The Isle of Wight MP has been called out by the boss of Wightlink for making “highly inaccurate” accusations about the ferry company.
Last week Bob Seely released what he described as “in-depth study into cross-Solent ferry services” in which he stated that the “two major ferry operators are subject to repeated mechanical and ‘technical’ issues”.
Greenfield: “Highly inaccurate”
Wightlink Chief Executive, Keith Greenfield, said,
“It is highly inaccurate for the Island’s MP to accuse Wightlink of having a slow pace of investment, with ships that are ‘subject to repeated mechanical and technical faults.’”
He added that out of 35,583 scheduled sailings in the last 12 months, 215 were cancelled (less than 1%) a performance which puts Wightlink among the most reliable transport operators anywhere in the UK.
£90million invested over the last decade
Bob Seely also stated that the pace of investment has been slow compared to the broader maritime sector to which Mr Greenfield responded,
“We have invested more than £90million over the last ten years giving us one of the most modern fleets in the country – including the UK’s first large hybrid electric ferry, Victoria of Wight, launched in 2018.
“The average age of our ferries is 18 years, compared to a design life of 35 years.”
Voted Best UK Ferry Operator in 2023
Mr Greenfield said that Wightlink welcomes debate about how ferry services can be further improved for the benefit of Islanders and understands that the topics of fares and timetables will always be important discussion points. He said,
“We are always open to ideas on how ferry services are run, but for this process to be constructive the MP also needs to recognise Wightlink’s starting point is not as he describes.
“Our customers have already done this by voting us into first place as Best UK Ferry Operator in 2023 in the British Travel Awards, the country’s largest customer travel survey.”
Customer engagement
The ferry company CEO also highlighted that Wightlink consistently engaged with customers by conducting thousands of surveys every month and holding regular Island Link Forum meetings.
He said that in direct response to customer feedback, Wightlink has recently increased the number of sailings in 2024 on the Yarmouth-Lymington route, introduced a cap on NHS travel fares for travel at any time of the year and enabled discounted Multilink tickets to be used more widely across households on sailings throughout the year.
