A COMPANY looking to bring ultra-high speed internet access to scores of cities and town centres has had more than 200 businesses register their interest for its latest scheme, in Edinburgh.

CityFibre launched its “Gig-Up Edinburgh” campaign last month, and in an update to investors yesterday said it had been encouraged by the strong take-up to date.

Those firms registering their interest are over and above the connections committed under CityFibre’s anchor tenant agreement with local service provider Commsworld.

CityFibre stressed that registration was not an obligation to sign up to services, but enabled the company to plan its network construction to accommodate likely demand.

In addition, Commsworld has signed contracts with a number of new customers, including the Edinburgh International Conference Centre (EICC), Apex Hotels and The Law Society of Scotland.

Greg Mesch, chief executive of CityFibre, said: “We are very encouraged by the response from businesses in our first month of pre-registration. In addition, it’s great to see our partner, Commsworld, already securing new customers.”

Andy Arkle, commercial director of Commsworld, added: “Our customers are excited by the opportunity.”

Direct risks are low but knock-on effect of Greek drama is harder to predict, writes Jeff Salway

Investors with diversified portfolios have nothing to fear from events in Greece, experts say, despite growing anxiety ahead of a referendum that could take the country closer to a euro exit.

Global and European stock markets have been skittish amid ongoing uncertainty over the outcome of prolonged negotiations between Greece and its creditors.

The latest crucial stage comes tomorrow, when the country votes on whether or not to accept the austerity measures proposed by the EU and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in exchange for further support.

A vote against the proposal would make a “Grexit” more likely, although several other scenarios could play out in the event of the deal being rejected.

“However, it is not yet clear what exactly will happen to Greece, even if the people vote no,” said Adrian Lowcock, head of investing at Axa Self Investor. “It is this lack of certainty that causes most concern amongst investors as it is harder to make rational investment decisions.”

With the financial crisis fresh in the memory and clouds hanging over other European economies, anxiety and even panic among savers and investors is “rational”, according to Harry Morgan, chief investment officer at Anderson Strathern Asset Management.

“It is one thing for stock markets to take a dip, but when the stability of the banking system is in question, people are prone to panic. Recent history has provided vivid examples of the corrosive effect of a collapse in confidence,” he said, pointing to the September 2007 run on Northern Rock and the losses suffered by bank depositors when the Bank of Cyprus used their cash to shore up the country’s banking system in 2013.

“So, the Greek financial crisis carries real resonance, and reminds us that cash is not necessarily a safe asset. UK depositors’ cash balances are only guaranteed up to £85,000 with any one institution,” said Morgan.

“As ever, diversification remains vital for large cash investors, even if it means the inconvenience of operating several bank accounts.”

The referendum is unlikely to have a significant short-term impact on the equity and bond markets to which ordinary UK investors and pension savers are directly exposed, whatever the outcome, said Tom Stevenson, investment director at Fidelity Personal investing.

“Greece’s economy is small in European terms and even smaller from a global perspective. It does not really move the dial from a purely economic perspective,” he said.

The drawn-out nature of the Greek saga means investors are largely prepared for the current events, he added.

“This means that almost no Greek debt is held outside the official creditors. Private lenders have almost no exposure to Greek bonds. Equity investors, too, won’t have been caught short by the slow unfolding of this drama. If they didn’t want to hold Greek shares they will have got rid of them long ago.”

Not everyone is convinced that investors have prepared for the ramifications of a no vote, however. One leading fund manager suggests that a ramping up of uncertainty over the future of the eurozone could wipe 15 per cent off equity markets in the euro area.

The uncertainty for investors is now largely over the extent to which events in Greece will affect other “peripheral” economies to which many investment and pension funds do have exposure, such as Italy and Portugal.

Graham Spooner, investment research analyst at The Share Centre, said: “Longer-term investors are unlikely to be panicked by the situation, but should be aware that markets could be entering uncharted waters. The greater concern may be over the possibility of contagion into other countries.”

That makes it essential for anyone with shares or collective investments to have their holdings spread across different assets to spread the risks.

“Investors should make sure their portfolios are well-diversified, have a sensible balance of assets and are spread around the world’s markets,” said Stevenson. “The short-term outlook is unknowable but the long term has always rewarded deep breaths and calm thinking.”

Broadcaster Sky has announced plans to create about 200 jobs at its call centre facilities in Scotland.

The new posts, at contact centres in Dunfermline, Livingston and Uddingston, come as a similar number of roles are created across two English sites, at Newcastle and Stockport.

Sky, which already employs some 5,700 people in its Scottish contact centres, said the new roles would offer a combination of permanent full-time and part-time work.

They form part of a recruitment drive to expand the firm’s corporate business while serving millions of existing Sky viewers.

Spokesman Steven Lindsay said: “We are very excited to be launching one of our biggest sales department intakes for 2015.

“Our aim is to build a reliable and diverse workforce to help grow and expand the Sky brand.We are passionate about delivering excellent customer service and retaining our existing customers, this relies heavily on an experienced and passionate workforce.”

The group said that with a 6,000-strong workforce in Scotland, that also includes engineering and technical staff, it ranked as the country’s ninth largest private sector employer. In April, the satellite broadcaster saw its shares hit 14-year highs as it posted a one-fifth jump in profits after its UK business made the best start to a calendar year for more than a decade.

Sky’s UK operation achieved the largest share of group operating profit after growing 14 per cent to more than £1 billion.

Events, birthdays and anniversaries for 4 July

1653: The “Barebones” parliament – an assembly entirely nominated by Oliver Cromwell and the Army’s Council of Officers – went into session.

1776: The Declaration of Independence was adopted in Philadelphia.

1798: Napoleon Bonaparte occupied Alexandria, Egypt.

1827: Slavery was abolished in New York.

1829: The first scheduled horse-drawn bus service was introduced in London, running between Marylebone Road and Bank Junction.

1838: Flooding during a rainstorm drowned 26 children in the Huskar Colliery mining disaster at Silkstone, England. This led to the 1842 commission on the employment of women and children in mines, resulting in the ban on female and child labour underground.

1840: The Cunard Line began its first Atlantic crossing as RMS Britannia, a 700-ton wooden paddle-steamer departed from Liverpool, bound for Halifax, Nova Scotia.

1848: The Communist Manifesto was published by Karl Marx and Freidrich Engels.

1883: The Statue of Liberty was presented to the US by France.

1892: James Keir Hardie became the first Socialist to win a seat in the British Parliament.

1892: Western Samoa changed the International Dateline, so there were 367 days there that year, with two occurrences on Monday 4 July.

1898: French ocean liner SS La Bourgogne collided with British sailing ship Cromartyshire. La Bourgogne sank with the loss of 549 lives.

1910: In a boxing match billed as the “fight of the century”, former undefeated world heavyweight champion James J Jeffries came out of retirement to challenge the incumbent, Jack Johnson, for his title, but was knocked out in the 15th round.

1937: First successful flight in a helicopter was made by Hanna Reitsch in Germany.

1944: Japanese fighter pilots launched their first kamikaze attack on the US fleet at Iwo Jima.

1960: The USA unfurled their new Stars and Stripes flag, with a 50th star to honour Hawaii as a new state.

1980: Evonne Cawley defeated Chris Evert 6-1, 7-6 in the Wimbledon ladies singles final, the first mother to win since the First World War.

1981: John McEnroe defeated Bjorn Borg 4-6, 7-6, 7-6, 6-4 to win the Wimbledon men’s singles final.

1992: Steffi Graf won the ladies singles title at Wimbledon.

1996: The Prince of Wales delivered his divorce terms to the Princess, said to be £15 million.

1996: Hotmail, the free internet email service, was launched.

2004: The cornerstone of Freedom Tower was laid on the site of the World Trade Center, New York City.

2007: BBC correspondent Alan Johnston was freed by Gaza captors after being held for 114 days.

2009: The Statue of Liberty’s crown reopened to the public after eight years, having been closed due to security fears following the World Trade Centre attacks.

2014: Rolf Harris was sentenced to five years and nine months of imprisonment for indecently assaulting minors.

BIRTHDAYS

Jo Whiley, broadcaster, 50; Neil Morrissey, actor, 53; Doddie Weir, rugby player and commentator, 45; René Arnoux, racing driver, 67; Mark Davis, golfer, 51; David “Kid” Jensen, broadcaster, 65; Prince Michael of Kent, 73 Henri Leconte, tennis player, 52; Ute Lemper, singer, 52; Gina Lollobrigida, actress, 88; Jenny Seagrove, actress, 58; Colin Welland, actor and playwright, 81; Eva Marie Saint, actress, 91; Jeremy Spencer, musician (Fleetwood Mac), 67; Bill Withers, singer-songwriter, 77; Neil Simon, playwright, 88; Pam Shriver, tennis player and analyst, 53; Patrick Tilley, science fiction author, 87.

ANNIVERSARIES

Births: 1790 Sir George Everest, surveyor-general of India after whom mountain was named; 1807 Giuseppe Garibaldi, Italian politician and war hero; 1845 Thomas Barnardo, founder of homes for destitute children; 1898 Gertrude Lawrence, actress; 1916 Iva Toguri D’Aquino (“Tokyo Rose”), wartime radio propagandist; 1918 Abigail Van Buren, advice columnist and radio show host (“Dear Abby”); 1960 Roland Ratzenberger, Formula One racing driver.

Deaths: 965 Pope Benedict V; 1850 William Kirby, “the father of entomology”; 1881 William H Bonney, outlaw “Billy the Kid”; 1934 Marie Curie, discoverer of radium; 1938 Suzanne Lenglen, six-time Wimbledon singles champion; 1995 Eva Gabor, actress; 1996 Clay Jones, chairman of BBC radio’s Gardener’s Question Time; 2003 Barry White, singer-songwriter; ; 2012 Eric Sykes CBE, comedian.

THE chances of an interest rate rise by the end of the year rose yesterday after Britain’s powerhouse services sector grew more than expected last month.

Markit/Cips’ latest purchasing managers’ index for the sector – more than two-thirds of the UK economy – rose by 2 points in June to 58.5, topping forecasts and staying comfortably above the 50 mark that separates growth from contraction.

Combined with PMI reports for the manufacturing and construction sectors published earlier this week, Markit said the gain suggested Britain’s economy expanded by about 0.5 per cent from April through June, compared with an official reading of 0.4 per cent in the first three months of the year.

Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit, said: “The UK PMI surveys indicate that the pace of economic growth rebounded in June, from what appears to have been a brief lull caused by the general election.

“The buoyancy of the service sector PMI survey data in particular increases the possibility of interest rates rising later this year, especially when viewed alongside the recent upturn in wage growth to the highest since early-2009.

“A rate hike isn’t imminent, however, not least because policymakers will want to avoid adding further stress and uncertainty while the Greek debt crisis rolls on.”

The detail behind the upbeat services survey, which does not include retailers or the public sector, presented a mixed picture. Service businesses took on staff at the slowest pace this year. New orders also increased at the weakest pace so far in 2015. However, companies’ optimism regarding the coming year remained at a high level.

Howard Archer, chief UK and European economist at forecasting consultancy IHS Global Insight, said the data offered a boost for second-quarter growth hopes.

“The pretty buoyant June services sector purchasing managers’ survey makes us more confident on our call that GDP growth picked up to at least 0.6 per cent quarter-on-quarter in the second quarter and could very well have been 0.7 per cent,” noted Archer.

“This would be up from 0.4 per cent in the first quarter. Robust consumer spending is likely to have underpinned growth in the second quarter along with improved services activity.”

Meanwhile, the CBI said today the rate of economic growth had eased in the three months to June, but activity remained solid across the quarter as a whole.

Releasing its latest growth indicator, the business lobby group said expectations were buoyant, with respondents anticipating that growth will bounce back in the next three months. Its survey quizzed 752 businesses across the manufacturing, retail and service sectors.

Rain Newton-Smith, CBI director of economics, said: “Despite an easing in performance this month, activity over the quarter as a whole has been good. We expect the economy to sustain a solid pace of growth over the remainder of the year as lower oil prices and inflation continue to boost real incomes and consumer spending.”

WILL Young took four years between albums, but says the break did him good. It gave the singer time to reflect on his life, get more comfortable in his skin and start to look at the world beyond the pop star bubble

H ow many pop stars do you know who use the word fulcrum? OK, how many people do you know who use the word fulcrum? To be honest, I could probably just leave this interview right here: Will Young is a man who lobs the word fulcrum into chit chat over coffee. But that would leave an awful lot of blank space on the page so bear with me.

Young arrives at the bar where we’re meeting looking pretty tired. His white shirt is a bit rumpled underneath a hoody. His hair is messy and he’s not had a shave. There is no pop star primping and preening. His mobile phone gets put on the table alongside his packet of Silk Cut. (I didn’t know anyone smoked Silk Cut anymore). Turns out it’s not that he’s been partying up a storm – he doesn’t really drink anymore – he’s just done an overnight drive from the South of France, a sort of mercy mission for a friend of his. So he’s feeling a bit peaky but he’s optimistic the orange and soda water will sort him out and actually, he really quite enjoyed his adventure.

“So many funny things happened,” he says of his trans-continental road trip. “My favourite was when we discovered that the road we were on was blocked and there were eight firemen in attendance for a poodle that was tied to some railings. By a lead. They didn’t know who owned it. It was amazing.” He beams. “Eight firemen for a poodle.”

Will Young has been a pop star for nearly 15 years. There have been millions of albums sold, three number ones and 11 top ten singles. That’s a bigger pop career than most would manage to squeeze from the aftermath of an encounter with Simon Cowell. But there have also been appearances on film as well as documentaries for telly, an autobiography, a whole load of charity work for Stonewall amongst other charities. And then there’s the stage. He did a stint in a Noel Coward play, The Vortex (he played the cocaine addled composer Nicky Lancaster, whom Coward had played in the original production). And then came Cabaret. Young was the Emcee in director Rufus Norris and producer Bill Kenwright’s version of the show for which he was nominated as best actor in a musical at the 2013 Olivier Awards. So what we know is that Young is a shape shifter. He was never a one trick pony on a fast track to panto in Didsbury. But it seems that in the four years since his last album, he might have made the biggest shift of all – he’s become a happy man.

Young’s last album, Echoes, was released in 2011. And now he’s back with a new one. He’s “chuffed” with 85% Proof. And why shouldn’t he be? But before we get to that, it’s worth taking a little detour by way of the topic of Muay Thai boxing. It turns out Young has discovered a love for the sport. Having a flick through the sleeve notes of the new album it transpires Young’s been in Thailand at a kind of martial arts boot camp. That’s where the photographs were taken too – all mean and moody in harem pants. Let’s start with Muay Thai, I say, as he sips his fresh orange and soda. I am aware I make it sound like a cocktail.

“It does sound like that,” he says, “or some sort of dodgy bar. It’s amazing. I wanted a break. My brother said let’s go away but let’s do some fitness. So I said great, let’s do it.”

They picked a training camp called Tiger Muay Thai in Phuket. Eight corrugated-roofed training spaces dotted along an entire road. Then there are juice bars and massage places for recovery from the arduous work outs.

“After a training session, it’s like when tutorials finish at university,” he says. “You see everyone in transit, people who have just finished and others just arriving for a session. You line up and have an hour long massage for a fiver.

“There were guys built like brick s**thouses but there were women too. It was 50/50 split between women and men. There were MMA fighters, Muay Thai fighters and people like me who want to learn it for the first time. And you can also just do fitness – I say just. It was hardcore. I was running round the camp dragging tyres. It was amazing.”

He did one bout of sparring but didn’t like it. “I like the aggression and getting it out – healthy aggression is good and that was another reason that I wanted to do this. But I didn’t like sparring. I’m not sure I’d want to do that again. It is a beautiful thing to watch.” He drains his glass. “I will do it every year. I’ll go back there. It was my best holiday.”

Four years is a lifetime in the fickle world of pop music. But the break was important for Young. Vital really. It gave him a chance to catch up with himself. And when he did go back into the studio, with Jim Eliot and Mima Stilwell whom he’d worked with before, everything just flowed. The whole album was made in just 10 writing sessions. “I wasn’t really sure that we were going to work on the album, but we’re friends and it’s easy to be together. It was because of that, because it was so easy, it just worked. We wrote three tracks in two days. We’d average about two a day. Weird.”

Having just signed to Island Records, he was nervous about sending the first songs in for them to listen to. But he needn’t have been because they agreed instantly that those tracks would be the first two singles. “So our confidence was really high because it was so nice to get that feedback. Everyone needs feedback.”

The word he uses to describe the album is “eclectic”. And it’s true – it’s unashamedly a pop record but within that the sound ranges from ballad to belting pop tune. And Young sounds more sure of himself in every style. He’s written all but one of the songs. “As a song writer now, particularly lyrically, I’ve got a lot more confident,” he says. In part, that comes from having found his voice while writing his autobiography, Funny Peculiar. And since then he’s been doing some other kinds of writing – blogs mainly for the Huffington Post. “I’ve found a different voice as a writer,” he says. “I’ve got a great article coming up, the power of women.”

What prompted that? I ask. I don’t know what I expected his answer to be, but I didn’t expect it to begin with the sentence, ‘I was in Waitrose really early…’ It turns out he’s living in the countryside at the moment. Up sharpish one day, his plan was to hand in his dry-cleaning and to shop for a dinner party he was hosting. “I don’t usually cook so I get really uptight otherwise I forget the ingredients. I have to put it all in bowls, like a cookery show, because I’m so disorganised. There were just all these women in the supermarket, mostly women, mostly mothers, a lot of them in gym kit. It was 8:45am. I was supposed to have dropped off my dry cleaning but I hadn’t because I’d forgotten it – even though I left the bag by the door so that I wouldn’t forget it. They would have got the kids up, sorted breakfast, organised their kids for school, got them off to school, got to Waitrose and then they were heading to the gym. I just thought women are amazing. They are powerhouses. I know people go on about yummy mummies but f**k that, they’re doing it. Unless I got it completely wrong and they were just pottering around Waitrose and the nanny has done everything.”

A new album, a more chilled out way of being, inspiration everywhere. Young strikes me as a man at ease with himself. Happy to chat, sure of himself, confident. That’s it, he’s confident. “I think it’s also not being so inward-thinking,” he says. “That’s true about my music too. I’m in my 30s and I’ve settled. I’ve grown in confidence but also I’ve stopped worrying about whether that person will like my shoes. It allows me to look out more and be more interested in life and people and happenings. That’s affected everything I’m doing at the moment.

“I think it’s about the power of vulnerability. There you go, that’s another article. I’m going to do a book in the end. A self-help book. I’ve just started formulating it now. I meditate. I study somatics. I practice – actually I don’t like that word – I’ve learned mindfulness. So I’ll do a book.”

I’ve never met Young before, so I don’t know from first hand experience that he’s changed radically, but it very much seems like that. He strikes me as a man who’s been through something and has found himself now, on the other side, different. So what’s that about?

“I think it’s just been a natural progression. It’s come mainly from working on myself because the more that anyone works on themselves the more they’re settled and can look out beyond themselves. I’ve never set out to change because if I had it wouldn’t have been real.

“I’ve been very fortunate because I’ve managed to attain my dreams quickly. In 13 years. I’m financially well off so that doesn’t take up loads of my time and for which I’m constantly grateful, it’s amazing. I’ve got a nice house, I’ve always been able to have nice cars, all those things.” He pauses. “Actually no, there was a moment. I got number one with the last record, I moved into my house – beautiful, I’d done it all up, it was like World of Interiors, and I thought there’s something missing and I don’t know what it is. So I thought, let’s find out. But it was because I’d got to that place that I could do that. I could’ve gone my whole life just being like I must get another whatever and that will make me settled or fulfilled. So I started looking at behaviours and what was important. Was it important to get a really big house? The answer is, it’s not. At all.”

He started reading books too, self-help classics such as Pia Mellody’s Codependency and Love Addiction and John Bradshaw’s Healing the Shame that Binds You. “What’s been incredible is that it allows me to know what’s going on with myself and also other people in terms of how I’m reacting. The two together are magical.”

I tell you what all this awareness has done for Will Young. It has made him the kind of interviewee who when he doesn’t understand what I’m banging on about says exactly that. Care for an example? I try to ask a question about how Young is managing to be his new authentic self in the music industry, a business not exactly renowned for encouraging self-awareness, certainly not at the expense of record sales. Does he know what I mean? “No, I don’t,” he says, straightforwardly. Oh, right then. I give it another bash referencing big houses and flash cars. He doesn’t look convinced. “Oh in that way,” he says skeptically, “like in an 80s way, all money, money, money.” I try again – well even if it’s not about money, it might be about attention or fame. “I’m just me, wherever I am,” he says. OK, fair enough, I’m not trying a third time. He relents. “Here’s a good example, I’m off to some fashion parties. I used to go to them when I partied a lot. It was brilliant fun. I’d go with a bunch of friends, we’d go from party to party, get smashed, try to steal goody bags. I’d go trying to be someone else. Now, I’ll go tonight and I’ll be the same there as I am now. I don’t need to be anyone else.

“Now when I meet people I’m actually listening to them. Before I would’ve been looking over their shoulder and my shoulder, thinking how’s it all going? How am I looking? Oh god, he’s got a better outfit than me. S**t why did I wear these shoes? I got out the car and no one paid any attention. Now it will be noise in the background and I will be properly talking to someone and genuinely being interested. That’s the difference. And it’s huge.” And he knows that this way of being isn’t easy to achieve so he’s even clearer that taking a break from the music industry was really important. And when he says break, he means more than just time out. He had made “the record he’d always wanted to make”, and it went to number one. He finished his contract at Sony and left “under all good circumstances”, then he left his management too. But the game changer was when he got himself a pair of leather shorts and a corset and turned into the Emcee from Cabaret.

“Cabaret was a huge fulcrum,” he says. “I was really protected because it wasn’t me so I didn’t have to worry at all. I just got on stage and played this person. I loved the production and it was everything I believe in because the person I was playing was very fluid so I could just be on stage and that was just amazing.

“It reminded me how important it is as a performer to be political and to play with the audience, manipulate them and show them what’s going on. Cabaret is such a brilliant way to do that, to hold a mirror up. Looking back, it’s really awakened my political interests and my social conscience. It’s made me really think about what I’m putting out there.”

Later in the year, he’ll start touring. He’s been inspired by Cabaret. “It’s going to be amazing,” he says. “I’ve got a whole idea, a whole bloody idea. My poor tour manager. It’s going to be quite theatrical.” He smiles.

And just in case I’ve created the impression that Young is totally zen-like, completely chilled out and relaxed, oozing self-awareness and confidence from every pore, let me add a little ballast. He still has days when he feels the pressure of where the next job will come from. He is, he says, ever mindful of “freak out mode”.

“I call it I’m being mental pop star today,” he says. It’s when he gets a bit high maintenance. “And then I also have pop star days when I feel like a proper pop star. I had one the other day. I got given a suite in the Savoy. I was chauffeur driven, nice outfit, hair and make up. I sang a song in front of lots of famous people at the Southbank Awards. It was a major pop star day. I even had a glass of champagne and I don’t really drink anymore. Awesome.”

And then the day after that?

“I was cleaning up my dog’s s**t in the countryside.”

85% Proof is out now on Island Records

The treatment

The Planets, £285 for three hours at the Lush Spa (115 Princes Street, Edinburgh, 0131-225 4688, www.lush.co.uk).

Why go?

If you’re bored of conventional spa treatments and want to try something weird, wacky and completely unconventional.

Our spy says

The Lush website doesn’t say much about its newest therapy, but I know from previous experience of this place that it might be kooky, so check your cynicism at the door.

Therapist, Kris, talks me through what’s to come, and lets me choose from a selection of cards. Mine says Saturn and Confidence on it. Then I move through to the treatment room, where I’m instructed to lie on the table face down for the first phase of three.

Phase One

I’m not going to give EVERYTHING away, as much of the fun is the surprise element, but the first 90 minutes involves a thorough full body massage combined with talk therapy and choreographed to some lovely music that’s been based on Gustav Holst’s The Planets. When Kris finds a particularly stubborn knot, he’ll link that to a particular emotion or subject matter, and you’re prompted to talk about whatever pops into your head until the knot releases, then he’ll rub a cool or hot stone over the area to metaphorically “close the drawer after it’s been tidied”. I feel slightly self conscious at first, but, once I’m into the swing of it, it feels cathartic.

Phase Two

A tea party! A hand and arm massage! Chocolate! A palm reading! Positive affirmations! Some other fun stuff! Not necessarily in that order, but this is the crazy filling in the middle of this treatment sandwich.

Phase Three

It’s time to think about the future, so let’s have an hour long anti-gravity facial using lots of lovely products, including the Full of Grace Serum Bar. My jowls are whisked into submission, and acupressure points along my temples and round my eyes are pressed hard. This is a lymph stimulating, circulation pumping experience that’s not for namby pambies. I love it and so does my face.

The results

I couldn’t stop smiling. This is a spa treatment blended with performance art and therapy. I wouldn’t expect anything less from Lush.

19/20

Greek PM Alexis Tsipras yesterday called on voters to reject “blackmail” when they vote in a bailout referendum tomorrow.

In a short TV address, he insisted Greece’s presence in the EU was not at stake and urged voters to reject the “sirens of scaremongering”.

Tomorrow, Greek voters will decide whether they support the terms of further international loans, following months of tough talks with creditors.

Banks have been shut and limits imposed on withdrawals, with the head of Greece’s banking association warning that although the banks have enough funds until Monday, they will be dependent on the European Central Bank thereafter.

Mr Tsipras called the referendum last weekend, asking Greeks to decide whether to accept creditors’ proposals for more austerity in exchange for more loans, even though those proposals are no longer on the table.

He says a No vote would put him in a stronger position to seek a better deal for Greece within the 19-nation eurozone to reduce its 320 billion-euro national debt and make payments more sustainable.

In the televised address yesterday, Mr Tsipras urged Greeks to vote “no to ultimatums, divisions and fear”.

He emphasised that tomorrow’s referendum was not a vote on whether Greece will remain in the euro.

But opposition parties and many European officials say a No vote would drive Greece out of the euro and into an even more impoverished future.

Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis yesterday said that an agreement with the country’s creditors “is more or less done” and that the only issue left is debt relief.

But the head of the eurozone finance ministers’ group, Jeroen Dijsselbloem, harshly rejected those comments, saying negotiations were not still going on.

“There are no new proposals from our side and, whatever happens, the future for Greece will be extremely tough,” Mr Dijsselbloem said.

“To get Greece back on track and the economy out of the slump, tough decisions will have to be taken and every politician that says that won’t be the case following a No vote is deceiving his population.”

A poll conducted on Tuesday and Wednesday, and published in Greece’s To Ethnos newspaper yesterday, showed the two sides in a dead-heat. It also showed an overwhelming majority – 74 per cent – want the country to remain in the euro, compared to 15 per cent who want a national currency.

Of the 1,000 respondents to the nationwide survey, 41.5 per cent will vote Yes and 40.2 per cent No – well within the margin of error of 3.1 percentage points. Another 10.9 per cent were undecided and the rest said they would abstain or leave their ballots blank.

Both sides were trying to sway the undecided in rallies last night, to be held 800m apart in central Athens.

Mr Tsipras was due to speak at the No rally in the capital’s main Syntagma Square outside parliament, while Yes supporters were set to gather at the nearby Panathenian Stadium, where the first modern Olympics were held in 1896.

The vote could be the most important in Greece’s modern history, but the question is said to be unclear and many are confused about what is at stake.

The council of state, the country’s highest administrative court, was to rule last night on a motion brought by two private citizens asking for the referendum to be declared illegal.

Tomorrow’s vote “is invalid because it expressly violates the constitution, which stipulates that a referendum cannot take place on economic matters”, Spyridon Nicolaou, one of the two filing the motion, said.

“But it’s also invalid because it doesn’t incorporate the text of the documents on which the Greek people are called on to decide. Would anyone from Evros (in far north-eastern Greece) know the specific documents?”

A separate group has filed a counter-motion supporting the referendum’s legality.

Greeks to head home for crunch vote in economic referendum

Many Greeks living in the UK will return to the troubled country this weekend to vote in a crucial referendum over its economy, the Greek Embassy said.

Those who are unable to return at short notice say it is “always on their mind” as their concern for family members in Greece grows.

Voters will be asked in tomorrow’s poll whether to accept an austerity package put forward by international lenders in return for a further bailout from the eurozone rescue fund.

Greek citizens living in the UK can only take part in the referendum if they return to Greece to cast their vote.

A spokesman for the Greek Embassy in London said: “Many people will make the effort to go back if they can because it’s a pivotal moment in our recent history. We cannot measure the numbers, but I have heard of many people from the Greek community here in the UK going back.”

Banks have been closed all week in Greece to prevent a run driven by savers withdrawing cash amid uncertainty about whether the country will crash out of the euro, after falling into arrears with the International Monetary Fund.

The Greek Embassy said that Greek tourists visiting the UK are facing the same €60 (£43) restrictions on withdrawing money from their bank ­accounts.

“Tourists might have a problem with the ATM because of the bank limits,” he said.

“The government has said they are going to look in to that and a find a solution for people outside of the country.”

Marina Livaniou, 30, a Greek teacher from north-west London, said she is becoming increasingly stressed about the situation in Athens where her parents live.

“I’ve been following the news every day and speaking with my family, who are very mixed up because they voted for this government. It’s difficult, especially for my father who is a pensioner and has been queuing to get money out of the bank. They’ve been trying to use my card so they can get some more money. It’s a very hard time. I can hear how stressed they are on the phone and it affects me. I’m very worried for my country.

“I would love to be able to vote from here because going back is not an option – flights are expensive in summer and I would have to get child care and cover for work.”

Chris Neophytou, who runs a Greek patisserie in Wood Green, north London, said: “A lot of my customers and staff are Greek and it is all they are talking about. It is always on their mind. But it is very hard for many of them to go back to vote, as much as they wish they could. In the last year or so I have noticed an influx of Greek people coming to London looking for work, they come in here asking for jobs. It is very difficult situation for them back home.”

A REVOLUTIONARY microchip that has been proven to significantly reduce hospital admissions for people with chronic heart failure has been implanted in patients in the UK for the first time.

The tiny sensor alerts doctors to any change in the condition of patients with heart failure, enabling them to contact the patient and advise them on measures to take before their symptoms get worse.

The condition, which means the heart does not pump blood around the body at the right pressure, affects around 900,000 people in the UK and doctors believe the device could have the potential to improve the treatment and management of many patients.

Professor Martin Cowie is consultant cardiologist at Royal Brompton & Harefield NHS Foundation Trust in London, where seven patients have had the device fitted, and said it has proved to be useful during the recent hot weather as patients who live with heart failure have to regulate how much fluid they take in each day.

He said that despite being at a conference in Brazil at the time, he was able to see that one of his patients was dehydrated and so was able to contact them and tell them to drink more water. The miniature device even alerts doctors before the patients have noticed any symptoms.

Its use in the UK follows a trial in the United States, which found the sensor reduced hospital admissions by an average of 30 per cent after six months, compared with a control group.

Patients have had the miniature sensor inserted into their pulmonary artery – the main blood vessel carrying blood from the heart to the lungs – using a thin tube that is passed up to the heart through a vein in the leg in a minimally invasive procedure.

Once in place, the device – which has no battery or replaceable parts – enables remote monitoring of changes in blood pressure in the pulmonary artery, which is a good indicator of worsening heart failure because the condition causes pressure within the heart, and in turn the pulmonary artery, to rise.

Its use requires the patient to spend a couple of minutes a couple of times a week lying on a specially adapted pillow, which receives data wirelessly from the implanted sensor and is connected to a monitor that sends the readings directly to the patient’s doctors.

The readings can then be analysed to determine if they need to adjust their treatment.

He said: “This device has the potential to revolutionise the care of heart failure patients. By detecting any deterioration in heart function at a much earlier stage and changing treatment accordingly, we should be able to prevent significant numbers of hospital admissions and improve the quality of life for many thousands of people with the condition.”

BRAIN cancer survivor Ashya King has returned to the UK with his parents ten months after they took him out of hospital and sparked an international manhunt.

The five-year-old, who made a “miracle” recovery after receiving proton beam therapy in Prague, said he was “excited” to return home and wished to see his grandmother.

His parents Brett and Naghmeh King initially said they feared to return because their son could be taken into care but the pair now say they have “no reason to hide”.

Mr King, 52, said: “We just have to face up to the situation now. We would like nothing to happen and for us to be able to get on with our lives.

“We shouldn’t have to be afraid and that’s why we won’t go on living like refugees in a different country for no reason.

“We feel sufficiently assured by Portsmouth City Council that it’s all finished. However, we do have a lingering fear that one day we will get a knock on the door.”

He added the family’s “conscience is clear” following their decision to take Ashya out of Southampton General Hospital without doctors’ consent and seek treatment elsewhere.

Police launched an international search for the parents at the end of August last year and the Kings were arrested in Spain a few days later, spending several nights in prison away from their son before being released.

A High Court judge approved the move to take Ashya to Prague for proton therapy, which the Czech Republic’s proton therapy centre said was more effective than the radiotherapy Ashya was being offered on the NHS.

It limits the collateral damage of radiation to other vital organs, such as the heart and liver in Ashya’s case. This would lead to less severe long-term side-effects including heart and breathing problems.

The therapy was not offered to him on the NHS, although the health service later agreed to fund Ashya’s treatment.

His grandmother Patricia King has previously described the authorities’ handling of the case as a “huge injustice”.

Last September, Southampton General boss Dr Michael Marsh spoke of his chances of recovery, saying: “The chances of surviving the condition Ashya has are about 70-80 per cent after five years so we believe he has a good chance of a successful outcome provided he gets access to the most appropriate treatment.”

But his parents took their son and their six other children on a ferry to France before driving to Malaga.

The proton beam therapy he underwent, which costs £100,000 per patient, is not widely available on the NHS but is commonly used throughout Europe.

In December, Mr King claimed he was “treated like a criminal” when he returned to Britain for the first time.

Defence Secretary Michael Fallon has warned that the UK government needs a veto over the use of Crown Estates land to prevent the SNP “playing political games” with the future of Britain’s nuclear deterrent and other key military sites. His comments come ahead of the final day of the committee stage of the Scotland Bill’s progress through the Commons where the devolution of Crown Estates is due to be discussed and agreed.

The Scottish Government has already complained about the number of potential vetoes on devolved powers held by UK ministers in the bill.

But Mr Fallon said the bill would allow the Ministry of Defence to protect its assets because the areas include the edges of Faslane on the Clyde where the Vanguard submarines which carry the UK’s Trident nuclear deterrent are based. The base is surrounded by Crown Estates seabed property and UK ministers fear the Scottish Government could use ownership to block submarines entering and exiting the base or, more likely, develop the areas in a way which would make Faslane unviable.

The Defence Secretary has made clear he wants the UK government to be able to prevent this from happening, particularly as the SNP has a record of using devolved powers to veto UK government policies with which they disagree.

In the past they have said they would use planning powers to veto new nuclear power stations being built north of the Border.

Mr Fallon is also concerned about training zones in places such as Cape Wrath in the north- west of Scotland which is Crown Estates property and where environmentalists have pushed for an end to UK sea battle trials because of the deaths of whales.

Another area of concern among many potential training areas in Scotland is the Firth of Forth.

The Defence Secretary, born and raised in Perth and Dundee, stressed he and the UK government respected the devolution process and were entirely supportive of Crown Estates land being devolved to Scotland.

He acknowledged the land, which includes many of the seabeds around Scotland and places like West Princes Street Gardens in Edinburgh and Kings Park in Stirling, could be used to make more money which could benefit communities across Scotland.

But he warned this could not be done at the expense of the defence of the UK.

The SNP has made its opposition to Trident clear, maintaining its position despite ending the party’s opposition to Scotland joining Nato should it become independent.

Both Alex Salmond, the SNP foreign affairs spokesman at Westminster, and defence spokesman Brendan O’Hara have made opposition to Trident a priority since the election.

The crunch moment is due to come next year when MPs are asked to vote on a “maingate decision” that will confirm whether Trident is replaced or not at a cost of £100 billion.

Mr Fallon said: “We cannot compromise the integrity of our defence, including the deterrent, by allowing the SNP to play political games.”

He added: “The only purpose of reserving this control over defence sites is to ensure that any future development is fully compatible with the way in which we operate our training and other defence activities in Scotland.”

He said there would be an agreement drawn up with the Scottish Government about any future developments so that the operation of MoD facilities would be safeguarded.

However, his words infuriated the SNP, which has accused Mr Fallon of being high-handed and disrespectful.

SNP Westminster leader Angus Robertson said: “Michael Fallon does his case no favours with this kind of language.

“It is clear the Tories have completely abandoned any idea of living up to the Smith Commission or recognising the mandate from the people of Scotland the SNP received in May, so to suggest we are the ones playing games is ridiculous.”

He added: “Trident is an obscenity – a total waste of money. Mr Fallon needs to stop being so high-handed and dismissive of people’s concerns.”

SOLAR power yesterday supplied 16 per cent of the UK’s electricity as the country basked in sunshine, according to industry estimates.

An increase in the amount of solar panels and the glorious sunshine meant that solar arrays from large farms to home roof panels yesterday helped to raise the amount it contributes to meet the country’s energy needs. to what is thought to be a record level.

The most recent official figures show more than 40,000 Scottish homes have photovoltaic solar systems installed. There is a similar number in Wales, but more than 500,000 in England.

Despite having less than 10 per cent of the capacity, homes in parts of Scotland were the top producers of solar power across the country in the past few days.

A report from the renewables website WeatherEnergy showed solar-powered households in Inverness, Wick and the Aberdeen region would have produced massive surpluses of energy due to the sunny conditions on Thursday.

Homes in Inverness were able to generate 158 per cent of the electricity needs of an average household. This compares to the top spot south of the border, in Falmouth, with 124 per cent.

The news comes as solar-powered homes, commercial rooftop schemes and solar farms were opened to the public for Solar Independence Day yesterday. At the same time a schools project run by climate change charity 10:10 has been celebrating the 1,000th solar panel to be installed on a school roof in England to save money and carbon.

“It has been amazing to see schools all over the country benefiting from the power of the sun, especially in this weather,” said Cecily Spelling, solar schools project manager for 10:10.

“With 1,000 panels now installed, it’s only going to grow.”

Locations ranging from a stately home in Aberdeenshire to a solar farm in Cornwall yesterday and today displayed their power installations as part of solar independence day.

The solar industry has set out how it believes the UK can double the amount of solar power generated and make it as cheap as fossil fuel electricity by 2020.

An ambitious programme to deliver two million homes with solar schemes, 24,000 commercial rooftops and 2,000 solar farms by 2020 and providing 56,900 jobs would cost around £13.35 on the average energy bill by the end of the decade, the industry claims.

Though it would cost £350 million more than the government’s planned spending of just under £1.2 billion in 2020, industry experts argue it would deliver around twice as much solar capacity as current policies and would lead to solar being free of subsidies.

While solar panels are an intermittent source of power, a new generation of batteries has been developed to allow electricity from the sun to be stored for use in the evenings.

Paul Barwell, chief executive of the Solar Trade Association, said: “Solar really gives power back to the people, allowing households and businesses to generate their own clean, green electricity.At more than 80 per cent public support, solar has been shown in government opinion polls to be the country’s most popular form of energy.”

Energy minister Andrea Leadsom said: “Solar is an integral part of the UK’s energy mix.

“It’s great to see industry initiatives like this boosting confidence and take-up, so hardworking families and businesses can benefit from low-carbon energy and lower bills.”

Juliet Davenport, chief executive of the Good Energy solar farm in Bude said: “Solar power in the UK is an astonishing success story. Five years ago solar hardly existed in the UK, so it’s amazing to see that today over 15 per cent of the UK’s electricity is produced by solar.”

She added: “And best of all, it doesn’t pump carbon into the atmosphere.”

YOUNG people at risk of being radicalised and groomed for acts of terror should be offered help through a new national help-line, according to a charity.

In a report due to be submitted to the Scottish Government next week, the Glasgow-based group Roshni is calling on ministers to back plans for an anti-extremism hotline.

The recommendation comes amid growing concern over the number of young people prepared to travel to Iraq and Syria to join up with the group calling itself Islamic State.

Roshni, which works to address issues affecting Scotland’s ethnic minority groups, said the phone line would be a support and counselling service, rather than one used to raise concerns about other people.

Ali Khan, the charity’s executive chair, said: “It’s a support line we’re looking to put together, it’s not a whistleblowing line.

“One of the young people we spoke to said there was a fear about asking questions because of the answers they might get, so they go to the internet where they won’t be judged.

“There needs to be a bridge set up to allow people to say things which we may find uncomfortable, but means they won’t get arrested.”

Mr Khan said the phone line could be run by young volunteers, who would be given training in how to manage the calls.

Earlier this week the UK Government outlined guidance for schools on how to spot children at risk of being radicalised.

It said attacks on British values or intolerance to homosexuality were examples of behaviour which could raise concerns.

The Department of Education, which has responsibility for schools in England and Wales, already has a telephone helpline and e-mail address which allows members of the public to raise concerns about radicalisation, but there is nothing similar north of the Border.

Hundreds of young people are believed to have left the UK to join jihadists in the Middle East.

They include former Glasgow schoolgirl Aqsa Mahmood, whose family were this week forced to issue a condemnation after their daughter wrote a blog in praise of the attack on British tourists in Tunisia.

Mr Khan said his charity hoped to set up groups for young people, which would give them a “modicum of freedom” to express their views.

But he said the idea ran the risk of going against the government’s radicalisation strategy, which he criticised for being too much of a “top-down” approach.

Labour MSP Graeme Pearson, a former police officer, said it was up to government, not charities, to come up with a strategy.

He said: “It seems to me the time is right for the government to call together a strategy group to put a well-thought-out plan in place, rather than individual organisations coming up with one-off ideas.

“Up to now, it has been a lot of well-meaning organisations cherry-picking ideas and presumably seeking funding without an overall plan that says how will this all fit together.”

He added: “What we’re dealing with here is something that is going to last decades – this isn’t a short-term fix we’re looking for. Therefore, it would be right for the Scottish Government, along with Police Scotland and the security service, to begin to sit down in a Scottish context and decide how to put a plan 
together.”

A Scottish Government spokeswoman said there were already measures in place to tackle radicalisation.

She said: “Scotland has robust measures in place to help safeguard children and young people from any risks from extremism, not least work by the Preventing Violent Extremism unit and Police Scotland, working with Education Scotland and local authorities, as part of the UK counter-terrorism strategy.

“This includes promoting awareness of vulnerabilities and risks and in recent years has reached thousands of pupils and teachers through hundreds of events, including class discussions, presentations and teacher workshops in schools, as part of Scotland’s wider multi-agency response to the threat posed by extremism.

“Protecting our children and young people is our priority and we will always review our own work and what we can learn from the successes of others.”

MOTOR neurone disease (MND) campaigner Gordon Aikman will receive an honorary degree from the University of Edinburgh today.

Mr Aikman, 30, who was diagnosed with the neurodegenerative disease last year, is being recognised for his contribution to improving research and care for patients.

He launched Gordon’s Fightback to help those diagnosed with the disease and last month it was announced that the campaign had raised more than £300,000 to fund research into a cure.

The campaigner had already successfully lobbied the First Minister to publicly fund and double the number of specialist MND nurses across Scotland.

Together with MND Scotland, he has also been campaigning for a law change so that the 80%-95% of MND patients who lose their voice are guaranteed the equipment they need to communicate.

Mr Aikman, who is a graduate of the university, will be awarded the degree at a ceremony at the Usher Hall in the city.

He was given a British Empire Medal in this year’s Queen’s Birthday Honours list for his campaigning.

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Fresh disruption was brought to Channel Tunnel services after around 150 migrants tried to storm the terminal in Calais in a bid to board UK-bound freight.

Eurotunnel said services were delayed and cancelled after migrants attempted to access restricted areas on the French side.

The incident caused a return of queues on the M20 in Kent for lorry drivers trying to cross the Channel after Kent Police reintroduced Operation Stack.

It also prompted renewed calls for authorities to act to solve the worsening Calais migrant crisis, which is costing the UK economy millions of pounds.

The Fresh Produce Consortium estimates that £10 million of fresh fruit and vegetables have been thrown away since the start of the year as a result of the problems.

A Eurotunnel spokesman said the incident was affecting freight traffic only, with passenger services running to a full timetable.

He said: “Eurotunnel reiterates its call to the authorities to provide a solution to the migrant crisis and restore order to the Calais region.”

The Port of Dover, which faced heavy disruption this week due to striking ferry workers in France, said it remains “open for business”.

A port spokesman said P&O Ferries was operating a full Dover-Calais service, while DFDS Seaways was running full services to Dunkirk.

The return of Operation Stack - where freight traffic is queued on sections of the M20 - came hours after police lifted all phases of it.

Kent Police said: “Op Stack phase 2 implemented due to disruption at Channel Tunnel. M20 closed coast-bound 8 to 9.

“Non-freight traffic now being allowed into Channel Tunnel terminal. M20 Junctions 11 to 12 no longer closed but delays likely. Check with operator if heading to Channel Tunnel as services disrupted.”

The migrant crisis in Calais has been escalating in recent weeks, with around 3,000 people displaced from countries including Eritrea, Syria and Afghanistan setting up camp near the port.

Migrants have been taking advantage of slow-moving and queuing traffic by trying to board UK-bound vehicles, forcing some drivers to take long detours to skip Calais altogether.

Home Secretary Theresa May and her French counterpart Bernard Cazeneuve this week agreed to increase the joint intervention fund to improve security around the port and the Channel Tunnel.

French aid workers have reported a “catastrophic” situation, with predictions that 2,000 more migrants could arrive over the summer at the camp, dubbed Jungle II.

Volunteers from l’Auberge des Migrants say up to 50 new migrants were arriving every day at the camp, and there were not enough tents, blankets or food.

British travellers have been advised by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) to keep vehicle doors locked in traffic and when unattended in Calais.

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CHANCELLOR George Osborne is expected to use his first all-Conservative Budget on Wednesday to deliver the party’s promise to end inheritance tax on family homes worth up to £1 million.

It is understood that Mr Osborne is preparing to confirm that a new allowance enabling parents to pass on the main family home to their children tax-free after their death will come into effect from April 2017.

The pledge effectively to take all but the most expensive homes out of inheritance tax - at an estimated £1 billion cost to the Exchequer - was a key plank of the Conservatives’ general election manifesto.

David Cameron said at the time that the party was responding to the “most basic, human and natural instinct there is” for parents to be able to pass on something to their children.

Mr Osborne and Mr Cameron had first promised to cut inheritance tax in 2007 - a move which was widely credited with deterring Gordon Brown from calling a snap general election he had been expected to win.

However, following the 2010 general election, the scheme was blocked by their Liberal Democrat coalition partners.

At the time of last May’s election, the Tories estimated by 2020 that 22,000 families could benefit from the proposed new £175,000 main residence allowance.

The allowance will be transferable on the death of one spouse and added to the existing £325,000 transferable allowance to bring the tax-free total up to £1 million.

But on properties worth more than £2 million, the allowance would be gradually tapered away until it was worth nothing to those with homes worth more than £2.35 million.

Since the election, it is understood that the plan has been tweaked so that where couples have “downsized” to a smaller property after their children have left home, the allowance will still apply to the old family home.

The manifesto said that the scheme - which will be available to married couples or civil partners - would be funded by a raid on pension tax reliefs for people earning over £150,000.

In a joint article in The Times, Mr Cameron and Mr Osborne said: “It can only be right that when you’ve worked hard to own your own home, it will go to your family and not the taxman.”

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JAPAN is looking to the Outer Hebrides to help it harness wind and wave power in the wake of the destruction wrought by the country’s devastating tsunami in 2011.

The Consul General of Japan will be visiting the Western Isles this week researching smaller-scale renewable energy projects - in what he says could be “one of the most significant” visits he has undertaken.

Mr. Hajime Kitaoka will particularly look at wind and wave energy schemes during his two day visit, beginning on Tuesday.

Mr. Kitaoka was the U.K Desk officer at the Japanese Embassy in London before he later became the Deputy Director of the UK at the Tokyo Headquarters.

As part of his visit he will call at Lews Castle College, The Shawbost Mill, the Callanish Stones and the Seaweed Factory in addition to a few other visits.

Cllr. Norman A MacDonald, Convener of Western Isles Council, said: “We are delighted to have the opportunity to host the Consul General of Japan and look forward to welcoming him to our islands next week.

“We hope that he will enjoy his visit and that it will be productive in relation to his particular interest.

“In addition, Mr Kitaoka will have the opportunity to visit some local cultural and heritage sites.”

Mr Kitaoka, said: “I am excited to be visiting the Western Isles for the first time, which were described as ‘the most beautiful islands in Europe’ by Trip Advisor last year.

“I believe this visit could be one of the most significant I have undertaken since assuming the position of Consul-General over one and a half years ago. “I am very much looking forward to visiting sites relating to renewable energy, which is now of the utmost importance for the future of Japan since the nuclear disaster caused by the tsunami in 2011.”

The last act of the former prime minister Naoto Kan before his departure in 2011 was the passing of a bill to promote renewable energy such as wind, solar and geothermal.

The new law forces power utilities to buy power generated by renewable sources at fixed prices, while allowing them to pass on extra costs to consumers.

Hydro power and wind power are other sources of renewable energy which both the government and industries are increasingly tapping into in a bid to help power resources-poor Japan.

Another key area that is being tapped for greater development in the future is the source of the very force which caused the March 11 earthquake – Japan’s seismic activities, in the form of geothermal power.

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TOURISM operators in the Western Isles have called on the Scottish Government to prevent another crippling ferry strike during one of the busiest periods of the year.

They also demanded compensation for the damage the action was having on their trade and to the reputational image of the islands.

The strike due on Friday has been called by the RMT union despite new talks to be held on Monday to try and resolve a dispute that badly hit west coast ferry services last week.

Caledonian MacBrayne and the RMT union are meeting in an effort to resolve the row over job security and pensions.

But reacting to the news of the new action, Ian Fordham, chairman of Outer Hebrides Tourism, said the Scottish government should intervene to halt the action which was crippling businesses.

“We are dismayed at the prospect of a further strike this week, just as the industry was getting back to normal after the last action,” he said.

“Businesses have already seen significant cancellations and losses from the last strike, which comes on the back of the five week disruption to the Stornoway – Ullapool route, and the long standing concerns over the inadequate Mallaig – Lochboisdale trial service.

“We call on the Scottish Government to intervene and ensure there are no further strikes, and also to establish a proper and fair mechanism for compensating both visitors and businesses who are out of pocket as a result of the industrial action.

“The compensation currently offered by Calmac only goes part of the way to helping people who have lost out, and we repeat our call for a proper scheme to be established immediately.”

Cal Mac’s managing director, Martin Dorchester said:”We are extremely disappointed that the RMT has chosen to continue with strike action. The best way to protect the existing terms and conditions of its members is to work with us to ensure we win the Clyde and Hebrides Ferry Service contract and this action is damaging.

“We are anxious to avoid any more disruption which is not in the best interests of our employees and the communities we serve and would urge all our colleagues to turn out for work.”

The Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association (TSSA) has also sent out strike ballot papers to about 100 of its members who work for CalMac.

Two thirds of state-owned CalMac’s ferry services were cancelled last Friday week during a 24-hour strike by RMT members - the culmination of three days of action.

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THE groove of Uptown Funk may sound effortless, but it’s the product of endless tweaking, Mark Ronson tells Fiona Shepherd ahead of his T in the Park gig

There were perhaps some eyebrows raised when Mark Ronson stepped up to accept the 2008 Brit Award for Best British Male. Surely this DJ/producer with the slightly affected transatlantic accent didn’t qualify for the description? His hit album at the time, Version, didn’t even feature original material, being a succession of indie covers souped-up by soulful backing band The Dap-Kings and sung by guest vocalists. Even the man himself seemed a little bemused by the accolade, despite his work on Amy Winehouse’s Back to Black album virtually defining the musical zeitgeist of the time.

“I’m very self-critical and over-think things,” says Ronson. “I’m probably a bit too neurotic.”

Yet Ronson is at it again seven years later, creating the hit sound of now, as it were, with the omnipotent and omnipresent groove of Uptown Funk and accompanying album Uptown Special, which has returned him to the top of the charts after the relative commercial disappointment of his previous album, the appropriately named but undeservedly underappreciated 80s-inspired electro odyssey Record Collection.

“I realised that I just had to make something really good to smack people in the face with,” he says. “After you have a really big hit record, of course everybody’s going to check out your next thing but the difference is if you’re bringing out the record after the record that was after the hit record then it’s a different story – you really have to make something really great to get people’s attention.”

The collaborative Uptown Special is a consummate feelgood suite of jazz, funk, disco and soul written with the likes of Bruno Mars and hit producer/multi-instrumentalist Jeff Bhasker and executed as deftly as Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories, another party album which benefited from assembling a group of talented musicians in the studio to play live and give things that subtle human touch.

Despite the success, awards and satisfaction of collaborations, Ronson is sensitive to accusations that he is simply a musical pastiche merchant, recycling the sound of the classic soul, funk and rare groove records he has favoured over the years in his DJ sets.

“I want to make music for this generation and future generations, not just for people who used to like something else,” he counters.

There is no doubt he is serious in his musical mission. He comes to DJ at T in the Park next weekend with more than 20 years’ experience of giving a club crowd a lot of what they want and a little of what he reckons they need.

Ronson, whose family moved from London to New York when he was eight, made his name locally as a DJ with diverse tastes while he was still a student at NYU. Although he is characteristically self-deprecating about his jump into production and making his own music a decade ago – “anybody who was a DJ in New York at the time was getting some kind of record contract” – he has subsequently turned in exquisite production work for Winehouse, as well as Adele, Lily Allen, Rufus Wainwright, even his step-dad Mick Jones’s band Foreigner and – still to come – Lana Del Rey.

As for his own albums, “it’s never kind of ‘right, it’s gonna be about me now’,” he says. “It’s just because I’ve got some ideas that aren’t really going to fit anyone else. So none of them were made intentionally. These were things I was messing around with.”

Uptown Special is the exception in his catalogue, forged with a sense of the imperative, then meticulously tweaked before it was released from the traps. Evidently, it takes a lot of work to sound this carefree.

“Regardless of how much time we might have spent perfecting the sound, the moment of inspiration, the creative spark for these songs does just come out of nowhere,” he says. “Uptown Funk came out of having a jam in the studio. Some people sit down to jam and it sounds like Neil Young or Fleetwood Mac or Arcade Fire. When Bruno and I sit down in the studio with Jeff and we start to make a song, that’s just the default that we go to, and the kind of music it is, soul and funk and R&B, it’s not supposed to sound laboured or forced because then it’s not going to feel right.”

The album is much more than one global hit. There are echoes of Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder, who contributes a signature harmonica solo, in the sound, while mischievous rapper Mystikal channels James Brown, regular Ronson collaborator Andrew Wyatt provides bruised soul vocals and Kevin Parker, the frontman of Australian indie band Tame Impala, sings lead on a couple of blissed out, jazz-infused psychedelic soul numbers which recall The Isley Brothers and Donald Byrd.

However, Ronson’s most intriguing collaborator is not a musician at all, but novelist Michael Chabon, author of Wonder Boys and The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, who accepted Ronson’s unusual offer to try his hand as a pop lyricist. “He’s a massive music buff, he’s like an encyclopaedia,” says Ronson. Still, his presence among the musos is a testament to Ronson’s ability to think outside the box.

“I was out in Venice when I started to write the album,” he says. “Venice has got a spooky vibe after dark, and I started to write melodies that were different to what I’d written before. I felt like the lyrics had to be about stories and characters and that’s something that I don’t really know how to do.

“When you think of really great lyrics in contemporary music, it’s always indie music and rap. When you think of soul or groove-based music, it’s usually about the dancefloor or heartbreak so I just told him that I wanted to try something to stimulate the mind and the behind.”

These are not your standard get-up-get-down lyrics. Chabon atmospherically captures the sultry, slightly altered feel of pulling an all-nighter on Daffodils, the mix of invincibility and yearning that plagues the perennial clubber on Leaving Los Feliz and takes an evocative snapshot of a break-up on Crack in the Pearl.

Ronson has always picked his wing(wo)men astutely, yet somehow casually. Amy Winehouse casts a long shadow – so much so that I am politely asked not to bring her up in interview, as Ronson has been asked about little else surrounding the release of Asif Kapadia’s documentary Amy (see review, p22).

But he has also teased out career-best vocal performances from Boy George and wee Kyle Falconer of The View on the affecting Somebody to Love Me and the blithe Bike Song respectively. For Uptown Special, he embarked on a road trip round the southern states to find an old school soul singer. His “discovery” Keyone Starr guests on the album, while he mustered the auspicious likes of Mary J Blige, George Clinton and Grandmaster Flash for his Glastonbury appearance.

When asked who he would like to work with next, Ronson says he is already collaborating with all the artists he likes – including Glaswegian DJ/producer Hudson Mohawke who has just released his second album Lantern.

“That instrumental orchestral piece Kettles, that’s one of my favourite pieces of music this year,” he says. “There will be something wrong if [Batman director] Christopher Nolan doesn’t snatch him up.”

Mark Ronson plays T in the Park on 10 July, www.tinthepark.com

Silma Hill, a historical thriller about witchcraft by Iain Maloney begins in the forbidding manse of Reverend E S Burnett

The Reverend E. S. Burnett, minister for the parish of Abdale, was composing his sermon when his daughter intruded. At her apologetic knock he paused, nib hovering over Romans 15:4: “For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope.” He waited his customary ten seconds, pen dripping, before a granite, ‘Come!’ He rubbed the ink from his pale, soft hands, the only marks on them graft from the labour of his mind. His study was wood-panelled and book-lined, a lifetime of accumulated knowledge, theological texts, scientific treatises, drawers of correspondence. The fruits of man’s explorations since the Fall there for him to harvest. Removing his glasses he ran his finger over the groove they had worn in the bridge of his nose. The ploughed furrows in his forehead, the widow’s peak and curl in his once broad shoulders spoke of the hours he spent hunched over a thick book or a blank sheet.

Fiona’s hands, pressed heavy against the door, were those of a woman much older than herself, barnacled with a near-decade of work. Sixteen and already care-worn, she approached the frontier of his citadel. There was no telling what reception she would receive, what choler had aggravated his temper. A storm may be gathering over his desk waiting for a conductor on which to break. The Lord was strong and wrathful. Reverend Burnett, his representative.

‘Begging your pardon, sir,’ she said. ‘Old Man… I mean Mister Sangster is at the kitchen door. He says he has found something. Something in which you may have an interest.’ He considered her with a stern eye, weighing her with the experienced consideration of a judger of men. Her voice was too harsh, the local accent too strong, the vowels too parochial. Steps needed to be taken. The sons of important men would never marry a wench with a mouth so common. The daughter of a respected minister and future member of the Historical Antiquities Society should be beyond reproach.

Burnett stood slowly, stretching his limbs out from the seat, reaching for his hat where it rested on the bust of Calvin. A discovery by Sangster would shift the face of his week but there was no need to rush. Let the old fool wait. Burnett was a man immersed in complex spiritual matters, a man wrestling with the nature of the Lord, the glory of His Creation, saving the damned souls of Abdale. The parishioners couldn’t expect him to respond to every trivial request with haste. Each man had his place in the Lord’s grand scheme, and Sangster’s was at the kitchen door, hat in hand. He waved Fiona away. She retreated to the pantry, alone in the darkness amongst the preserves and grains, the scratching of mice and the musk of old wood. Burnett’s existence moved between the twin poles of his study and the kirk, and while he was secluded she had the manse to herself. When he walked abroad in her world, she tried to become a ghost, unseen, forgotten. It was safer that way.

As he passed through his house he searched for anything out of place. The manse gave him some satisfaction. High ceilings, solid walls, uncluttered, austere, every inch under his control. A man’s home reflected his soul. Upon entering a home of squalor, of fetid stench and decay, of broken furniture and bestrewn floors, he knew there lived the damned. Parishioners concerned for the repose of their eternal soul need only glance around their abodes for an answer. Evidence abounded.

Twenty years before, arriving in Abdale a freshly made minister with a young wife, he had found the manse an abomination. The minister who preceded him, Cullen, was a simpleton, delighting in art and fancy. The manse reflected his tastes. Watercolours, many of them by Cullen himself, offended the walls. Flowers, ornaments, trinkets of such irrelevance that Burnett had wondered if Cullen had been a serious man in any way. Everything that could be burned was burned, the rest dumped. He had given orders. His wife had obeyed.

The manse had remained the same ever since. Fiona maintained it tolerably well. Not with the same surety and efficiency as Moira, may she rest in peace with the Lord, but these things were sent to test mankind. If Burnett could not educate his own child and order his own residence, he had no business educating and ordering his parishioners.

Sangster was waiting at the kitchen door, fingers filthy, back curled. The Sangsters were farmers, but had a hand in much that went on in the village, including the digging and selling of peat. It was in this capacity that the old man’s existence proved valuable for Burnett. Peat bogs were excellent sites of discovery, preserving the treasures of history until ripe for reclamation. Over the years Sangster’s clumsy fingers had unearthed Roman coins, shards of pottery, even a claymore. Finds he dutifully handed over to Burnett, the authority on such things.

Antiquities were Burnett’s passion. He read widely on the subject, his shelves heaving with learned texts. He corresponded with the leading experts of the day, men of knowledge at the universities, the Royal Society and the Historical Antiquaries Society, the missives carefully filed. His finds methodically written up and submitted, copies sent to the relevant authorities. To date all he had received were watery letters thanking him for his contribution, curt notes, displaying vague sentiments. He had been to lectures at the Society, heard papers read, asked apposite questions, engaged in debates, but the doors to its inner sanctum remained sealed. They took him for a country minister. Typical of the city breed, he thought. Self-absorbed, unable to see work of real clarity and insight when it was right in front of them. Too much claret. Too many feasts. One day he would produce work of such high and clear learning they would have no recourse but to make room at their table.

He strode through the kitchen to where Sangster was waiting. ‘Sangster.’

‘Good morning, Mister Burnett.’

‘You have found something?’ He was carrying it wrapped in a fraying grey blanket, delicately held in both hands. It was long, between four and five feet.

Sangster was a man of few words. Brevity was a holy virtue, even in a man as rough as him. Sangster laid the package on the ground and unwrapped it. Inside was a wooden object, a rough statue of human form carved from a single piece of dark wood. Long and thin, with grooves suggesting limbs, an unnaturally extended, narrow neck and an egg-shaped head, a flat slash for a mouth. It had absorbed some damage, chips serrated its edges, and the legs ended at the ankles, the feet long gone. It was female. Full breasts and an over-emphasised reproductive area. The eyes demanded attention. Two round brass pins raised from the head, the coloured metal fierce against the wood. The dirt that clung to the body had seemingly avoided the eyes, ringed them like exhaustion. They shone as though recently polished, a fervent light.

He crouched down beside Sangster. It was a false idol of some sort. Heathen. Before the light of Christianity came to the area it had been under the sway of a number of different barbarian sets. Celts, Romans, Norsemen. Burnett couldn’t immediately tell which but he could conclude one thing: great care had been taken over its creation.

The eyes gave off an uncanny power. The power of graven images. Therein lies the appeal of false idols, why they have power over the imagination of weaker men. It was a mere object, carved by a man. To anyone with any intelligence the trickery was clear.

‘Where did you find it?’

‘North corner of the bog, Mister Burnett.’

The bog was on the far side of Silma Hill, which rose up behind the manse. Sangsters’ beasts roamed the nearside. On the top of the hill stood a small copse and the remains of a stone circle. ‘I’m going to examine it now, but I shall be down later today to sketch the site.’ Burnett wrapped it carefully and carried it protectively inside.

Iain Maloney was born in Aberdeen and now lives in Japan where he teaches English and writes about travel, literature and music. He studied English at the University of Aberdeen, has a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Glasgow and as a writer of fiction, non-fiction and poetry has been published in journals and anthologies around the world. In 2013 he was shortlisted for the Dundee International Book Prize. His debut novel, First Time Solo, was shortlisted for the Guardian’s ‘Not The Booker Prize.’