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: What are your thoughts on recent media coverage of the industry?
: One of the biggest issues we’ve had to deal with this year has been to do with the media, who have hit us with constant criti- cism and misrepresentation – I don’t think we’ve ever had a year like it. The Sunday Times thankfully got their comeuppance when the BBC bit its ankles (over the no cod left in the North Sea story), but it’s an issue we still need to address and we’ve been talking about what we can do at the Federation to change things. Unfortunately current media culture favours the sensa- tional stories. We need to look into addressing the balance. A few years ago the media were generally both interested in, and sympathetic towards, the industry – they appreciated it was a tough job and that fishermen operate under difficult and dangerous conditions – but very rapidly the pendulum has swung to portray fisher- men as irresponsible and greedy people, who have driven fish stocks to the point of collapse, even though most stocks are now improving.
It’s partly because the public are increas- ingly concerned with the environment, but mainly because of the growing power and influence of green organisations, many of whom are funded to emphasise the nega- tives.