Diary of a Shopkeeper, 1st August
I am pretty sure this is a photo of the Anthem of the Seas, but it was so foggy I can’t be 100% sure.
The mist cleared, revealing a bank of fog. And then the fog dispersed, exposing a wall of haar. When the haar drifted it was finally visible: The Anthem of the Seas, the first cruise liner since February 2020, a mammoth 16-deck vessel dwarfing everything around it.
It’s the largest liner expected in Orkney this year, with a maximum passenger capacity of 4,180. However, as cruise companies are limiting numbers for social distancing reasons, there were only 1,111 on board for this voyage. Of those, around 370 chose to leave the ship while it was docked at Hatston.
Did the shops and eateries of Kirkwall benefit, as we usually do when large liners visit? I’m afraid not, because for the moment passengers are restricted to going on pre-booked ‘bubble excursions.’ Which means they’re decanted onto scrupulously disinfected coaches, given a tour of the Mainland, then delivered back to the gangway.
In England, cruise passengers are already allowed to set foot on dry land, but the Scottish Government’s more cautious approach means they’re not currently permitted to wander the streets. Holyrood will be announcing revised rules from 9th August, and it’s possible they’ll change what’s allowed for liner passengers. We’ll have to wait and see whether we will align with other parts of the UK at that stage.
Even then, it’s not certain that cruise passengers will fill the shops and cafes of Kirkwall (and occasionally Stromness) again. They could be limited to ‘bubble excursions’ by the liner operators themselves.
The large companies that run cruise were badly affected by the lockdown last year. The damage was financial, but also reputational, with early outbreaks of Covid on various liners suggesting they provided ideal conditions for the swift spread of infection.
Around 40 liners around the world reported positive cases before the industry was shut down, with several hundred positive cases and a total of about 80 deaths. It’s notable that more than half of those deaths came from just two liners, the Diamond Princess with 712 cases and 14 deaths, and the Ruby Princess with 852 cases and 28 deaths. Most liners had between zero and twenty infections, and either no or very few deaths: the two Princesses skew the figures considerably. None of the infections or deaths were on ships in UK waters.
The damage to the reputation of the cruise industry has been enormous, though of course it cannot be compared to the immeasurable grief of the families of the deceased.
In my line of work, when I recommend an Austrian wine to a customer, I quite often get the response, ‘I hope there’s no anti-freeze in it!’ They’re harking back to the illegal addition of diethylene glycol to low-quality Austrian wines, in an attempt to make them taste richer and sweeter. The scandal happened in 1985, but it still leaps into the mind of many – even though, thank goodness, no one died as a result of drinking the adulterated wine.
In another 36 years’ time, will many people immediately think ‘Covid!’ when cruise liners are mentioned? I think they will.
Whether that is fair or not is another matter. By all accounts the cruise companies have introduced a flurry of measures to make their industry safe for passengers, crew and ports: reduced capacities, social distancing, intensive cleaning, changes to how food is served, the need to prove double vaccination before boarding, and repeated testing during the voyage.
In other words, they’ve done what all business owners and managers have: worked hard to make their customers and staff as safe as possible. As an industry, cruise has probably worked harder than most, because it had a huge reputational hole to dig itself out of.
As a result, the virus is less likely to be circulating asymptomatically amongst liner passengers than it is in the populations they meet ashore. Cruise companies are aware of this, and to avoid anyone carrying the virus back onboard, resulting in further reputational damage, may well restrict the extent to which their passengers can wander – or shop – ashore.
In all of the above, I haven’t expressed an opinion about the pros and cons of the cruise industry and its interaction with Orkney, but just stuck to facts and figures. For what it’s worth, my view is that what we need is sustainable tourism, that brings income and employment over the long term, without irreparably damaging the environment or our infrastructure.
I also believe we need sustainable agriculture and sustainable fishing. And we certainly need sustainable energy production. The oil industry has provided hundreds of jobs and millions of pounds for Orkney. But is oil and gas sustainable as an energy source? We all know it isn’t.
As a deli owner, I’m no expert in defining strategies for sustainability – except maybe sustainable wine production. But I know enough to be sure that all industries – not just mass tourism – need to reform themselves for a sustainable future. Otherwise, the electric liners of the late 21st century will be sailing past the drowned remains of these islands.
Update at the time of posting.
As far as I can see, liners are not mentioned specifically in the Scottish Government’s notice about changes to Covid precautions from 9th August. However, as movement generally is being freed up, Port Health have said they will allow liner passengers to go on private tours and explore Kirkwall on foot from this week, as long as all other safeguarding measures continue to be followed. As predicted above, the next few liners have all said they prefer to keep their passengers restricted to bubble excursions, for their own safety. However, it will surely only be a matter of a week or two before different cruise line companies made different decisions.
This diary appeared in The Orcadian on 4th August. Other diaries continue to appear weekly. I am posting them in this blog a few days after each newspaper appearance, with added illustrations., and occasional small corrections or additions.