1. N
Throughout cambridge, the words “do you want to go punting today” can be heard all over.
Some people, mainly tourists welcome the words. However, many, including locals despise
them and have had enough. But the touts will stay, legally or otherwise, so long as theres
money to be made and tourists to tout, even if the council have outlawed it.
--”money” by pink floyd clip
N
With the industry of punting in cambridge also comes the unlicensed punt operators, who many
believe have given punting a bad name throughtout the city and further beyond.
I wanted to get the perspective of someone on the river so i spoke to emma, owner of
rutherford's punting company, a licenced operator based on quayside who operate, at their
peak, four boats at a time.
Emma
My names emma wyne, ive been on the river since 1998, I started as a boat hand working for
frauca at tyrells, as a boat hand / and / Alex ramsey , taught me how to punt.
N
The largest punt company in cambridge is Scudamores, owned by james mcnortan. Today they
are viewed as the height of punting, cambridge students in boaters and waistcoats.Would you
agree that scuds dominate the tourism and the industry on the river or they still need to fight to
keep their place on the river
Emma:
I think scudamores are the leader in the market place, on quayside they dont dominate, they
take 50% of the market place there. In the mill pond they do dominate
N
However it wasn’t always like this. In the last 20 years punting was a lot rougher as an industry,
would you be able to give me an idea of how it was back then?
Emma
Unlike what it is now, it was a lot more dangerous in the sense that the police didn’t care, the
council didn’t care, so scuds were quite heavy handed and so were the other punt companies –
extremely heavy hand and they took the law into their own hands and dish out what ever they
deemed fit. We’d find electric eals in our punts, punts sunk, locked up in the middle of the day
by scuds, frangrantly put that in our faces, it was rather bizarre. Unlike now where its all very
this century, back then it still had the splatters of the 70s and 80s about it.
Aaron:
2. Would it be fair to say that scudamores is very different to what it was and has come a long way
especially in the public eye
Emma:
They are more proffesional, they get on with their own business, theyre not interested in killing
their competition with brute force, they’re more interested in building their own business
Aaron:
You’ve been on the river since 98 - how would you say punting has evolved in cambridge as in
industry and as a tourist attraction in those 18 years.
Emma:
It has evovled, it could hopefully get better. I look back to when i started and it was a very
closed scenario with all the companies, there were no independent operators. At that point in
time, people would put doubles and triples together and punt them down the river, there were
less boats on the river, there were less tourists, there were less people in cambridge so the river
was a lot less busy. Has it got better? I wouldnt have thought so, from the user aspect of the
river its probably got a lot worse. If i was a local on the saturday, you probably wouldn’t. Its not
the river it used to be.
N
The main problem, in the public eye, that comes with punting is the touts. They can be seen as
harrasive and annoying, especially if the same person is asked by many different touts.
Do you think touts are nuisance in cambridge? Do you think they are something that make
cambridge, or a necessity?
Emma:
I think touts are a nuisance in cambridge. It really depends on the way a tout approaches
somebody, whether or not they are just blanket touting or whether they are taking an intellectual
choice on who they are gonna ask to go punting. You've seen an influx of many more touts and
it's been ongoing over the last 15 years or so and everyone on the river has had hell to pay with
it.
Aaron:
With the recent introduction of the laws against touting in certain parts of cambridge how much
do you think its going to change the industry of punting in cambridge.
Emma:
What we've seen from that so far is that it hasn't actually made much of an impact on stopping
those people touting, as they put it in the paper they are just adjusting to this new way of selling,
so they are not allowed to say boat or punting or gondola or river. So they are just saying to
people would you like to do this and pointing to a picture and the people say do you mean
punting and they are saying if anyone is listening “something like that but maybe not” and when
3. the person has disappeared they are saying “yes yes yes it is punting and book on”. It's only
recently that they've got a whole new banner and they've got this coop with the newsagents on
kings parade saying buy your punting tickets here. I don't think they've got inclination to stop.
N
Many of the complaints against touts have stemmed from harassment because locals can be
asked if they want to go punting by at least 4 people in space of 10m or even have touts fighting
over, with one tout trying to beat the other to get the sale.
Aaron:
What do you think of the unofficial ask system on quayside
Emma:
Its great, quayside used to be quite a feisty place, a difficult place for people to work. Full of
tension, it's a sales industry so there's always going to be that tension between people but on
quayside now, at the top, where people come down the street on bridgestreet there two people
only allowed to stand there, one from the independents and one from scudamore's. And they
take turns so it's very very relaxed and a lot less squabbles go on.
N
I think its clear to see that from an operator's perspective the touts are a neccessity in
cambridge even if they are a nuisance but i also wanted to talk to a tout themself and see what
they have to say. I spoke to ben, who’s full time job is working for one of the independant
operators as a tout.
Ben
I think that touting is a nuisance in cambridge and i sometimes look at myself and think that i’m
a pest. Literally when people are walking past quayside there are about 15-20 people all trying
to get you to go in this tiny little area and i think it looks a bit silly and i've only just realised how
irritating it can be to be approached in the street in a pushy manner because these people who
collect the charity things in town when they approach you that can be really annoying and i've
only just realised what i do is exactly the same if not worse because it's not for charity and we’re
just trying to put them on a boat.
I then went onto to speak to James, he is not a tout but has worked with them, in both the
licensed and unlicensed areas before.
Aaron
Do you think touts are a nuisance in cambridge?
Kier
Not really, I mean, I can understand why people would get annoyed with them because every
site that you want to go and chill out with your family and things like that theres a volume of
them that kind of can bug you a little bit. In the same turn of that if you go anywhere in the
4. country theres charity workers, there’s big issue sellers, i kind of put touts in the same category
as them. They are annoying, but they are still doing a job and trying to earn money.
