# General > Doanalsin's Diary >  Fit's in 'e Coorier 'e day

## Nwicker60

Caithness Courier headlines for January 7, 2014

RECOVERY  teams are on standby to survey a cargo vessel on which eight men  drowned after it sank in the Pentland Firth.  With bad weather expected  over the next few days, it is not known when a remote controlled vehicle  inspection will be able to be carried out on the Cemfjord which  capsized 10 miles east of the  Pentland Skerries on Friday.

A BID to  allow the public to attend a crunch meeting about the future of surgical  cover at Caithness General Hospital failed - despite support from some  local councillors.  Around 30 clinicians, NHS Highland representatives,  MSPs and councillors gatheed at Wick Town Hall to discuss the issue  yesterday morning.  It was to be debated in private despite being  described as "the key issue facing Caithness and Sutherland at the  moment" and one which is worrying staff at the hospital.

THE last  calls are soon to be broadcast from the friendly voices at Radio Remedy  as the long-standing service comes to an end.  Caithness General  Hospital's very own radio station has been running for nearly 30 years  but the group of v olunteers in charge, have decided it is time to call  it a day.  Its last show will be broadcast at the end of January.

MOTORISTS  on the A9 will see that work is well under way on the first of two  substations being build at Spittal as part of the major upgrading of the  electricity grid.  The development is a vital link in the multi-million  pound scheme to increase the capacity of the mains power line in the  north which features a new sub-sea cable between Caithness and Moray.

OUR  three Lib Dem MPs, John Thurso, Charles Kennedy and Danny Alexander  will be tightening their grip on their seats in the run-up to the  General Election in May.   Those confirmed to challenge John Thurso for his Caithness, Sutherland  and Easter Ross seat, include 21-year-old-Labour candidate John Erskine,  a former Highland Youth convener from Conon Bridge.

TEACHER numbers  in the Highlands are at their lowest since 2007, new statistics have  revealed.   Figures from the Scottish Conservatives show there are  nearly 300 fewer primary and secondary teachers in schools across the  region.  Lindsay McCallum, the party's candidate for Liberal Democrat  Charles Kennedy's Westminster seat in the General Election said the  plummeting numbers proved the SNP had "taken its eye off the ball".

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