THIS time last year, I wrote that Scotland’s public ferry service was in crisis due to the “failure of the Scottish government to invest in a new fleet over many years,” with sailings cancelled at short notice due to technical breakdowns.

Since then, matters have spiralled out of control.

On Arran, islanders faced food and fuel shortages over the winter due to unreliable sailings. In South Uist, hundreds of residents have been turning out in recent days to protest their service being withdrawn due to difficulties elsewhere on the network.

Public operator CalMac’s belated and costly new ticketing system has been plagued with issues since it was finally introduced. Two transport ministers have come and gone.

Then there’s the endless string of controversies at the publicly owned shipbuilder Ferguson Marine: further delays, costs trebled, unacceptable bonuses for bosses, poor accounting practices and skilled yard workers treated like a political football.

When it comes to throwing blame about, there’s no doubt the Scottish government deserve the lion’s share.

After all, since entering government, the SNP has delivered just two vessels on major routes, and ministers have failed to heed the warnings of island residents, trade unions, maritime experts or, indeed, opposition parties that the future of the service is under threat.

Voices on the left of politics need to reflect on who stands to gain from this crisis.

Many islanders are understandably desperate for CalMac to lease temporary vessels that can be used to add capacity.

Private operators are circling, teaming up with business voices on island ferry committees to lobby for the “unbundling” of routes.

Pentland Ferries, an operator with a catalogue of health and safety mishaps, is a case in point. CalMac recently chartered the MV Alfred as a Clyde relief vessel from the operator for a fee of £9 million, breaching a collective bargaining agreement with RMT in the process.

Ministers signed off on the charter without meeting with the operator even though the vessel crashed into an island last year.

The charter was then delayed as its replacement on the Orkney Route, the MV Pentalina, didn’t yet have a safety certificate. Once MV Alfred was finally deployed last month, staffing and capacity issues on the boat left 60 people stranded on Arran.

This incident has received less scrutiny than CalMac’s own difficulties, but it’s an illustration of why the right-wing argument that privatisation will lead to better outcomes for ordinary people who rely on the service is so hollow and misleading.

We should fight all attempts to start a race to the bottom on workers’ rights, which is inevitable if private companies are awarded lifeline ferry routes.

But even on its own terms, the business case for “unbundling routes” and bringing in private operators makes no sense — multiple operators grasping for what little profit can be made on these lifeline routes will not build ferries or a better service.

Voices on the left need to be loudly making the case that it’s not the public ownership model that has failed — it’s the procurement model for the ferries that they run that’s failed.

The Scottish government’s approach to procurement to this point has been short-termist and panicked. There has been a failure to procure the new fleet required over many years.

CMAL, the public body which owns the vessels CalMac uses, has scoured the globe for any second-hand vessel it can find — it was reported recently it had dismissed at least 650.

There has been little interest in building shipbuilding capacity along the Clyde other than the overdue vessels at Ferguson, even though doing so would clearly be a much more sustainable long-term strategy.

And where there are commissions, they usually go abroad. Last year, two shipbuilding projects for the Islay route were outsourced to a shipyard in Turkey, a country where the TUC has reported workers face random arrests and unions operate in a climate of fear.

As recent debacles around ticketing and leasing have shown, CalMac is far from perfect, but it can’t take the blame for the current fiasco. And, importantly, it’s a lifeline service that belongs to us, the public.

Instead of allowing opponents to paint CalMac and public ownership as a millstone, we need to build on these successes and reiterate the serious network problems are down to the confusing and dysfunctional model and the failure of the Scottish government’s vessel procurement timetable.

That’s why the left needs to be ready to fight to defend it.

CalMac must be given a direct award to run the service when its current contract expires next year.

That’s how to ensure we have well-staffed, well-run and zero-carbon passenger ferry services delivering for islanders, visitors and workers in the long term.

Katy Clark is the Scottish Labour MSP for West Scotland. Follow her on Twitter @KatySClark.