£100,000 in over three weeks? - we think not.
For a change, the local paper Cornishman made fishing news the front page headline last week. However, news that the recent run of bad weather that lasted nearly four weeks had cost the fishing industry £100,000 was a little off the mark.
If Newlyn's turnover was running at this level over the course of one year then the port would gross around 12 X £100,000 equaling £1.2 million - in fact, by July this year the port had already grossed nearly £11 million!
It would be much closer to the truth to have reported that the fishermen of Newlyn have personally lost around £100,000 in wages as a result of the abnormally long spell of bad weather. To have published such inaccurate information in Brittany in the two local papers ( Le Telegramme and Ouest France) that cover fishing ports similar to Newlyn would have undoubtedly cost the editors a severe reprimand from their respective fishing community readers - at the very least.
Similar stories of slackness are to be found in the reporting annals of the past.
Fifteen years ago a number of local boats, Silver Harvester, Sowenna, Ar-Bageergan and Britannia IV were involved in fishing for tuna using drift nets. This attracted much media attention, especially when Spanish fishermen became incensed that the Cornish and Irish boats were using nets rather than traditional line and pole methods - talk of boarding parties at sea and shotguns were rife in the national press. Several incidents were reported from the Bay of Biscay during one week of fishing, the full might of the Media waded in keen to make a story. One evening, a local boat involved in several reported incidents with the Spanish fleet, the 30m Silver Harvester was contacted around 11pm by a reporter from The Independent as she headed home to land. The conversation was made all the more difficult as the reporter had gone to enormous trouble to put the call through via a link-call but was in a noisy London pub at the time. He was told that the boat would enter Penzance dock around 5am to land her tuna catch. The boat was carrying an early version of an Inmarsat C transceiver on a trial with BT which is how she was able to report some of the incidents confidentially.
The crew member who took the phone call on watch that night (Vince Marshall, sadly lost on the Margaretha Maria 12 years ago) was surprised, if not amazed, to be greeted by the aforementioned Independent reporter as the SH entered the dock gates in Penzance at first light. By then, Penzance Harbour was host to satellite TV trucks from the BBC, ITN, CNN and dozens of reporters as they clamoured in search of hot news from fishermen involved in the latest Anglo-Spanish 'fishing war'.
Much later that morning, Vince was busy on the deck of the SH when a young man, opening a round of sandwiches, came and stood on the dockside . "What's going on here then?" enquired a bemused face looking across the dock to the sea of TV satellite dishes. Vince told him and then, out of curiosity, asked who he was was talking to, "Oh, I just popped out for a quick break like I always do, I'm from the Cornishman" - it was one of Vince's favourite stories, and one that as a Grimmy, he felt pretty much summed up the way things are in Cornwall, especially the far west.
If Newlyn's turnover was running at this level over the course of one year then the port would gross around 12 X £100,000 equaling £1.2 million - in fact, by July this year the port had already grossed nearly £11 million!
It would be much closer to the truth to have reported that the fishermen of Newlyn have personally lost around £100,000 in wages as a result of the abnormally long spell of bad weather. To have published such inaccurate information in Brittany in the two local papers ( Le Telegramme and Ouest France) that cover fishing ports similar to Newlyn would have undoubtedly cost the editors a severe reprimand from their respective fishing community readers - at the very least.
Similar stories of slackness are to be found in the reporting annals of the past.
Fifteen years ago a number of local boats, Silver Harvester, Sowenna, Ar-Bageergan and Britannia IV were involved in fishing for tuna using drift nets. This attracted much media attention, especially when Spanish fishermen became incensed that the Cornish and Irish boats were using nets rather than traditional line and pole methods - talk of boarding parties at sea and shotguns were rife in the national press. Several incidents were reported from the Bay of Biscay during one week of fishing, the full might of the Media waded in keen to make a story. One evening, a local boat involved in several reported incidents with the Spanish fleet, the 30m Silver Harvester was contacted around 11pm by a reporter from The Independent as she headed home to land. The conversation was made all the more difficult as the reporter had gone to enormous trouble to put the call through via a link-call but was in a noisy London pub at the time. He was told that the boat would enter Penzance dock around 5am to land her tuna catch. The boat was carrying an early version of an Inmarsat C transceiver on a trial with BT which is how she was able to report some of the incidents confidentially.
The crew member who took the phone call on watch that night (Vince Marshall, sadly lost on the Margaretha Maria 12 years ago) was surprised, if not amazed, to be greeted by the aforementioned Independent reporter as the SH entered the dock gates in Penzance at first light. By then, Penzance Harbour was host to satellite TV trucks from the BBC, ITN, CNN and dozens of reporters as they clamoured in search of hot news from fishermen involved in the latest Anglo-Spanish 'fishing war'.
Much later that morning, Vince was busy on the deck of the SH when a young man, opening a round of sandwiches, came and stood on the dockside . "What's going on here then?" enquired a bemused face looking across the dock to the sea of TV satellite dishes. Vince told him and then, out of curiosity, asked who he was was talking to, "Oh, I just popped out for a quick break like I always do, I'm from the Cornishman" - it was one of Vince's favourite stories, and one that as a Grimmy, he felt pretty much summed up the way things are in Cornwall, especially the far west.
Photo © Phil LockleyThe press weren't the only ones interested in the tuna nets in use at the time - here, with regulatory clipboard and no doubt MAFF approved tape measure, every measurement possible is being checked on the gear by officers from the Royal Navy's oldest front line fleet, fisheries protection.
posted by Laurence Hartwell at
Wednesday, December 09, 2009
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