Ol’ swivel eyes himself sailed past today. From the river bank at Tower Bridge, I looked for Farage in vain aboard the lead trawler, but it turned out the besuited Brexiters were wobbling up the Thames on a pleasure boat, the aptly named Edwardian.
Not much of a turnout on our stretch of the river beyond the usual bunch of bemused tourists and a couple of camera crews. I told the lady from China TV that I thought it was a pretty good propaganda stunt by the Outers. “We Brits are a maritime nation,” I opined for the benefit of viewers in Beijing, “so you can’t really go wrong if you sign up a few trawlermen to your cause.”
It’s true, isn’t it? Everyone has a warm glow about our brave fishermen upon the sea, even if many people’s connection to the piscatorial is these days limited to frozen Vietnamese shrimps from the supermarket or the whiting in kitty’s canned dinner.
I’m not sure we should have much sympathy though for the flagship in Nigel’s “Vote Leave” fleet. The Scottish-registered Christina S was involved in a £63m illegal fishing scam a few years back and its owner was among a dozen people who ended up in the dock.
The Out crowd had to cope with a rival demo from remainers, whose theme song – “I’m in with the in-crowd” – blasted out across the river from a slightly bigger pleasure boat than Nigel’s. It also blasted out a few fishing facts for the UKIP gang, pointing out the British industry is in fact thriving and selling two-thirds of its catch to the EU. Small operators have been pushed out, not so much by the EU as by the big operators whose quotas are doled out in Westminster. Example: trawlers involved in the above-mentioned fishing scam were part-owned by a firm that controls 12 percent of the country’s quotas.
The Chinese TV lady put me on the spot by asking how I thought the public would vote. Could go either way, I said. The EU was an imperfect institution, I told her, but on balance I thought it was positive. Trouble was if people voted “OUT”, they couldn’t later change their mind.
I told her I personally was particularly worried that Brexit would leave the country at the mercy of the profoundly dodgy right-wing populists who, over my shoulder at that very moment, were floating back down the Thames.
Idle Thoughts on London Walks 