"I want to be a fisherman. But I don't feel secure in my job. It's getting very difficult now to make a living out of it. We're running to stand still at the moment - working really hard but not getting anywhere... I don't know what help and support is out there for me."

I’m a fisherman – a skipper-owner of my own boat, a tangle-netter based in Helford. We fish for monkfish all year round. I have two full-time crew, with an extra crewman sometimes in the winter. I’m married with two young children and another one on the way.

I’ve been doing this for 19 years – I started when I was 16 and have been fishing pretty much solidly since then. I got into it through my dad. He was a fisherman and I ran his boats for about 10 years before I went on to buy my own boat.

The boat needs to gross about £1,000 a day, for everybody to get a decent wage. Recently we’ve been averaging about £600 a day. On a bad day, we only catch £300 or £400 of fish. The fuel is very expensive – around £150 a day and it’s getting more expensive all the time, eating away at the profits. All the crew members are on 20% of the catch. After the expenses are knocked off at the end of the trip, we share out the money. So if we don’t catch enough fish we don’t get paid.

Lately we’ve had quite a few bad days… Last year we had what we called ‘the red tide’ – a really nasty algae that killed a lot of fish. We think it has affected our yearly catches. Things like this are completely beyond our control – however hard we work. The sea temperatures are also really cold for this time of year and we think that’s also affecting our catch.

I want to be a fisherman. But I don’t feel secure in my job. It’s getting very difficult now to make a living out of it. We’re running to stand still at the moment – working really hard but not getting anywhere.

My biggest worry is not catching enough fish to cover all the repayments. We owe a lot of money to the bank, insurance is very expensive, and I want to keep the crew employed. As soon as I have a bad month, I worry that they might leave and then I won’t have the capacity to catch more fish without a trained crew.

I have tried to find another job. I went to learn how to skipper a big boat that was more efficient than mine. But it meant being at sea for 200 days a year, which is not really suitable for me with a small family. I’ve also looked into working for Seacore, and had an interview for becoming a bargemaster (in charge of one of their rigs). But again it was eight months a year away from home, which is not suitable for my family life.

I definitely think that 19 years’ experience at sea has to be worth something, in another industry. If I could gain qualifications in the marine industry I might be able to move into another job. I’d like to have help for funding with training, but I’d also like some advice as to what training I would need to get into certain jobs. I don’t really know what options are available to me. I’d like to discuss my skills with somebody and the different ways I could use them.

I don’t know what help and support is out there for me. We can go to our local fisheries office, but apart from that I don’t really know where to start to even look.

Roly Kirby - 35