Please allow me to respond to your article on the resignation of Stuart Turnbull from the Dunbar Harbour Trust and the many comments posted on your website.
Via the Link Group, Dunbar Fishermen's Association and Dunbar Harbour Trust representatives are working together on a number of harbour projects including putting a report together that identifies all the repair work required to both the Victoria and Cromwell
harbour walls. We will then work together to raise funding from various sources, including Marine Scotland, and implement repairs.
What is confusing matters, and giving scope to malicious mischief makers, is the fact that the DFA does not support Dunbar Harbour Developments Ltd harbour development plan in its current format. Whilst our aims are aligned, we have legitimate concerns
about the design and implementation and have proposed amendments. It will not be tensions that could see renewables companies go elsewhere but allowing a not-fit-for-purpose design to be built. Dunbar councillors have attended various members meetings when
these matters have been discussed and they can confirm, I'm sure, there was no scope for members to be misled or misinformed!
At a recent Link Group meeting attended by East Lothian Council officials, we secured a commitment for them to provide a consultant engineer to sanity check the two designs. With a fresh pair of eyes on the problem we can be hopeful of achieving a consensus
in due course. Accordingly, we can have our walls secured for the longer term, the lifeboat back in the harbour, we can grow the fishing industry, provide more mooring for leisure craft and attract new business such as windfarm maintenance.