John Payne
THE death has recently been announced of a former chairman of the Scottish Salmon Growers Association (SSGA). James Gladstone Payne passed away peacefully at home on December 25, 2019, aged 87. He will be sadly missed by his wife, Margaret and children, Nichola, Michael and Phillipa. His family and friends knew him as Jim.
Payne was chairman of the SSGA from 1992 to 1995 and he played a leading role in the development of the Scottish salmon industry.
He was the first independent salmon farmer to install feed barges and utilise larger flexible seawater pens.
Furthermore, during the 90s he was heavily involved in exerting pressure on the UK government and the European Commission in response to the dumping of Norwegian salmon into the EU market.
Payne was born in Dannevirke, Hawkes Bay, New Zealand, in 1932 and his family moved to Auckland prior to the Second World War.
He was educated at King’s Preparatory School in Auckland and in 1945 went on to Whanganui Collegiate School, where he remained until 1948. He enjoyed rugby and rowing at school and his forte was long distance running.
Aged 16, he and his mother moved to London, where Edward Wykes, senior partner of Lawrence Graham and Company, encouraged him to become a management trainee in either the banking, shipping or insurance sectors.
Payne decided to give further education a try and enrolled in a ‘crammer’ in Notting Hill, but soon felt dissatisfaction with the teaching and requested that his fees be returned. The principal obliged and he felt quite victorious, but his mother didn’t share this sentiment. He enrolled in another school, where he was one of two boys and 19 girls. He was conscientious and left school having achieved a number of exam passes.
In 1950, Payne was hired as a management trainee in J&N Philips in Manchester, where his grandfather had been managing director; however, he found the work humdrum.
The following year he joined the Royal Armoured Corps in Catterick, Yorkshire, and he passed for officer training; it was a statutory requirement at the time for all young men to serve two years in the Armed Forces.
He went on to Mons Officer Training School in Aldershot and progressed to become a training officer for new recruits at only 19 years old. He considered the army a good establishment for learning discipline and leadership. He had hoped to join the Royal Navy, but his eyesight didn’t meet the minimum standard.
Payne went on to join the shipping industry and began as a management trainee with Vestey’s Smithfield office in 1953. Through his connection with Edmund Vestey, one of the founders of the business, he met his future wife, Margaret (at a dance in the autumn of 1953). They married at Great Tharlow on July 24, 1954.
Their first child, Nichola Rosemary, was born on June 23, 1955, and shortly afterwards, the family emigrated to Australia. Payne devoted much of his free time to sailing, spent some time in New Zealand, but returned to the UK and settled in Dunmow in Essex.
Two more children, Michael Payne and Philippa Margaret Payne, were born, in 1959 and 1963.
A notable achievement during Payne’s time in the shipping industry was the establishment of a service from Australia and New Zealand to North America.
He also held the position of chairman of the Council of European and Japanese National Shipowners’ Association.
In 1979, he said goodbye to the shipping industry, and his career took a U-turn. Having bought Ardvar Estate in Sutherland in 1977 as a holiday home, he decided to try his hand at salmon farming, establishing Ardvar Salmon in 1980. One motivation behind this was the desire to provide long term employment for the local community.
Payne eventually stood down as chairman of Ardvar in 1997 and Angus Morgan, formerly of Marine Harvest, stepped into his shoes.
Morgan described Payne as a ‘giant of the industry…who sought to develop and protect a sustainable future for the businesses and their people’.
He sought to develop and protect a sustainable future for businesses and their people”