Mark by Mark
After
almost 31 years, 23 of them on the Isle of Wight, the excitement of it all has
caught up with me and an ill health retirement sees me leaving the vast office
in a prestigious location known to most people as Cowes. I’ll stay long enough
to see the birth of HMRC and should be enjoying retirement from May 2005.
Not wanting to spend the school holidays working in the local MacFisheries I became an AO in Worthing (with the odd foray to Chichester) in 1974, passed the Civil Service EO exam in 1976 – yes you could get promoted by simply passing an exam then – and moved on to Dorking and Reigate VAT. Not really cut out to study figures I moved to Southampton in 1980 and became a collection officer, working at many south coast ports and airports as well as having a jolly good time at Edinburgh Airport and a couple of cutter spells which took me almost all the way round Britain’s coast.
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A six week cutter relief spell to Cowes in 1982 turned into 3 years detached duty with summers then spent skippering the Solent patrol vessel Antelope and the winters back in Cowes. |
The Cowes
post then included Registry of Shipping (we were the country’s fifth largest
registry port), Receiver of Wreck, Collector of Light Dues and being the
Immigration Officer. Office ‘technology’ comprised: a grey phone and a beige
phone, one typewriter and a customs radio and that was it – if you wanted a
copy of anything you got a second piece of paper (foolscap) and inserted carbon
paper. All this was housed in a traditional Waterguard Watch House with office
and messroom on the first floor and a boathouse underneath. Reflecting on those
times is like looking back centuries not 20 years.
We boarded yachts, thousands of
them in a normal year, from a very bouncy dory sometimes dressed in peaked cap
and brass-buttoned jacket. Agent’s launches would ferry us to anchored ships
in the Solent anywhere between Yarmouth and St Helen’s Roads and the official
mini (yes a mini! - has anyone ever driven on Island roads?) would take us to
either airport to clear aircraft. We had under us three coast preventive men and
at one stage had four cars, three boats and four offices for six staff!
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That bouncy
dory had been provided in 1981 when the launch service was disbanded and
Cowes’ two launch crew were paid off along with the 37ft launch Fulmar.
This major change meant that us Officers were now required to drive ourselves to
the work! The dory was referred to by Mike Rees as a ‘plastic soapdish’ and
generally disliked by all who drove it. So in 1983 we got an 18ft launch, slower
but a lot more comfortable to drive.
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| 1986 saw an interesting development in boating – waterjets, we had the department’s first waterjet launch, a 23ft Taskforce boat, and for the first time since 1981 were back out in the Solent again (the smaller boats had all been limited to the River Medina and Yarmouth harbour). |
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Whilst very clever and manoeuvrable it was a
bit too manoeuvrable for our work and we managed
to swap it for Courser a 28ft twin-screw Cowes-built Cheverton work boat,
the perfect boat for our work. |
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weren’t the only boats we had. Yarmouth had a 10ft clinker varnished rowing
boat in 1982 but we put the Cowes dory there when the launch arrived. (In
Yarmouth the dory did a good job) and Bembridge was supplied with an 11ft dory -
again ideal for the harbour. |
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1990
I was appointed full time to Cowes – without question the best job in the
country. Working on an Island guaranteed a departmental life driving all sorts
of small boats eventually teaching others how to – a dream job.
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The 1990
post was as part of the Island’s own Anti-Smuggling Unit; 2 Eos (Steve Stevens
& I) & 2 AOs (Valerie Hardman & Graham Osborne) With 2 POs (Roy
Griffiths & Mike Rees) doing the boarding work. Anne Watson was the AO
Coastal Intelligence and we even had our own Senior Officer (Vince Slade). That
summer I commanded the hired launch Filius in which we patrolled from
Weymouth to Eastbourne.
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In 1992 we
helped Financial Investigations Branch in Operation Greenice particularly
involving the yacht Sarava, at that time it was Britain’s largest ever
financial investigation. |
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With
Roy’s death in 1993 and the Senior Officer’s retirement management of Cowes
staff transferred to the mainland. Initially 7 staff were managed by 3 different
Senior Officers under 2 different Surveyors (all based in Southampton), that
example of ‘streaming’ didn’t last long as you would expect!
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In |
By the
‘90s the skills acquired on the Island were put to good use and customs made
me a trainer of others in small craft. We brought all the country’s advanced
rib training to the Island basing it in the Yarmouth office.
I also
spent the ‘90s helping train other customs officers about yachts and
contributed to the national coastal intelligence initiative.
As part of a mainland team there was one occasion
when in the same shift I drove Yarmouth’s outboard-engined dory, the Cowes
waterjet, the twin-screw Badger, Southampton’s single engine rib and
Lymington’s twin-engine rib – who says ‘fully flexible’ is a modern
concept!
Those halcyon days afloat, all year round in a
variety of boats, were magical, if ever a job had ‘this is for you’ written
all over it then this was it.
Operation
Eyeful in 2000 involved 400kgs of cocaine landed from a yacht by rubber dinghy
on the Island’s Undercliff coast. I was fully involved and as this is
Britain’s biggest coastal drugs seizure it can’t be bettered as a
professional experience. Asked by the Eyeful team to help them afloat on the day
was great, ok - I stranded our rib on the beach, after all my orders were
‘land your crew on the beach and don’t let anyone escape’ – can’t do
that any better than sitting across it with a rib!!
The Eyeful
seizure took place at the end of 2000. Early in 2002 I ended up on 6 months sick
leave with what I now know is a permanent back problem. Mike Rees retired in
November 2002 leaving just Anne & I as the Island’s customs
Customs’ Law Enforcement Business Plan of 2003
has other ideas for Cowes which do not include me or the Cowes office for that
matter. So with a future as murky as a Solent fog bank an ill health retirement
has appeared out of the miasma so at least my future happiness is ensured.
One rewarding aspect of holding an official
position on the Island has been involvement in the community, from attending the
High Sheriff’s annual Legal Year Service, to various Cowes Week functions and
the inspirational Seafarer’s Service at the beginning of Cowes Week to giving
talks to local schools and presentations to professional bodies (including
Police, Immigration & Special Branch) they have all meant representing HM
Customs and has resulted in a very high public awareness of our work on the
Island.
I haven’t organised a leaving do as other
developments here may dictate the date – I’ll keep you posted. In the
meantime best wishes to the many good people I have had the pleasure of meeting
since 1974.
