The man behind the eye patch: Tom Scott interview

RM: So, how are you feeling, how was your weekend off and what's your current mentality?

TS: "I'm getting over it now but it was an incredible shock. When I said I'm about to pass out, well I said, I be about to pass out, I wasn't lying, I couldn't feel my hands, I was going faint. I honestly never expected that to happen."

RM: Was a euphoric pass out or shock?

TS: "Shock, I think. Even when the exit poll came out I didn't really believe it, I never ever thought that'd happen. It never does. There's been comedy candidates in the past. I remember a couple, and they never get in. They get a few more than RON maybe, to get this kind of response is...."

RM: "Do you think this is a general feeling of who are the SU, what do they mean to us, why should I care who gets it, or do you think it was that fact that there's someone who's come out and not promised me 600 things?

TS: "I don't know. I can't speak for how ever many students. I don't know, I can't speak for them, I can't think of the mentality. I guess I just hit a nerve whether it’s a comedy nerve or a disillusion nerve or both or neither. I don't know. Something just connected."

RM: I guess the fact you came out and said, "I'm me" - well, "I'm Mad Cap'n Tom" - was a bit clearer?

TS: "I didn't have any concrete policies. I, well, Mad Cap'n Tom, is going to try and follow through on as many as possible. There will be cutlasses. I've had an offer from someone in Fencing Club, it's not official yet, but someone has said they'll help out and give swashbuckling lessons."

RM: That could be quite a good team-building exercise I guess, during handover week!

For the press conferences and the public stuff, I'll be Mad Cap'n Tom, I've got to be.
Tom Scott

TS: "Yep, yep, I've had an offer to help build a cannon, a non-functional one sadly, but.."

RM: Well, it's progress.

TS: "Yes, some of these may happen which is quite nice. It's quite nice to be elected, on what's effectively a blank slate. Again, something I never thought would happen, but now I've had a few days to think about it, it's nice to be able to get on with the stuff a president has to get on with, rather than having to do that, as well as all that other stuff."

RM: Have you got one, or a couple of things, that you want to see in place at York, things that would have been your policies if you'd have run as Tom Scott?

TS: "I don't know. I think the things I've got to deal with. You've got Hes East, you've got a student venue, all the normal things that a president has to deal with. Which, to be honest, are going to be the same policies as any one who gets in. You want to make sure students are ok. You want to make sure students have a good deal. You want to be able to make sure things work out. No matter who gets in, those policies are going to be exactly the same. In the end, they're probably going to come out exactly the same."

RM: For me, the point where I actually twigged where you could get this was at PEP Debate. There was a point in it, where there was a point that you mentioned societies, and you were pissed off about it. What was yours?

TS: "I think pissed off is a bit strong. There have been, in the past, some Societies Officers haven't done the greatest job. We originally had a non-Sabbatical Societies Officer, and, you do the best job you can, but when you've got a degree as well societies get left behind. I've always been a societies person, and it's the one thing at this uni that I'm really passionate about. Turning point...the exit poll."

I guess I just hit a nerve whether it’s a comedy nerve or a disillusion nerve or both or neither. I don't know.
Tom Scott

RM: That late?

TS: "I never saw this coming! People were going around saying I'll vote for you, or I've voted for you, and I was going for the apathetic vote. By definition, that doesn't work and it wasn't until I got a phone call from someone asking for a comment, and I sort of, I thought the exit poll was wrong. It turned out to be wrong, I mean the result was right, but it had me in a landslide victory."

RM: And it ended up as 52%?

TS: "Yeah, it had me at 52% on first preference whereas I knew that all my supporters had voted really early so I figured the exit poll was a bit skewed. I was worried to call my parents, talk to my girlfriend, talk to my campaign team, and work out, should I take it if I run? And they all said yes, if I win. I should."

RM: Did you genuinely doubt whether you should take it?

TS: "Yes. That sort of dramatic pause wasn't there to add dramatic value. I did change my mind a few times as I sort of stumbled up there."

RM: Because you doubted yourself or because you didn't know whether people had voted you for the right reasons?

TS: "All of things. My brain was in complete disarray, it's like, I listened back to it on URY, and there was one sentence that I remember saying, but what actually came out my mouth was a string of syllables, sort of speaking in tongues."

RM: I think that was one of the reasons people voted you. You weren't stood there as some sort of eloquent person who's been on YUSU for 20 years, you literally just stood up there and said, 'I can't believe this' and I think that's more heart-warming to students. I think for students to see that, is very different. All the results that night, minus AU had been as expected.

I did change my mind a few times as I've sort of stumbled up there.

TS: "AU was interesting wasn't it!"

RM: I think the thing about AU was that all four would have been fantastic.

TS: "When you have that many competent candidates, it's always going to come down to third/fourth preference. And when it gets down to that do people really have a third/fourth preference or are they just dragging names into a box?"

RM: Are you happy with your Sabb team?

TS: "One of the weird things about being elected is that I don't know most of them. The closest I've ever worked with them in the past was doing a RAG skydive with Matt Burton. We worked fairly well on that occasion. We both jumped out of a plane in the end, we're both alive. Beyond that...."

RM: Do you think that's better?

TS: "Ask me in a year's time! Obviously it'll be wrong to comment on them, but I don't know them. I'm going to meet them."

RM: Do you think the best policies won? Are you happy with the ideas that won?

TS: "I don't think it's my job. Students have voted, students have decided. It’s not up to me. So many people have asked me questions, 'Do you want to do this, do you want to do that?' on issues that it isn't my job to make my mind up on. There are lots of things mandated on by UGMs, and mandated by the student votes, and I've got to deal with that. That said, I've got to no problems at all with the Sabb team, best of luck to all of us, I'm looking forward to it."

RM: I have to ask this, the whole costume, voice issue! It's the biggest question. Do you have just the one outfit, or more than one?

TS: "Ah, well. I have two shirts, one sash, they're hand-wash only, and 100% polyester, so I need to go shopping!"

RM: Are you going to have a sash for a different occasion?"'

TS: "I was thinking a different colour for each day, and if I have to come in on a weekend, maybe tie-dye!"

RM: Nice!

TS: "How much am I going to go for the costume? I guess that's the biggest concern for people who aren't too happy with it being a pirate getting in. I've got to come dressed in pirate costume, I will be attending the SU Office in full pirate costume, that's what I've been elected as! That said, there's going to be a difference between public life, and back-stage. Once the camera is off, and people have forgotten that there's a pirate in office, which will happen, very quickly..."

RM: You'll be a regular guy in a shirt and trousers?

TS: "I think the hat and the eye patch will be hung up on my desk, and I'll be a guy in a somewhat frilly shirt?"

RM: Are you going to have Brian (his duck) there?

TS:"Brian will only be on my shoulder for special occasions."

RM: Ok, but are you going to put him in-site in the corner of the SU?"

TS: "He's going to be on my desk I think. He's attached to my shoulder by trust, loyalty and two safety pins through his arse. Unfortunately that has a tendency to destroy the shoulders of my shirts."

RM: I'd imagine...and most likely his arse!

TS: "Yes! So, for Brian's sake he'll be sat on my desk."

RM: What would you have put your chances at, on day one?

TS: "Zero. Well no, 1000/1. I would have said if I'd got as much as any other candidate and have beaten RON, I'd have been happy. If I'd have given the other candidates a run for their money, I'd have been amazed!"

I have been told that the majority of the uni staff is laughing with me, and not at me.

RM: There have been comments in York Press that it's typical students who vote a pirate in.

TS: It's like that zany stuff, I hate the word zany, and the idea that students will vote for stuff because it's weird. There's an element of that, and people in general, see as students as not caring, and I don't think that's true. I think students care about different things; I don't think students care about politics, in general. Student welfare's important, student life's important but student politics is not. I don't know, it's going to be interesting talking to folks who aren't students."

RM: Have you idea how people like Trevor Sheldon and the Vice-Chancellor will react to you?

TS: "I have been told that the majority of the uni staff is laughing with me, and not at me. However, that's all through very unofficial channels and until I take the job and go in there, I don't know. I think it'll be the same thing. For the press conferences and the public stuff, I'll be Mad Cap'n Tom, I've got to be. But it's hard to talk with someone with a pirate accent as you've got to work out what they're saying, for efficiency's sake and my own sanity..."

RM: I honestly don't know how you managed it. From emails to Facebook to hustings, you kept it up!

TS: "When the doors are shut, the hat'll come off and it'll be down to business. That said, after five years of doing this...."

RM: Yeah, how did pirate-ing come about?

TS: "Well, five years ago, I became involved in Talk like a Pirate Day, by accident. It means talking and typing like a pirate comes naturally. I've had to stop myself a few times, and think I've had to change my emails. Lose the ahoy, take the apostrophes away, I can keep it up, but it did falter a little bit during interviews after elections, just because my mind was so far distracted. But, it be quite easy to slip in and out of now me hearty.'"

The big thing I want to say is that I think I can do a good job. I never really wanted to originally, but now I'm in, yes.
Tom Scott

RM: Where did it begin?

TS: "Me and a friend set up a site for 'Talk like a Pirate'. It broke around the web, no-one else had set up a website, and there were rumours it was going to commercialised, and we thought that's not right, we'll get there first. So we did. Two weeks later the American pirate guys emailed me and said, we were going to do that, and we invented it, so we will do that, but they said, do you want to run Talk to a Pirate Day. I said ok, what's the worst that can happen. They're now both professional pirates."

RM: By professional do you mean they live in a ship, have a wench etc?

TS: "Yes, they certainly have a wench rather than a wife, I think behind the scenes people slip. Each year, a few radio stations ring me up, and interview me, and then two years ago, the Southampton Boat Show rang me and said, we're doing a pirate thing at our show. On the train on the way down they said Newsround are interested, so I said ok, got decked up (dressed up) and got interviewed by Liso as Mad Cap'n Tom, and then it's gone up a bit more and more each year. And then two weeks ago, Alton Towers invited me down and I gave a master class on how to talk like a pirate, as a PR stunt, and it was loads of fun."

RM: Has it always been an ambition of yours to run for SU President?

TS: "No. It's always been an idea that went round with the friends for a while, and I was in a hostel in Riga for a conference. And I got an email from YUSU asking if I minded whether they can give my name to the press. And I was like, what! A friend of mine, Tim, had taken my nomination form while I was away, and written Mad Cap't Tom on it. So I thought, why the hell not. So yeah, let's build a ship out of a porter's trolley and sail around campus."

RM: Have you anything to clear up?

TS: "The big thing I want to say is that I think I can do a good job. I never really wanted to originally, but now I'm in, yes. I'm going to do the best job I can, and in the end, it is just student politics, student welfare is incredibly important, student life is incredibly important, student’s politics is not. I have to remind myself regularly to take a step back and, you don't sweat the small stuff, just the stuff that's going to affect people, and that's the big thing. The thing I'm trying to get across is pragmatism and I'll do the best job I can with what I've got."

And with that Tom left me to go back to his day of media interviews and meeting YUSU. It was genuinely refreshing to hear a President-elect be so honest about the YUSU experience and the expectations he has.

It was an odd experience walking through Vanbrugh with Tom. Unlike last week, when in full regalia he couldn't walk anywhere without the odd 'arr', today, Tom blended in as an ordinary student. After all, until a week ago, he was just that, an ordinary student with a humourous hobby, and he has the unique position of being able to be recognised when he wants, and taking off the pirate hat when he doesn't.

On top of that, despite the uproar caused by his election, Tom had the outlook that, "it's a load of people I don't know, talking about someone they don't know", and although Tom will never be my SU President that piece of advice alone will stay with me as a mantra for quite some time. This being the third or so time I've interviewed him, I think he'll be a level-headed and laid-back one, and above all, should be given a chance to get on with the job he has been voted into before the critics lay into him.

Add Comment

You must log in to submit a comment.