last year on operating subsidy and, so far, some £400 million earmarked for the two Ferguson ships, another £200 million plus for the four Turkish ships and more on over-engineered terminals. The problem is not lack of investment; it’s that the money is badly spent. The productivity of the system is appalling.

This problem is partly due to wasteful operating practices and ships and terminals of dated and inefficient design, but a major contributor is that the ten “major” ships carry double the crew of the ships of comparable efficient operators. For example the Arran ferry MV Caledonian Isles has 26 crew compared with 13 crew on the chartered MV Alfred (capital cost £14 million) currently also on the Arran run.

CalMac’s Clansman and Hebrides have 32 crew. When it is borne in mind that that each ship has 2½ crews (fortnight on and fortnight off plus up to 10 weeks annual leave) the excess crewing equates to some £18 million per annum. Then, when the major terminals are considered, again the number of personnel employed is highly excessive, considering that in Norway, for example, most ferry terminals are unmanned.

If more appropriate levels of personnel were employed, the savings would be of the order of £30 million per annum – a sum that could surely be more productively directed towards our cash-strapped health service.

It is said that the clincher whereby CalMac won the last round of the Clyde and Hebrides tender, was a commitment to the unions of no compulsory redundancies. This means that CalMac and the Scottish Government are stuck with a costly and dysfunctional nightmare. Who thought it a good idea, during a time of full employment to devote substantial scarce public funds to supporting some 500 unnecessary jobs on CalMac, when the health, and hospitality sectors, for example, are crying out for recruits?

Until Scottish ministers, through Transport Scotland, stop treating CalMac as a sacred cow and work towards a debundled community-based solution, the nightmare will continue.

Roy Pedersen, Inverness

Reality of unreliable ferry service

Robbie Drummond, chief executive of CalMac, writes a good letter about the quality and local sourcing of food on the CalMac fleet (Letters June 28). All this is true, but beside the point. Clearly, he is still unable to grasp how unreliable the Arran service has become for commuting and keeping hospital appointments.

While both the food and attention from the staff are of a very high standard on the Caledonian Isles, quality high tea on the MV Glen Sannox also included white table cloths and waiter service. The Sannox, like MV Cowal, also had proper fiddles round the edges of the tables, because she was expected to, and did, sail in stormy weather.

Now we have no port of refuge, a pier at Brodick that faces the wrong way, and an elderly, over-sized, breakdown-prone ferry that hides from a force eight wind.

And to all this Mr Drummond says, "Ah, let them eat cheese."

James M Arnold, Arran

Scotland’s pupils deserve much better

Like Brian Boyd, I am pleased to see educational debate in your columns (Letters, June 30). I accept what Brian Boyd says about Scottish education in the 1930s but I am surprised to read an educationalist’s summary of the past century which makes no reference to the Curriculum for Excellence (CoE) during the operation of which Scottish education has plummeted in the rankings and, in particular, has been overtaken by England.

The English comparison may be especially instructive because the Scottish and English systems are effectively two trees growing in the same garden but tended by different gardeners using radically different methods.

I have been impressed also by the constructive but adverse criticism of the CoE by those conscientious Scottish educationalists who have been prepared to face the career-threatening consequences of proffering that criticism.

I decided to look at the evidence beyond the statistical comparisons and read that part of the CoE dealing with the teaching of literacy and English. I was surprised that the contents included little or no use of terminology such as nouns, verbs, adjectives or suffixes and such like. The English curriculum is much more technical and includes many passages such as “Converting nouns or adjectives into verbs using suffixes”.

In fact the CoE gives teachers almost no inkling of what has to be taught in schools and presents no bases for standards or uniformity of teaching and learning from one school to another. A reading of the English document is a lesson in itself providing not only a guide as to what has to be taught and learned but also providing the teacher, and any interested reader, with an informative aide memoire to the construction and use of the most important language in the world.

The evidence is there and experts have told us but we continue to deny our school children access to the knowledge which they need and deserve.

Michael Sheridan, Glasgow

An example of good customer service

Alison Rowat writes of being "a woman of a certain age and hair colour" as she asked for "an appointment with a real live human being" when in her bank (“Fed up with shoddy service? Here's what you can do. The Herald”, June 28th).

I have to admit to being in the same club as Ms Rowat, rather older and wobblier but definitely fed-up with hanging about on the telephone or messing about with my laptop. A couple of weeks ago, wanting to transfer cash to my son but no longer being able to wander the streets of Kelso to the bank, I did a final call at the branch, was greeted by a lovely young man and given the telephone number I need to phone to effect those transfers when needed.

I made the call using the new number, was greeted by a lady who obviously had a wide smile on her face and she talked me through what needed to be done. Now, I can just use my special customer number and code and there we are - sorted. I had asked her about being able to order a new cheque book and a statement record book, as neither can be done in the branch. She sorted that out and the books have just arrived.

I do wish that the old ways of banking were still in use; I will never use telephone or internet banking but this small addition I have now is satisfactory. It is all thanks to those special, helpful people at the RBS. I will not be part of Ms Rowat's "consumer rebellion" ... at least not yet.

Thelma Edwards, Kelso

Stick with the catchy old name

Roy Gardiner suggests that changing the name of the Bank of England to Bank of the United Kingdom would be appropriate. This suggestion was debated in 1998, when Conservatives pressed the Government to change the name to reflect devolution.

Ahead of European Monetary Union, Lord Mackay of Ardbrecknish said that it would be unacceptable to keep the old name when the bank became the UK's voice in Frankfurt.

To me, Bank of England is more catchy, whilst The Old Lady of Threadneedle Street is a bit of a mouthful.

David Miller, Milngavie