Speaker 1: Hello everybody, and thank you for joining us again Seafood Matters.
I'm proud to welcome you to my hundredth podcast episode.
I'm delighted to mark this milestone with a good friend
of the series, Mike park Obe. Over the years, Mike's
generosity with his time, honesty and insight has made these
conversations something special and I genuinely appreciate that. Today, rather
than talking about industry headlines, I want to focus on
your journey the man behind the role at the Scottish
White Frist Producers Association. Hi, Mike, Good morning, Jim.
Speaker 2: How are you.
Speaker 1: I'm good, Thank you, I'm good?
Speaker 2: Are you? Yeah? Yeah? Good. Down in London yesterday. So
back in the office today and away on holiday tonight,
which is always a good thing.
Speaker 1: Excellent. We will earned I'm sure. Let's start by taking
you back to the early eighties when fishermen blockaded ports
and harbors and protests over imported fish. Where were you
at that time and looking back now, was that one
of the biggest situations of your career or did the
real test later the.
Speaker 2: I guess it was a test for others at the time.
I mean, I recall back in nineteen seventy five, I
think just before I entered the industry full time. I
was just entering the industry. I recall the vessels blockading
Aberdeen and being able to walk from one side to
the other, and I think that was in frustration at
the import of fish from outside the country and the
prices and the prices that it delivered to Scottish fishermen,
I guess, and the wider UK cause I know that
Grimsby was involved in that as well. But I think
that was an early indicat to me Jim, that the
industry was there and it would stand up for itself
and it would put up with any nonsense I respect
of a what government was in place. My one recollection
of that, Jim as well, was that a lot of
vessels got rits in their masts, and I think a
lot of them had to pay money, and a lot
of them were warned if they did it again, they'd
end up in jail. Because if you recall, the oil
industry was booming in Aberdeen at that time and you
were pretty much bringing a substantial industry to its knees.
So although it was a gesture from the fishing industry
at that time, I think it was a lesson that
if we were going to protest in the future, it
had to be in a different way. And I think
that was an early lesson for me that you only
get away with doing that sort of once in your lifetime.
If you do it twice, then you will pay the
penalty for it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And what was your thoughts about the outcome, because
I know at the time we didn't really feel there
was any benefit because it didn't stop them.
Speaker 2: No, it didn't stop the imports. The industry got back
to see. I mean that was frustration being vented. The
industry go back to see go on with what it
did best and tried to make a crumb because in
those days, I remember, you know, there was die getting
pulled over, fish, fish getting withdrawn, It's all sort of stuff.
And I remember being in one protest around that time
where they were actually dragging fishermen were actually dragging the
fish off the the backs of lorries and tipping it
out in the road. I remember it was Whitings and
I think I think the Whitings were coming in from
Ireland at the time.
Speaker 1: That's right, that's right.
Speaker 2: Company in Aberdeen you may remember, called Club n Yeah,
used to be. So I recall, you know, fishermen jumping
on the lorry and tipping the boxes of whitings out
on the road, which I think there was a few
boxes tipped, and everybody kind of thought, this is this
is not the right thing to do, because you know
that whiting was sold to them by fishermen in Ireland
and you're doing the fishermen down in a different country.
So I think it was very very short lived.
Speaker 1: Where did you start in the industry, what drew you
to leadership, who influenced you early on, or mentors, family colleagues.
Speaker 2: I was brought up pretty much fifty yards from the
sea gym, and my playground was the harbor, and I
started going on the local vessels at a very early age.
And indeed a friend of mine and myself at a vessel,
a small creole vessel that we used to row out
every morning from about nine years old. So that triggered
my interest in fishing. And all I ever wanted to
be was the top. I used to dream about, you know,
I'll get a fishing boat and I'll be the best
fishing whenever. Of course that was never the case, but
that's what drove me on and all through my teens
I used to spend you know, trips away rock Hall
with long liners, and my uncle had a vessel called
the Trustfall. It was about thirty seven foot scene at vessel.
Every weekend, every school holiday, probably from the age of twelve,
I spent aboard that sick every day I was out.
And why I went back, I'll never be sure, but
I did. Every weekend I'd go back again and would
be sick again. And then I entered the industry full
time after being in the Merchantnavy for a while aboard
the Argonauts. Spent seven weeks there, and then aboard a
vessel called Helene sat My ticket carried that vessel, got
my first seeing it vessel at twenty one. It was
a eighty seven foot seeing it vessel called the Jazzarine.
And then I built the Genebula, bought another boat called
the Dauntless, so I took them at one point. So
that that was pretty much my career pathway. The people
that influenced me all the way along where my uncle David.
He died at a very early age when I was
in the Merchant Navy at seventeen. He passed away, but
he was instrumental in my younger career by allowing me
aboard the boat and being a very gentle character, never
ever put you under stress, always within reason, allowed you
to do what you wanted to do, and at the
same time trying to bring you on to do more,
especially in regards to what you were capable of. So
at the very early age, my uncle David, David Andrew,
he was instrumental in there, and of course my father
was in the background as well, and he did a
merchant navy career, in a Royal Navy career, although he
hadn't beat the fishing for any lent a period of time,
and then you come up through the ranks and of
course every skip a year with when you're a young boy,
you know, as an example to you like the Darrown
I was on there, Alert Macintosh, Billy Malcolm where it
was an influence. People like Davy Smith were a big,
big influence because you know, some of your listeners may
not be aware that at that time they argueaut which
was owned and skippered by Davy Smith and his brother
Robert Smith. They were the top in the UK, and
not just an Aberdeen or Peterhead. These guys were beating
big trawlers that were going to Iceland and in terms
of their annual gross that were making extortion amounts of
money because of their skill set. So he was he
was a strong influence in what I did. But I
also recall that is that career pathway was taking place.
I always recall the work that was being put in
by people like Gilbert Bucking Wly Hay. You know, I
used to look up to Wally Hay a lot because
I saw them as the leaders of an industry and
an industry that I was in. It was a very
important industry in my eyes, and for me, these guys
had floated to the top and they were doing a
tremendous job. So in terms of my fishing career, it
was people like Davy Smith that spurned me on, But
in terms of where I was going to go eventually,
it was people like Gilbert Bucking, you know, big names.
It was people like Wally Hay, and you know a
latter than that, there was people like Bob Allen in
the SFF as well, and then you had people coming
along like Alex Smith, who was chairman Association prior to
me and then went on to lead the SFF and
the good thing is that you pull out different aspects
of how they deliver their own model in terms of leadership,
you draw down from them the best bits that you
think you need for your personality to then go deliver.
So very early age I became involved in the committee
structure of the port structures of the association work my
way through. I was always a confidence speaker. I always
had a reasonable brain. I always tried to find balance
in anything I did, and it sometimes that was seen
as a strength and other times that was seen as
a weakness because you should be trying to balance things.
You should just tell them what you want and you
go and deliver. So even trying to be balanced in
there sometimes is seen as a negative or a positive.
And all the way through Jim I I did things
like join the speakers clubs to give me the ability
to talk in public. I did that for two years.
I then embarked in a degree in European politics through
the Open University, and that then taught me how to
write and write position papers, because I'll admit my writing
skills in my English was pretty poor. Mathsie is always
good at but that sort of side of it, you know,
I had to improve my abilities. And then as you
move through that leadership pathway, you learn all sorts of tricks.
You first understand that you've got to get to know people.
You've got to get people to know you. You've got
to get people to like you, because if they don't
like you, they I've got to deal with you. So
in terms of leadership, there's a lot of skill sets
in there, and all the way along, I've tried to
draw down from the people I've met or the situations
I've been in, and I think at the end of
the day, it's made me who I am. And you know,
I'm the first to admit that there'll be people out
there that think my style is not good, it's not
tough enough, and there'll be others out there that realize
it's a difficult job, and you do have to find
balance and find situations where everybody wins. You know, everything's
going to be almost you know, a good agreement is
a you know, it's a positive sum game. Everybody's going
to get something out of it. And that's that's the
position that I try to push all the time. Now,
try and look at, you know, the people you're dealing with.
Try and look at what they're thinking about and from
their side, what would they be wanting, and just try
and work it out on that basis.
Speaker 1: It's all very interesting and I get exactly everything you're saying.
The one thing that you mentioned there, but there will
be some people that don't like your style and that
unfortunate or annoying thing about people like that, they wouldn't
do it. They would criticize who was doing it, but
they wouldn't take it. On the other thing that, I
totally respect you what you're saying about the characters you mentioned,
like Willie Ay and people like that. If I had
to describe them, I would say big, correct you. No,
Obviously we've been in different paths and things. Two of
the people I would say have been a big place
in my days, my life and big characters, Nori Bremner
and Johnny Thompson.
Speaker 2: Yes, it's funny you should mention the both of them,
because just yesterday, you know, I was thinking about doing
the Cup of the podcast, and obviously you know the
main people in my life. Norri wasn't a main person
in my life, but when you needed Nori, he was
there and he always gave you information that you required,
and he was always there to assist you. And that
was a good thing about Norri. He knew what he
was talking about and if you needed him, he was there.
I never sat around the table with Norri. I sat
around the table with Johnny Thompson, and Johnny was one
of the biggest thinkers. I think I've come across that
if john was asked a question around the table, he
wouldn't immediately spring into an answer. He would sit there
and for a few seconds ponder and sort of, you know,
put his answer together before he told you. And he
was very you know, he was very capable, very able.
And I still recall some of the big discussions around
the table at the Scottish Whitefish when fall broke away,
the Fisherman's Association Limited broke away to do with issues
over Europe and him and Tom Hay and they were
a formidable due, a formidable due, they really were. And
at the same time, you know, I talk about people
that infanced my life previously. At that time you had
people like George Sutherland heading up to Whitefish as well,
who himself had a big brain and was a big thinker.
And of course you had George McCrae in there, who
was the legal secretarated at the time. So there was
always strong people involved in the situation. And you know,
my path we could have taken a different direction had
it not been for George Sutherland, because when George stepped
down from the association, he pinpointed two people to come
in the back of him. One was Alex Smith as
chairman and myself as vice chairman. And had George probably
not seen something in me at that time, I could
still be at sea fishing. Who knows, I don't know.
My career might have taken a different pathway. But when
you look back in history, there is always big players
in the game at some point, whether it be Johnny Thompson,
whether it be John Hay, whether it be Sorry tell
me you know, whether it be others like like Gilbert
Buck and Wally Hay. There always seems to be a
conveyor belt of people coming along that can make a difference.
And these were people that did make a difference and
you've got to hold your heart up to them because
at the same time everyone was going to see. You know,
this is not something you do in isolation. I do now,
but at that time even I recall, you know, coming
home on a Friday or a Thursday, in the shower,
in the suit, pick up a suitcase on a flight
away to Brussels, and you were doing that every other week.
We'll trying to carry out the you know, fishing business
with your boat and support your crew and make money
and pay the bank and everything. So these were high
stress situations. But the people in there, like Johnny, like Tom,
like Norny, knew what they were doing. They knew what
they were doing, and I guess we've got to look
back and thank them for the commitment that they made
at that time.
Speaker 1: I actually feel that says a lot about you, like
because your generous, we are praise of others. I think
that shows a confidence that is worthy of the position
you have, fairness, and it's making me, you know, when
you're talking about the different people of a situation that
I'll never forget, because well, obviously I'll never forget. It
was about the early seventies, late sixties, early seventies. He
was landing in Logan and I was going up a
lot to buy fish in Lochinver Market. At a time there
were a lot of lossy boats landing there at the
time I NS as we used to call I never
sleep and I had an order. I was young at
the time, my goodness, and George mackay lochinver fish selling.
George Ramsey used to come up from Aberdeen. There was
a big, big market and strong, strong buyers and I
feel did me no harm cut my teeth with big
players like that. And I got an order from a
customer of mine in Edinburgh for Haddick small Haddache and
Johnny had landed. He had the horizon at the time,
and so I bought them, and of course the other
buyers ran me up them in a big price and
I got the fish, put them to the customer very happy.
That was on the Thursday. They were tied up for
the weekend. That was our pattern, and he was backing
again on the Tuesday, and I was up when he
come up to me, Mike, and he says to me,
how did you get on with my hudaches last week?
I says, I find john thanks, I no problem. I
had an order I got. I bought them for the order.
The customer was happy with them. Oh, he says, I'm fine,
pleased to hear that. He says, I was a wee
bit worried you paid too much for them?
Speaker 3: When have you ever heard the skippers say that before?
But I just thought a measure of the man. He
was looking further than a lot of people, and he
was what he was worried about. I paid too much
and I wouldn't be buying more, and I would take
me out.
Speaker 1: Of the market.
Speaker 2: What a forward thinker just been speaking the jers. I
was thinking about Nori Bremner and one of the stories
about Nori Brimner, and I think I've told you before
that when I first carried my first vessel at the
age of twenty one, the skipper's instructions we have phone
Nori and the Sunday before you sail and he'll tell
you where to go and issue his night follows day.
That's what he did. In the very first hall, I
had about one hundred bucks as a green and black
and we were in within two days. But one of
those stories about Nori was that we fished in Norwegian
Zone a lot. The majority of my career, especially in
the summer months, was out off Norway, in south Down
off Denmark, and I recall one particular Sunday morning sailing
out the van used to pick me up about nine
o'clock through to Aberdeen and you'd be out to the
harbor by ten. Because your cow would be with you
for ten fifteen years, they know what to do about
the boat and you're out by ten and used to
call the harbor. You would then leave the harbor and
what we would normally do is we would make sure
that the cord ends were okay and everything was okay,
get the darn ready for shooting when we got to
the grounds, and then you would set the line to
where you were going and all of the gnarlate would
take here about twelve hours to get to the Norwegian line.
And in those days, what you had to do was
call in an hour ahead of entering the Norwegian zone,
giving your position, your speed and any fish you had
on board. That's what you had to do. And you
had to do the same same coming out. And in
this particular Sunday it was flat cam. It was an
absolute glorious day. You don't get many of them, but
the sea was like glass years you're coming out of
the harbor. You could smell the cut grass off the
golf course and it was just it was just a
lovely day to be sailing anyway. We had word lunch,
went away to bed, and I would normally get up
about three hours before we got to the Norwegian line,
would have a supper, would raid the net on and
that would be it. Then you would go to your
bed again for the rest of that trip. So came
out of the harbor, set the watch, and the watch
changed every hour. Never thought thing about it. I got
a shout at about six o'clock to wake me up
to come up into the wheelhouse. I come up into
the wheelhouse, sat down in the chair, put on the
news in the radio, and here was the news broadcaster
saying that a vessel from Montrose with eight crew on
board had been reported missing and debris had been found.
And I remember one of the crew was sitting in
a seat next to me, and I said to him,
who could that be? Who else is registered Montros? Of course,
my boat, the the Nebula, was registered in Montros with
eight of a crew. And I'm saying to him, who
else from Montrose has eight of a crew? And I
was sitting thinking and we couldn't think of anything because
there we are sitting steaming at ten knots flat cam
night heading out to the Norwegian line. Unknown to me.
Back home, my friend had received a call from the
office to say, you need to get to Mike's house.
You need to get to this house right now, reported missing.
So my friend drove from Intros to my house and
his wife took the kids and put them in the
bedroom and proceeded to tell my wife that we had
been reported missing. Debris had been found. I remember my
dad sent to me later on that he'd put on
the teletext and he was reading it, and you know,
he was a marine guy, and he couldn't understand what
happened to make an eighty five foot vessel just disappear
with nothing, you know. But what they did was they
found the APUB. So the APERB was something that, as
you think, it floats off of the mast and it
sends a signal to satellite. They'd found the apup. Now,
unknown to us, during the time we've been sailing off,
the APIRB had fallen off the top of the wheelhouse
into the water, sent a distress signal. Helicopters launched, helicopters launched,
they found debris, so all of a sudden they thought
this was a real sinking, and it was up in
the teletext and everything. As I say, my friend was
at the house, the kids were in the bedroom, his
wife was looking after the kids. They were in tears,
and even my friend, who was a skipper himself, was
thinking what could have went on there? The only thing
is a collision. But if there's a collision then the
other vessel would have reported it if they were stuff,
so no one, no one could work out what was
going on. And there's us aboard of vessel sailing blindly
into the Norwegian sector and not knowing fully what was
going on behind us. But the thing about Nori was
Norri had been contact that norriy had been on the
radio and he was calling us up on the radio,
and he himself had worked out well, if he'd sailed
out of Aberdeen and he was going across the Norwegian
so he'll have to report in now. And so just
an hour before we got to the Norwegian line, I
called up stone Havan Radio and said, this is dn Nebula.
I'd like to book in the Norwegian sector. And the
response was dinebla, are you okay? And I said, yeah,
I'm fine, and he said, well he should be aware
that you've been reported missing sunk now with debris for
around eight hours. Because this happened only two I was
out the harbor for eight hours. Now at that point,
Norri had been monitoring the radio and he heard me
call up stone Haven radio and immediately he phoned the
house and said he's okay the fine and then I
then proceeded to call home, spoke to my wife and
then turned the vessel around, came back into port because
all the crew's wifes were up to high door. Wasn't
it just my family? Every family was up to high door.
Thunderboat Round came into port. Obviously there was news drama
and everything dealt with that, and then we took a
week off laying the harbor for a week just to
kind of get our thoughts back together again. Then we
went away after that. So that was Norriy's part in that.
And it's interesting that experience that I had then was
slightly traumatic, not not for me thatout, but it was
for the families. And you'll recall that some years ago
Jim I went away to row, from Scotland to Denmark
for charity, from stone Haven to Handsome for charity. It
was going to take me, I think it was sixteen
day I trained for ages to do it. I left
the harbor in store Haven. I'd been rowing for like
a day and a half. Two days my satllite phone
went down. Every day I was checking in twice a day, morning, night, morning, night.
I had somebody monitoring the weather for me, Derek Cardinal,
and I would call him see what like the weather was.
And I knew there was bad weather coming up, and
I was going to be just side of the west
bank with the Shaw water when it came. Now unknown
to me, the helicopter was out rescuing a crew from
a fishing boat, and then the helicopter had been asked
to look for me because two days I'm not reporting.
I was then reported missing at sea in this pelfoot
rowing boat. And I was rowing away and I looked
up and I seen that, and I know there would
be problems back home because I hadn't been in contact.
And I looked up and I saw a helicopter coming
towards me, and I knew what that was. I knew
exactly what it was, and he hovered over me. And
when he hovered over me, I could actually speak to
him in the sat phone because it was that close.
He said, well, we'll winch you up and I said, no,
it's fine. I'm just going to keep going because you know,
no leaving the boat because I'm selling that for charity
as well. And he said, okay, if I leave you now,
we're not coming back, so he left. I then proceeded
to continue to row for about another three hours, and
eventually I just put my horse down and I thought,
I can't do this because there's me going to be
another fourteen days rowing to Denmark across shallow water, bad weather,
and my family is sitting at home going through the
same feelings that they did when we were reported missing
on the Denbula. And that's when I thought I can't
do this. So I turned the boat around it and
started rowing back to Scotland, the same as I'd done
with the Denebula decades beforehand. So it's sorry, it's just
an anecdotal story that I thought would.
Speaker 1: My goodness, it's incredible. Course, what was your first moment
of real responsibility that made you think I can do this?
Speaker 2: I guess the moment of first responsibility was to try
and recover the cod stocks. I put it in a
belief within the industry that we could do this and
take a pathway that allowed it to do it with
some degree of responsibility. And everyone knows that back of
my younger career with big bank loans and everything that
they know that light like others the days of Blackfish,
I was in there, and I was probably one of
the biggest roles in there. I remember coming to terms
with myself and saying, right, this is my mea culpa,
I'm guilty. That's fine, let's leave it behind, but let's
try and work with others and coordinate thoughts to try
and get into some sort of sensible sustainable harvesting so
we can't try and protect the stocks and recover the stocks.
So that was my first challenge. But the real challenge
for me and one of the most difficult ones gim
was and it you know, it took me to the
brink of just walking away from it was Days at Sea.
When Days at Sea came and I think it was
two thousand and six, two thousand and seven, and that
was a way of continuing to reduce effort in the
cod stocks, will limit the amount of daysssels can go
to see and that was driven by the EU because
obviously we were a member of the EU at the time,
and at one point, one particular year of thing was
about two thousand and eight. I might be out one
year or whatever, but thinks about two thousand and eight,
that was the year where we're down to well, we're
going to be down to ninety days at sea year
now there was no vessel could really operate on that.
There were some vessels catching less than five percent cod.
They were out of the scheme, they were involved, but
some of the larger vessels they just couldn't live on
ninety days. And that's where I sat down with government
to try and work out what can we do here
to give you the confidence that you can allow these
boats to go to see and know they're not catching cod.
And that's when I pushed for cameras and vessels. No,
I didn't want cameras in the fleet long term, but
I realized that that had to be a short term
solution to the problem we faced. Now. Obviously, when you
try and introduce something like that, you get pushing pull,
you get people that see why are doing it and
they want it, and then you've got others who are
dead against it because it doesn't impact them and they
shouldn't have to do it. And it was never about
putting cameras on all the industry. But I do recall
one meeting I went to Peterhead. I came out my
tires and my car had been slashed. Internally, there was
one but that I was going to get sacked in
the meeting and various other things, And it was that
point I really thought, you know, I'm really trying to
do the best year, and I'm trying to provide a
short term solution to a problem that could have the
potential to bankrupt a certain section of the fleet. That
was one of the times that I came against some
elements of the industry as I tried to put my
mark on trying to solve a problem. And at one point,
I think we started with twenty odd vessels with cameras,
and latterly the last year, I think it was thirty
odd cameras vessels with cameras. So it worked, it provided
that short term solution, but it did create a high
degree of frustration and conflict within the industry.
Speaker 1: Must have asked you as well, like I should do
I need to be in.
Speaker 2: This Yeah, it's And remember at that point I still
had a vessel. I was still going to see I
wasn't getting paid. I used to pay my own satellite
bills for my phone and my satellite bills at that time,
or about eleven twelve hundred pound because I was phoning
into the secretary the association every day. Yeah, so it
was for me. It was trying to do the right
thing for an industry that needed help and it needed
people stepping up front. Whether it was me or anyone else,
you do need people to step up front and try
and make a difference. But that was one of the
most traumatic periods that I had in the industry. And
I say it was trying to provide a solution to
a problem and at the end it succeeded, but not
without its stresses and strains my head.
Speaker 1: When you were talking about that, I was thinking and
I thought, gee, when you mentioned that about the Days
at Sea, I thought, she I thought it was a
lot long longer further before that, the two thousands. But
I think I know where I'm confused, and I take
it they were very different, the Days at Sea and
the eight day tie ups.
Speaker 2: Yeah. The eight day tie Ups was an internal Scottish
thing and that was to try and improve prices. That's
what happened there was to try and reduce effort bit
of improved prices as well, because there's less fish coming ashore.
The days at c scheme was introduced by the EU
to reduce impact on cod because at that time they
were still trying to recover the cod stocks. I mean,
you could put in additional selectivity measures and you got
days back from Europe that went into a pot and
you all got two or three days extra. But remember
some of our boats were doing there, I don't know,
two hundred and forty two hundred and sixty days at
sea a year, and to come from that down to
ninety days it was just impossible. You just couldn't make
a living. So we needed to find a way of
trying to get some of these vessels out of the scheme,
and that that was the only way I could see
to deliver it was to give the managers the comfort
that what you said you were doing, you were actually doing.
And that was the role of the cameras at that time.
It was like a get out close and as I say,
I have no regrets at worked. They got a lot
of vessels through, but it did cause stress and strain
at the time.
Speaker 1: The early partier career. Yes, the WFP. Was there moments
that didn't go to plan and how did that spape
the way you led afterwards?
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was always moments that didn't go to plan.
Bothe in terms of trying to lobby the EU for
quotas and various other things. But we did learn over
time that if you want to deliver anything, you need
to work with people rather than work against people. And
a way back, I think it was in two thousand
and one, i'd un a Branking was Fisheries Minister at
the time. You recall that the fleet went on strike.
It was a result of the cord again they closed,
EU closed vast areas of the North Sea and not
north of Scotland. Fleet all came inside, caught nothing. But
year one and year two hurricks prices fell to the
deck and the industry went on strike. And I recall
going to discussions down in Parliament with people like John
good Lad, Bob Allen, Alex Smith at the time, trying
to get money to see the fleet through, and we
did get money. We got twenty I think it was
twenty seven million. We managed to get twenty five of
that went to decommission I think two million went to
technical measures to help the fleet improve selectivity, and that
was a point when it didn't go to plan because
we wanted money to keep the fleet tiding over. But
it was one of the bravest decisions by a fisheries
minister ever to not give you that they knew what
the outcome would be, that you'd be faced with the
same thing in twelve months time, and it was that
point two thousand and one that that money went to decommissioning.
So essentially we didn't get what we wanted at the time.
But I'm glad we didn't get what we wanted because
that decision by Rona Brank and as they said, it's
one of the bravest made by fisheries minister. It actually
allowed the fleet to downsize between that and the next
decommissioning scheme in two thousand and three, which between the
two I think reduced the effort of the fleet by
about thirty seven percent. I think it was in vessels
over ten meters, but it reduced the fleet by over
a third. And when you think about it now, in
the position we've got some more stocks in with sustainability,
that was the biggest, the biggest complementing there, and they
delivered the biggest benefit to the stocks. We just took
the vessels away from the port, so it wasn't nice
we decommissioned them. We turned them into razor blades. But
had that not happened, I think the devastation would have
been wider because there wouldn't have been enough to go around.
Speaker 1: Looking back in the blockade, like, were you actually directly
involved in.
Speaker 2: I wasn't involved in the blockade because I think that
our vessel I was under the Drona at the time
and our vessel was too small to go into the blockade.
It was only a fifty foot vessel. But obviously I
was aware of the blockade. We were around there, but
the vessel I was on wasn't actually in the blockade.
What I was involved in, GYM is the sail down
to the Firth and Fourth in two thousand and one
as well. I think there was one hundred vessels left
the northeast and sailed down to the Furth and Fourth
in protest, and that slot brought the twenty seven million
pound to the table. Was the fact that the fleet
did that, and it was quite a spectacle. Down in
the first with all those vessels just lying to the
seaside of the bridge. It was quite a sight at
the time. So I was involved in that gym.
Speaker 1: Yes, and what do you remember most vividly with the
tensions and the unity the atmosphere.
Speaker 2: The atmosphere was kind of toxic at that time. The
two gents leading the protest, for instance, was John Bucken,
who had a fair line at the time in Peter
Bruce and obviously we're trying to march the men to
the top of the hill and if you didn't get
there then you know there was going to be failure.
And I remember a big, big meeting just down from
the castle in a big church there where tensions were
running high because the failure. I remember when the EU
shut down all that north areas out in Norwegian Zone
into North of Scotland. Industry got to blame for it,
then the leadership got to blame for it. This is
your fault, Europe there representing us. We told you we
didn't want this and you failed. So when others take
on leadership of the protests, then the people they get
it in the neck is the people that are deemed
to have failed, which myself and I like West at
the time, and I remember at that point in time
in Edinburgh having to stay away from particular people because
they were angry, which, as I say, is not not
a good thing. But we managed to stay away from them,
and you know, we kept ourselves intact and then we
moved on. We moved on from that. But we have
to remember, Gym that the fishing industry is full of
alpha males. You know, they are alpha males, and they
just want the best for themselves and for the families
and others. And if people are seen not to deliver
what they should be delivering, then that in itself as
seen as a failure in their eyes. And I get that.
And as long as you can accept that is a
feature of a human life, and you know, we've got
to deal with that as leaders, then it works out.
You've just got to accept that there's frailties on my side,
there's frailties and other sides. But you've just got to
tolerate frailties and get on with it.
Speaker 1: Did the experience do anything as far as shape your
approach to now when you're in negotiations.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I remember one one meeting in particular,
where I realize is that the style of leadership that
the industry was using at that time, and I'm going
away back to the nineties wasn't appropriate anymore. And I
talked to someone about this recently who's also in that meeting,
and his recollection was the same as mine. And I
won't name names, but I remember industry blaming the scientists
at the time for the reduction in cod quota. Now, yeah,
everyone wants to blame in there because the stocks were declining,
but I remember voices getting raised, fingers getting pointed, to
the point I could see one member of the scientific
community across the table from me starting to tremble, started
to tremble and turning to the person who was pointing
the figures, saying, you need to back off. Now, you
need to back off, because I could see that individual
at the other side of the table starting to take
it personally and starting to crumble. And it was that
point I realized, this is not a fitting way to
go about trying to solve a problem, because the problem
wasn't created by science. Okay, some of the science may
be incomplete, but it wasn't created by the people sitting
across the table from us. We all had our hand
on the decrease of the stocks at that time, whether
it be over fishing or whatever. But that was the
real litmus test for me that if you are going
to sit down and act as a leader, then you've
got to act as a grown up first and foremost. Stakes.
Speaker 1: Hi, when you became chief executive, what did you think
the job would be?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I thought the job would be all encompassing because
you know, those people that know medium realized that I
don't do anything by half. I don't do anything by
half at all. When we moved away from the legal company,
be Chris, Stephen and cod that do you start a secretariat?
We then took it on board ourselves, so there was
no one to give you back up after that, you
were on your own, and we took a couple of
staff across with us as well. And we knew it
would be a challenge, but it was nothing we hadn't
done in the past in terms of dealing with politicians,
you know, writing reports, setting up meetings, trying to create positions.
So I knew that we would manage to do what
we did. I guess more recently the challenge has been
trying to man up the staff to deal with some
of the more complicated stuff now in I ces people
to deal with MPAs, aquaculture in the West of Scotland,
offshore renewables. The challenge for me has been to sort
of man up the association in terms of resource and
staff to try and deal with all these issues. And
there's never enough hours in the data. There is just
not enough hours in the day to deal with what
we're dealing with. And of course the staff like me
are on called twenty four to seven and the fishermen
know that, you know, if they'd need anything, they can
call us or text us at any time of the
day and that's just how we operate.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's your style evolved over the years, you feel.
Speaker 2: I think it has, Jim, Yeah, because you know I
talked about fisherman and being alpha males and at one
point I was probably one of them as well. I
don't see myself in that sort of light anymore. I
see myself as a problem solver. I like writing papers.
Now I never have a thought. I'd doubt it myself
saying that, but I like putting my thoughts down in
paper and working with others to try and you know,
sort of form that or mold that into a sensible
position for industry. But I guess I'm calmer now, Jim,
than I ever was. And you know, okay, that comes
with age anyway, I guess, but you do become wiser
over time without a shadow of doubt. You become less reactionary.
You know. I tend to think about things now before
I react. I ponder, and I don't get annoyed by anything. Ordinarily.
There's very few things actually annoying me because I just
take them away and think about them and try to
work out, you know, why that person thinks what they do,
or why the government think what they do, and what
do I need to do to try and to try
and change that opinion. So everything we do now, unlike before,
is very principled. There is a reason why we do something,
and we ordinarly maintain that position. And that's the difference now.
I think before we were all over the place. We
are not all over the place. Now. You know, we
take principal stances on things and we try and go
and deliver output based on that principles.
Speaker 1: My view on that Mike is not having a go
at academia, but I feel there's no substitute for experience.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that's true, that's very true. Somebody said
to me the last day, would you like to go
back to being thirty again? I said, well, physically, obviously
I would, but I don't. I don't think i'd like
to go back to being the guy I was at
thirty because I don't think I identify with him well
at all anymore.
Speaker 1: That's interesting. The next thing I was going to ask you,
were you more combative when younger or have you always
balanced diplomacy with firmness?
Speaker 2: No, it's I and I matured late in life. Gym, yeah,
and mind wise, I matured late in life, and I
only you know, if someone had broken down, or someone
had broken a rope or a wire. I used to say, oh,
that's really that's not good. I feel for you, And
in fact I didn't feel for them at all, because
it's a very competitive industry and if someone's not catching fish,
then you know, all the good for you sort of thing.
But I realized at one point one day, I said
to someone, that's really disappointing. I really feel for you,
and I actually meant it. I actually meant it, so
in terms of maturing in that way. I was quite
a late mature, but I was very competitive. I played
sport as a younger. Lad had to stop it when
I got my books. I couldn't afford to get to
get injured with rugby or anything like that. But yeah, yeah,
very competitive. And there's things I used to do at
the start of my life, and leadership and the association
that I wouldn't tell people anything and another association because
I wanted to be the person to deal with it.
Now I realized that it's a weakness, it's not a strength.
And I realized now the strength is is actually working
with others to develop something that everyone wants, rather than
you going out front and trying to lead the charge.
So in that respect, I've matured a lot over these
last you know, twenty years, because I understand working with
others is far better than working in isolation.
Speaker 1: What was the heaviest responsibility you've carried and how do
you did you manage it?
Speaker 2: The heaviest responsibility I carried, Jim, was as a young guy,
you know, twenty one, starting out in my career aid
of a crew. I was the youngest by fifteen years.
You absolutely had no respectable the vessel. Why would you
have respect You'd never proven your self. So from there
through to the point that I started making decent money
and started, you know, doing well in my career up
until my mid thirties and forties, the early part of
that with the new vessel was probably the biggest strain
I came under because they recall at the time that
Cotas was coming in, everybody was allocated the same. Whereas
some vessels had no debt, I had a massive debt.
I remember that my friend got the European grants when
he built his boat. I didn't get the European grants.
And back in when I was there about eighty six,
I was refused one hundred and seventy thousand pounds in
nineteen eighty six, and that in my eyes was absolutely massive,
and I remember almost about being being in tears about it,
as phoning up the accountant and he said, look, at
the end of the day, it'll all be the same.
So I just got my head down and tried to
do as much as I could. And I do realize
that through that point in time, I wasn't a nice
person because the pressure was on you. You had to
do what you had to do to pay the bank
because if you're called then the m day's gym. There
was your loans you got from ship mortgage finance. It
was a cheaper, cheaper interest. It was set up by
the government. It was a cheaper interest rate. But you
couldn't default on a payment. You weren't allowed to default
in a payment. And that's why, you know, we had
to go to it. We had to make money. And
that's probably where I felt the most pressure in my
career was at that point. And it's different from the
pressures now of you know, I'm going on holiday tomorrow
and I've got to get a paper out before the
end of the day, right so I know I'll get
on and I'll do that. It's a pressure, but it's
nothing like the pressure of having another seven of a crew.
You know, all the families, you know they've got a mortgage.
You know they've got to pay the payments on the car.
That's real pressure, you know. You know, finishing a paper
by five o'clock today is it's made up pressure. It's
not real because you know you can get through it
and you know what the outcome will be. Whereas when
you're trying to catch fish and pay the back. You
have no idea what's going to happen.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm fascinated listening to your the mic and
it's to me it shows a measure of the man
because we're talking about your career.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: I'm quite sure you've come across many people probably on
the same round, the same desk as you were. But
fascinates me and I think, well, then you you talk
about your career, but you go right back when you
were fishing.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: You're not a lot of people I would say the
position you're in that would be their career, that would
have forgotten about what happened before that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I always say that. You know, politicians
are always to a degree uneasy with me, because it's
not as though you came out of university and came
into this industry and you're learning as you go on,
and I continue to learn. I fished for thirty five
forty years, you know. I know the pressures, I know
the outputs. I know what fishermen have got to do
to make a living, what they've got to do to
pay their to pay the bank back. I know the
problems and the feelings you get with engines. That have
broken down. I recall being in Brussels and negotiations one
end of the year and the superintendent from the company
phoning me up and you said, Mike, before I tell
you that, someone get to sit down. And I'm thinking,
oh God, what's this going to be. And the vessel
had been up in the dry dock getting painted, and
it had fallen off the dry dock and landed on
the pier and I was stuck in Brussels, and I
just thought, I just can't do this anymore. I just,
honest to God, cannot do this anymore because you, yeah,
the pressures and the negotiations and then try to deliver
free members there. You knew that incident in the harbor
was going to cast you tens and tens of thousands
of pounds. You were going to be on shore for
a number of weeks or even months. And when you
get that pressure coming at you from from both sides,
if you're going to survive, it molds you into something
different and you have to be to be able to survive.
But yeah, I remember that call to this day thing
and what have I done to deserve this? You know,
what have I done to deserve this? Because things were
just not going well at the time. But you come
out of a jim and you know you are a
product of what you've done and what you've learned. And
as I said, there's been strong people in my life
that have learnt me a lot, and there's been incidents
in my life that have learnt me a lot as well,
and you just feed off of that and try and improve,
you know, what you do on a day to day basis.
And even now I enjoy this this job as much,
if not more now than I did when I came
into all those years ago.
Speaker 1: That's good. But the situation that you described there, obviously
it was not something you had done, but it's you
had to handle it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's not something I'd done. In the harbor said
it wasn't their responsibility. It was a responsibility to make
the make sure the vessel was secure. And I went
through legal fights, I went through insurance companies. Yeah it
was there was nothing to do with us. But at
the end of the day, it cost the business heavily
in terms of lost earnings, the cruise earnings. They went
and got jobs and other boats, and it just disrupted
our whole, our whole operation. But as they said, Jim,
what doesn't break you makes you stronger, and you just
learned to deal with it and then just just move
on and you take something from that, that incident or
that crisis and just get on with it. But you know,
all the same, I could have been done without it happening.
Because it did. It did slows down in terms of
the business sense, which which wasn't good because it was
challenging enough as it was.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that makes that's something that's be thinking about. You've
already said, I know you studied European law to improve
your negotiating skills. Was at a turning point in your career, Mike.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was European politics. It was a turning point
because I actually enjoyed what I did. I remember I
used to set Sundays aside to try and write my
dissertations and everything, and I used to sit listening to
Pink Floyd writing away. I could never read and listen
to music, but I got into this position where I
used to love listening to music and writing at the
same time. I got into a structure about taking notes.
But it got that bad that I remember going in
holiday to TENI reef with my good friend Raymond, the
guy that I talked about earlier, went down with his
wife after my wife and the kids when we were reported missing.
I remember being in a holiday with him and his
wife to ten Reef and he said, that's it. Never again.
He says, you cannot switch off when you're doing this,
and I'm not coming away on holiday to watch you
in a corner writing away on a laptop. It's just,
you know, it's not good for me and it's not
good for you. But yes, I took a lot out
of doing that, if nothing else, just the commitment of
getting it Dune Gym. It did learn me a lot
of things on writing skills. But what it also didim
that a lot of what I did was engaged with
environment and studied the rainforests and the Amazon, you know,
studied the Greek fresh war system around Athens and how
they securitize that. So it learns you a lot about
things outside of your industry, especially the environmental aspect of it.
I found that was beneficial. Has become more engaged with
environmentalists over the year as well. I mean, you understand
you don't necessarily agree with everything they say, but you
certainly understand where they're coming from, other than the real
you know anarchists out there who just just out there
to disrupt.
Speaker 1: To be fair, Yeah, would the success of your career,
would you put it down to preparation and learning versus instinct?
Speaker 2: There's there's a lot of Yeah, it's about it's about experiencing,
about taking that experience to the table and you know,
getting people to think that you're being honest and serious
with them and you are trying to do the right
thing by them. And there's a lot of times that
you know, you work with the government with directors deputy directors,
and you get to know things that you just can't
can't tell others. But and you've got to operate on
that basis. And I think a lot of people respect that.
But you know, as time has moved on, I even
think that the people we deal with in government now
are different and they're more accessible, they are easier to
deal with, just the next generation I get. But you know,
going forward, I would like to think that the industry,
the managers are probably closer together now than we've ever
been and hopefully going forward that will stand this in
good stead. And whoever comes, you know, behind me, that's
been the first thing I would say to them, you know,
go to the people that make the decisions and get
them to like you and get them to respect you
so that they're willing to lean on you at any
point they have to. And that's the real role. The
position I'm in now is with dealing with the politicians
and making sure they can rely on you and trust you.
And that's what that's the position in the area we've
had to move in over the last two to three decades.
Speaker 1: Jim, did people realize at the time the length you
are going to behind the scenes to better your position.
Speaker 2: Probably not. No, it's not something you know. Speakers clubs
wasn't popular at the time in my industry. It's not
something that everyone signed up for every second Saturday of
the month. But it did learn you a lot. It
learned your about responding professionally on the spot. I remember
once they used to be in the speaker's clubs what
they called the three minute Topics, and there used to
be a topics master, and the topics master was always
appointed on that day and at the next meeting he
had to come up with a list of topics that
if you were called out, you had to speak for
three minutes on and I had to be exactly three
minutes because they worked the light system at one minute,
two minutes and three minutes back. That was it. You
were finished. And I remember one of the most challenging
topics that I got was as I stood up in
the podium, the topics master said to me, Okay, now
give me three minutes on shoelaces. And I thought, wow,
how can I give you three minutes and shoelaces? But
it is it allows you to hone your skills. But no,
as I say, the industry, they weren't interested in what
I did behind the scenes. They just wanted me to
do what they told me to do and deliver to
the best of my ability. How I got there, I
don't guess there was really that concerned about, at least
my memory. My memory is you know.
Speaker 1: Well credit and looking back with a time investment in yourself,
do you think it was one of your smartest moves
in your career.
Speaker 2: I think it was the building blocks that I needed
to do what I do currently. Jim. You know, even
things like I chair the Northern Fishing Alliance, which is
a body, a post Brexit body of all the industry
leaders from the North Sea countries pretty much. You know,
we've got well Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Germany, France, Belgium, Netherlands
selves as Ireland in there as well. And I do
most of the position papers. I drop all the strow
men for for the Northern Fishing Alliance positions and cord
monkfish and whatever else. And I enjoy it. And I
think without the building blocks of what I did to
get here, I don't think I'd be able to or
capable of doing that. So to that end, what I
did help me. You know, I know some science. I'm
not a scientist there. You speak to people like Kobe
Needle and others, and you know chavone enough from Shetland.
They're scientists. They know what they're doing. I know a
bit here and a bit there. But it allows me
to try and piece position papers together that everybody else
can then start work on. But we are fortunate now,
Jim that you know, I'm there and I've fished in
the past, but we have a lot of good people
in the sector now that didn't fish in the past,
but they've got the fishermen's benefits at the heart. They
really want to deliver for the fishermen. And that's the
really good thing that they're in here without a fishing background,
but they understand what they need to do to deliver
for the people that they want to deliver for.
Speaker 1: Over the years. What a decision or outcome you particularly
proud of.
Speaker 2: Well, I guess it's not me that delivered, but I
guess my part was in there that you know, very
recently we managed to get monkfish or anglerfish pushed through
a benchmark, and it was Rufus and our organization who
we brought in knowing full well he'd done his PhD
on on monkfish and he then you know, aligned and
engage with the scientific community with the role of trying
to ensure that that back benchmark went ahead. And it
was after that that we we got a significant increase
in the monkfish quota. So that's certainly one area where
I think that you know, not just me, but you know,
we've we've taken a decision to bring someone in that
that has actually delivered. And the other things are you know,
getting three million from Boris Johnson to build our new headquarters,
you know, getting getting funded to defibrillate as in all
our vessels aboard the boat. I mean, these are sort
of things that you can see. But other times it's
just about working with government to try and ensure that
the fleet gets the opportunities, the fishing opportunities that it
can to allow it to make money, albeit within that
sustainable harvesting platform. I do recall one other instance, and
I think it was during COVID that the government was
putting up funding to bail out some of the Western
Scotland vessels, the startic gear vessels and the small pronouns
because COVID was having a severe impact on them, they
thought more than others, and our pron fleet round here
was basically pushed out. They set the parameters that low
that our guys in terms of their catches, a fashion
and efforts was above it, and it was just a
noble we weren't going to get anything. But then I
wrote a paper, I sat down with them, protested and
just said it was unfair and asked for their rationally
ast why we weren't getting anything. So they accepted. I
think they accepted in all but something like four Northeast
vessels into the scheme, and I remember on Saturday morning
it was agreed they're taking it to the politicians to
sign it off the parliament. And on the Saturday morning
I got a call. This is the person, said Mike,
they're just not accepting this at all. The U section
has said funding before and we reckon. They made a
mess of it. Some vessels got they shouldn't have got,
and that's left a bad taste. And the pushback now
is that you guys are just not going to get anything.
And he said, you've got two hours to come up
with a rationale as to why you think we should
get and it's solid enough that I can take to
the people that are now pushing back. So I sat
and I wrote a paper in two hours and sent
it through to them and said, right, this is the rationale.
And on Monday morning I got a call to say
that's what your guys are in. But it was like
that's paper thing and it's got seventy vessels in that
then got. I can't remember what they got. It was
like fifteen to twenty thousand each of them to try
and tide them through that COVID thing. But people don't
see that sort of issue us, you know, coming to
the fore. Because it was just that call on a
Saturday morning. You're out unless you can convinced me should stay.
And I wrote the paper and then we got the
vessels in which which was a big boost for me.
But people don't see that side of it. They just
think you'll succeeded, you fail. There's nothing, there's nothing between
you know. My goodness.
Speaker 1: Well, at that very point reminds me of a situation.
I'm sure you'll remember it. Christian Solvice and was going
on the market and we could buy their shares. And
a friend of mine says to me, are you are
you going to invest I says no, I know too
much about Christian Salvice and and he says, oh, come on,
where's your sporting spirit? I says, hey, my sporting spirit.
I don't need that for kicks. I says, I'm in
the fishing industry.
Speaker 2: And there's other people out there gym that you know
song and you know people like my chairman David Milne,
who's now been my chairman for twelve fourteen years. We've
never had a crossworld over all that time. If he
needs convincing about a policy direction, he'll sit down, you'll
listen and he'll make up his mind. He's still fishing.
He's just he's sold up, but he's now back into
the sector. And it's people like that that have to
deal with the real issues at the sea. So if
something goes wrong, he got he gets the call and
it's normally what's Parky up to now, you know, and
he's and he's got to deal with that at the sea. Well,
we'll try to get on with his work. And it's
people like like Davy and like James Anderson and Leslie
taitting that. And I see an old colleague of mine
just died. I think it was yesterday, Josie Simpson up
in Shedland. You know, I traveled for decades with Josie
and he was a top guy, really was. I loved
working with Josie and he was always very balanced, very articulate,
and it's sad, sad to see him going.
Speaker 1: You're so a note you put on social media a
bit about it. As I read your comment, I thought
it was very touching, but I have to say I
didn't I don't think he was in the same sector.
I did a lot of business in the Sheplains, but
I've never actually met Josie.
Speaker 2: Josie was in the PLGIC. He sold his vessel a
lot of years ago, so it was the logic he
was mainly involved in. But then you had you know,
people like Leslie Tate coming through, absolutely solid guys, James
Anderson in there now, and I say, I've got my chairman,
David Millan, who's been there for years. So there's a
lot of good people out there. They don't you know,
they're not involved in the work I'm doing, but they
go out there and they guard the fort and they
do that day and day out in the which is
the North Sea, the West Scotland, whatever it is. They're
out there guarding the fort and they lend their expertise
and knowledge and wisdom as and when it's required, and
you know, thank Davy and others for carrying out that role.
Speaker 1: Yeah, solid, solid guys. I know both of them very well.
Have a huge respect for both Davy and James. Was
there ever a moment when your approached surprised people or
even prove doubters wrong.
Speaker 2: Well, I guess that's too nuinous to mention, to be fair,
but yeah, I mean I might get you know, I
go back to that period of the days at seeing
the cameras, and then people thought that was wrong at
the time, and it pulled us through. Even even this
last year, you know, recommending a twenty percent reduction in
cord that we did through Northern Northern Alliance, there was
some that thought, you know, fishermen shouldn't be doing that
because they should be trying to protect the opportunities year
on year. And of course, you know that's a very
short termism approach, and we've got to take a medium
to long term approach well, not prejudicing the short short
term completely. So yeah, I guess, I guess there was
some that thought this last year we shouldn't have been
going for a twenty percent reduction in card quota. But
we're always trying to do the best for the stocks
gym without harming the industry. And there are times that
you know, you make a call or you take a
position that some don't understand and they'd rather you didn't.
But I always work in this principal gym and I
don't know what people will think about it, but you know,
leaders are called leaders for a reason that you're supposed
to be out there, you know, deciding the pathway and everything,
and of course you've got to bring your members along
with you. But if you were to do that, then
you're not a leader. You know, you're just a secretary
or whatever, sitting in the office just doing the paperwork.
And I normally work on a trip wire system that
I'll try and push and push and push in the
direction and you're begetting negative comments. But unless one of
ten people phone me up and say, what are you
playing at? Then you just keep eating away and eating
it away and eating away. And one of these ten
or twelve people phoning you up, you know it's time
to put the brakes on, and you've got to go
back and pick people up. And that's the system kind
of always operated in the past, is that, you know,
use your own thoughts, try and bring others along. But
at a point that the people out in the industry
you respect start to say what are you playing at?
Then you know it's time to put the brakes on
and go back and pick everyone up again and see
what direction you can then take. And that's for me,
what leadership is all about. It's not about sitting doing nothing.
It's about hearing the mood music. It's about trying to
assess the problem in the size of the problem and
taking the industry in a direction that you need, that
you think you need to take it to solve a problem.
Sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn't work. But I say,
you know, the name leader, industry leader should give people
some idea of the role of this job. And it's
it's not just about sitting doing nothing. It's about trying
to take decisions and half of others and trying to
convince them that it's the right thing to do.
Speaker 1: Any moments where you quietly smiled at a success that
only insiders would understand.
Speaker 2: That's an interesting one. It's a really interesting one. And
I'm not entirely sure to be fair, and I'm sure
the best ones I couldn't mentioned on here. Yeah, I mean,
there's a lot of things that I've good. Yeah, there's
a lot of things I've done in the past that
you know, people have been shocked at an outcome or whatever,
but it's been done for the right reason, and it
kind of pieces together with things that you've done afterworlds
or whatever. But there's nothing actually springs to mind that
is obvious. But there are some less obvious things that
you hand have obviously been on and you just couldn't say, now.
Speaker 1: What has this career demanded from you personally, family time
and energy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, my wife always felt that when I left to
see that would be the end of the days of
her sitting on her own, going to bed alone at night,
and that's not the case. I probably spend as much
time away from home now as I did in the past.
There's a lot of traveling involved, more so now that
we have a company that brings in on UK crew,
where we now have to audit the agents abroad regularly
and routinely. Obviously there's a lot of two and flowing
up and down London now as well, so it's kind
of taking its total wee bit in terms of home life.
But who am I to complain when my members are
doing two hundred odd days at sea a year. It's
not a strong complaint I could make to get any
degree of sympathy. You know, there are other things, like
you know, I had to sell my quota and everything
because at the time I couldn't be writing papers on
quota leasing while I was still holding cote and leasing
that out myself. So I had to get rid of
my coat and everything a point when the price wasn't
that it's optimum. So it's little things like that. But
that was my choice. I can't blame anyone for that,
and it allowed me to go on and take decisions
and right positions without being you know, without having that
sort of where I would to say, you know, or
the understanding the accusations could be lobbied against me. I
was taking a certain direction because I still had assets
or whatever. So yeah, I mean I did that. That
was my choice. And it's taken its toll financially, I guess,
and as much as that. If I still had it,
then that'd be great. But apart from things like that, no,
it hasn't really taken its toll much at all. You
might still keep good health. I still drive back and
forth the office every day. I'm in here at half
seven every day. If I'm not traveling. Some of the
worst aspects now, I guess Jim is the long haul flights,
where you know, to try and be home as much
as I can only fly to Manila and spend a
day and a half of Manila and then back again
or down to Akragana or Columbus Lanka, and as I say,
to make sure you're home as much as you can
only spend a day day and having country that starts
to take its toll after a while because of the
time lag and everything. But I'm not going to moan
about it. You know, would I rather be doing that
than you know, waking up one hundred and fifty miles
from the harbor, you're forth nine trying to get the
dan away as the sun come up. That's that's the choices,
you know, It's what would you rather do? So I'm
not going to moan about anything at all because I
know the alternative was to stay see and continue doing
that and that's not easy.
Speaker 1: Well, I have to say make I am living proof
that all you said about the service and your time,
and that I'm living proof that it's right, because I
honestly anytime I say and appreciate it, as you know,
I call you for a bit of advice and if
I'm doing a podcast with somebody different subjects and that
you've been a fantastic help to make it. And when
I'm picking up the phone did ring Mike Park Honestly,
I think to myself, what country is any? Is he
in this time? And you have answertainces. I've in Sri Lanka,
I've been Brussels.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess it's just it's a feature of the job.
I'm not someone that moans about anything. I just get
on with it. You know you're going to start moaning
get out, So I never moan. I just wake up
in the morning and I think today has got a
different set of challenges. Go and deal with them to
the best your ability. And that's the that's my modus
Operand I don't moan. Get on with it because as
people wire soft than you are, that's for sure. Yeah,
that's the wrong with that. That's true, That's very true.
Have there been moments of isolation or pressure that tested you.
I think you've maybe mentioned that when you're with your
boat and the slip. Yeah, that was one of the
downpoints in my career. And obviously, you know, if you
two or three bad trips in the trot towards the end,
your crew would phone up and say I've gotten a
berth with someone else. That always that always dug into me,
because it was like saying there was other people better
than you and they can make more than you. And
that used to to dig into me. And I guess
you know, at that point when we started losing the
crew because you know, catches were down, prices were great,
costs were up. That was a time of real pressure
because you couldn't get money to the bank, you know,
you couldn't give the money to the crew that you'd
want them to get, although I always made sure the
crew went home with something. I never liked those times, Jim,
because I was used to a steady crew, good money,
and then when that came to an end, that was
that was a pressure of the fishing that I didn't like.
And of course that appears every now and again in
the fishing industry. I guess there's been other times as
well that you know, when you especially when the European
Commissioning vote the precautionary principle away back in nineteen ninety nine.
You know, I remember sitting out in what we call
DG Mari D in Brussels, where the European commission Fisheries
Department was, where the discussions were ongoing, and hearing, you know,
the sort of course of artion they were trying to
take with quota reductions. I remember just sitting there thinking, Wow,
this is absolutely devastating. And I remember one year getting
to the airport. It had been a particularly bad year
at the negotiations, say, the cord quota came down from
like one hundred and twenty to forty thousand ton. And
I remember getting to the airport and the way home
and at that point, you know, Gramping TV always used
to have a camera waiting for you at Dice Airport
as you came off the flight. You'd always have to
answer to Gramping TV about the disaster that lay ahead
for the industry. And I remember, as I saying, Zavantami
Airport in Brussels, standing with Alex Smith waiting for our
flight to come up on the board, and it came
up with a flight to ten a Reef, and me
and him looked at one another, thinking that's probably a
better option. We should maybe get on that one, because
we knew what was coming when we got back home again.
And it's at times like that you do start to
feel it, because you know people are putting you out
there to try and make a difference for them, and
at that point, it was just all negativity, you know,
trying to rebuild stocks, shutting down North Sea, increasing the
mess size from one hundred towe hundred and twenty mil.
It was just it was a boiling point and I
guess it's that period of time, probably from nineteen ninety
nine through to the back end of the days at
SEE twenty ten. It was probably the most pressurized in
the industry that I've ever felt.
Speaker 1: It. Wow, who are you when the meeting stops? And
what do you enjoy outside the role?
Speaker 2: What do I enjoy outside the role? Well, I always
like speaking to the family, and you know, me and
my kids still go to football. Me and my kids
will still go to the bar for a drink if
they're if they're coming down, So I enjoy the family
side of it. The unfortunate that we've got a rather
large garden as well. And I enjoy weekends sitting on
my track toor my long cutter listening to American politics.
I'm a voyeur of American politics, which is very interesting currently,
to be fair, So I normally sit there and listen
to the politics until off the ball comes on with
Tom Cowen and the other guy. So I love things
like that at the weekends. But I'm going to have
a gym goer as well. Gym I love. I love
my hour in the gym every day, whether traveling or
not traveling. I like getting out in the bike in
the summer. I really like getting out the bike in
the summer. But you know, moreover, I just like spending,
you know, time with the family. My family's all around
about as. We've got seven grandchildren. They are absolutely wonderful.
I've got one in America just now in a soccer scholarship,
and they're just a great bunch of kids. Not just
because it's my grandchildren, but there are a great bunch
of kids. And my kids are a great bunch of kids.
And of course I've got a loving wife as well.
And you know, having your family around about you is
is always a big source of energy. It's always a
big source of energy. Although my daughter's a doctor and
anytime I go to her and complain, I'm Soci'll see, dad,
you're getting old. And that's that's all I get from her,
to be fair. So I time spent at university learning
medicine was not good in my part. But yeah, so
these are the things. There's nothing dramatic, you know. I
love coming up here. We've got a lovely building now
in fraserbera can eared house. It's a great working environment
and I love coming up here, sitting with the staff
and just getting on with work looking out the window
over the bay. Yeah, it's not big, big things, but
everything pieces together, which just makes you know, my life
outside of work actually quite special.
Speaker 1: That's good to keep. I think it's keeping the body fit,
keeps you mentally fit, and no question of that. When
you were stepping into leadership, Mike, you clearly worked hard
to prepare yourself. If you could go back to that moment,
what would you tell yourself to focus on and what
would you tell yourself not to worry about?
Speaker 2: Really interesting question, Jim, that I would probably tell myself
at that time to ignore the noise better than I did,
because at that time you're a sponge. Whatever anyone says,
you just absorb it. And when you start absorbing too
many viewpoints, it becomes difficult. It really becomes difficult. And
I've learned over time as well, Jim, to you know,
listen to what you need to listen to. But I've
all also learned to compartmentalized issues. So I can take
an issue now and stick it in the drawer, lock
the drawer in my mind, and just leave it, and
that's it. That's out of my mind. I'll leave it.
I'll go do something else and when I want to
go back and deal with it, I'll go back and
deal with it. In the absence of that, you start
jumpling too many plates and life becomes extremely difficult, and
that's where people start to suffer from pressure and breakdowns
and that. But that's one of the skills that I've
developed over time, and I wish that I'd developed that earlier,
because I think life back then would have been so
much more easier if I could have done that.
Speaker 1: To be fair, it's amazing that's from the blockade of
the early eighties to today, the industry has enormous change,
is dramatically What does the next chapter look like for
Scotland's fishermen.
Speaker 2: The next chapter? And of course there's been big changes
over time. You know, we went from sale to steam,
steam to diesel, went to hydraulics. You know, we went
to GPS rather than deck and lran. So there's been
big shifts over time. And what there has been, Jim,
whether it be through external funding or not, there has
been the fleet has shrunk quite significantly, and I think
what we all see going forward is a fleet that
will continue to adapt to the modern wave, which will
mean higher powered ships, more efficient ships, probably less ships
over time, and there's going to be a stress on
show services as well in the harbors in the coastal communities.
Without a shadow of a doubt, we just we see
it happening all the time. But I guess as an industry,
we've got to adapt to the special squeeze that's going
on and make sure that we can fight. We're calmer
going forward, to ensure that you know, areas of highest
sort of yield have kept areas of highest shield and
we don't you know, continue to get special squeeze. There
is going to be challenges for other challenges on the
industry going forward. GYM. You know, back in nineteen ninety nine,
as I mentioned the precautionary principle being evoked by the Commission.
At the time European commissioned, we focused on sustainability, and
now our focus has got to be on the treatment
of crew, making sure that you know, bonding is not
out there, ensuring that you know, human trafficking and slavery
is not out there, because there's a big focus on
that just now from the retailers. So we are going
to come under continuing pressure from them, both in terms
of certification for stocks, but also ensuring that there are
clear systems and to protect the worker, whether at seeing
while they're on the shore. And these are the challenges
that we're going to have to deal with. They're different,
but we all have to deal with them nonetheless. But
we are a primary producer GYM and there is a
real reason as to why we should continue to prosper
as an industry sector, just like other like agreage, like
other industry sectors. But have always said that, you know,
the fishing industry will always be here in some shape
the form. It will mean that we've got to invest wisely,
and it will mean that we've got to develop with
the times, whether that be through efficiency, different sorts of fuel,
different types of engines over time. But we will have
to embrace change without a shadow of doubt. It would
be good if it was at the speed that we wanted,
but undoubtedly we will have to embrace change going forward
because if we don't, then as an industry we will
weather in the vine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, before we finish it, I want to say something
to my personal view and I don't have a problem
by claiming ownership when a man of Mike Park will
be experience and status is kept outside the room during
critical negotiations. It doesn't just sideline one in individual but
it's a complete lack of respect stone to you and
the fisherman you represent. That's my view, and I say
it because value experience earned the hard way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, as we left Europe, we always thought
that as an industry we would be inside the room,
just like the Norwegian industry is with the Norwegian government.
But I guess within the UK there are complexities to that.
And as much as that, we have foreign companies who
have organizations in the UK that try and seek the
same access. So although they're operating in a European sort
of arena, they are flagged into the UK or whatever.
And I guess governments wary that they may compromise their
negotiating positions if they start to let industry into that room,
because if they like industry, and they can't just let me,
and they've got to let others in as well. And
I guess that's where the complexity comes from in terms
of the UK relative to the Norwegian situation. But in fairness, Jim,
I do think we get to have a good say
with our officials. I think our positions are taken on
board by officials, and I do understand the complexity at
play with non UK players in that room. Were they
allowed to let them in? So whereas we had a
vision when we left Europe, I understand now why that
vision hasn't come to play.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, Mike, thank you for sharing your journey today
from the key side through those defining moments and work
you're put into shaping your career. I also want to
acknowledge your friendship with the podcast. Your willingness to share
your story, your insight, and your experience has made a
real difference, I have to say, and it's something I
deeply value. You've built a remarkable career and today we've
had a glimpse behind the title into the man himself.
Thank you for being part of the milestone episode. Here
to more stories, more insights, and more moments that remind
us why we do what we do. Thank you so much,
Mike today, I.
Speaker 2: Thank thank you Jim. It's always a pleasure speaking to you.
Thank you.