Opinion: The meaning of disappointment
Well, I am married now! It all went very well and thanks to all of those who sent me kind thoughts. The “disappointment” refers to something completely different, however. A headline in the last Fish Farmer said MSPs are “disappointed” in the slow progress of our industry. Really?
The hypocrisy of that statement beggars belief. If they think they understand what “disappointment” means, they are horribly wrong. Try being a member of this industry for the last 50 years, constantly let down by politicians. Before elections they make promises which they have no intention of keeping, and often have the intention of doing the exact opposite.
Almost every constituent in Scotland is completely disenchanted with politics and politicians. They promise to do better whilst pocketing large amounts of our cash and then spending the remainder with as much financial acumen as an eight-year-old child with their first pocket money.
So let’s look back at the government of Scotland over my career. In the start we were governed by the Scottish Office, responsible to Westminster and run by the civil service under the Secretary of State for Scotland. I did not have much interaction with them but it seemed slow and dozy. It was an establishment organisation, rather against change, and it was very supportive of the wild salmonid lobby as the civil service usually is.
Then came devolution and all the wonders that were promised to us. We would have locally based politicians, and all of the decisions would be made close to the coal face with local accountability.
Do you recognise any of those things having come to fruition? Devolution has only proved that government doubled is generally complication, confusion and bureaucracy doubled; and accountability, decision making and transparency halved.
Talking sense, but not seeing it
In the run-up to the 2007 election, a delegation from the SNP arrived at our office in Scourie, on the north-west coast of Scotland. I was interested and thought it good policy to meet all parties. They made a big play on the importance of the salmon farming industry and how they were very business-orientated. I fell for it, hook, line and sinker.
I really believed that they were going to focus on driving Scotland forward in order to establish a strong state for independence. Though I am not a supporter, I could see the logic behind the idea, as “independence” needs strong industries. I made the fatal mistake of assuming that people who were talking sense actually understood what they were saying.
At my daughter’s wedding I learnt a speech in Swedish, as her husband is Swedish, by getting a local to translate it for me. I learnt it phonetically and got him to check my accent until I sounded Swedish. It went down well with the Swedish contingent at the wedding but because my accent was good, they all assumed I had learned Swedish. People can learn words without really understanding their meaning.
My words to MSPs Gougeon, Carson et al regarding their disappointment are simple: why don’t you and the wild salmonid lobby do a bit of delivery for a change? How about the promise of a one-step planning system, or a single authority for salmon farming, or any of the other manifest promises that your lot have made over the years?
To the wild lobby, how about real dialogue where you actually say what you mean? Also, how about real-time delivery of catch results?
The salmon industry has delivered for Scotland over the last 50 years. It has delivered jobs, balance of payments, support for fragile rural areas and most of all a fantastic product that makes Scotland look good on the world stage.
And while we’re on the subject of disappointment, I cannot tell you how disappointed I am in the scientists in this country who don’t understand the difference between causation and correlation. It is possible to correlate the decline of mental health in this country with the uptake of benefits but that doesn’t mean benefits cause it.
Sea lice numbers do not correlate with the decline of wild salmon, or with the number of salmon farms, but even if they did, that is not causation. So when it comes to disappointment, I think the Scottish salmon industry can hold its head up high! It’s done more for Scotland than any of the MSPs or scientists have, or likely ever will.
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