Toby Symonds

IT’S just after 10am on a refreshingly sunny Monday morning. I’m on one side of Glasgow and George Parsonage MBE, 73-year servant of the Glasgow Humane Society, is on the other. Unfortunately I am running late.

In a last grasp at making it within the realms of fashionable lateness, I seize my smartphone and summon a taxi to take me to Glasgow Green and the river's edge, where the society is based. It’s a roundabout journey and not nearly so straightforward as simply walking along the Clyde, as would have likely been my sole option in this scenario some 227 years ago when the Society was founded.

At the end of my drive is a breathtakingly intelligent man, whose eyes have seen more on the Clyde than many in the city could possibly imagine. George Parsonage is not without recognition – he has two Jubilee medals from the Queen and Parsonage Square is named for him – but unavoidable on meeting him is the feeling that none of this matters to the man himself. George’s joy for the job that has dominated his life for seven decades is infectious, whilst his gaze never quite leaves the river as we talk. There’s sadness too; last year alone the society recovered three bodies from the Clyde for Police Scotland and it seems a near certainty that George has never forgotten a casualty of the river.

The Press too seems a sticking point. Too many journalists have come and gone with a disrespect for the pride George holds for the Society and insensitivity to the delicacy of their work, in which lives are at stake and families suffer painful uncertainty.

According to its website, the GHS exits to: preserve human life in and around Glasgow’s waterways, provide lifeboats and safety services, advise authority figures on the maintenance of accident prevention, and educate the public in water safety. As Gordon Goldie, an equally illuminating volunteer for the society, puts it: “People come to us when they want expert advice.” In George, they have it.

I ask if George always knew that this would be his life-long career and his response is a nod in agreement, with not a trace of hesitation. It’s hardly surprising when you consider the environment into which the Glaswegian was brought up. Born the son of Sarah and erstwhile GHS officer Benjamin Parsonage, George spent the majority of his childhood either on or by the water. A delve into the society’s archives reveals a delightful tale from days after his birth when an apparent stranger delivered to George’s mother a celebratory cake. Neither friend nor relation, the elderly woman had read of the recent birth in the papers and wished to give a small present seeing as "Bennie" had given her back her son, by rescuing him from the river. As a beginning to the story of George’s bond with the river, it is almost a fairytale.

“This is the job I always dreamed I’d be doing” says George. He’s referring to a number of recent successes by the GHS in getting the city council to implement their advised safety measures for the prevention of incidents on the river’s bridges and towpaths. Successes like the replacing of St Andrew’s Suspension Bridge’s flat parapet to a circular design so as to discourage climbing. Indeed, “the design of all new bridges in Glasgow,” George later tells me, “have now to be shown to the Glasgow Humane Society for approval.”

At this point, Gordon, who has himself first-hand experience of the society’s service to Glasgow, brings out pen and paper to draw for me a diagram. He outlines an equilateral triangle and divides it into four levels with three horizontal lines. At the peak of the triangle is the number 1, referring to an exemplar individual who has lost their life to the river. Below that is a 10, the number of major accidents in this formula, with 100 and then 1000 following, the latter being the innumerable unreported incidents that occur every year. It is these unreported incidents that the GHS are attempting nip in the bud. Their hope is that if these smaller issues can be prevented, through increased safety precautioning and public education, the benefits will be felt all the way up the triangle. Look after the masses and the individuals will look after themselves, so to speak.

There is still, however, much to be done and a long way to go. Many national and regional water authorities, Scottish water and SEPA among them, are now reluctant to attend the GHS’s water safety group meetings due to claims that the river is reasonably clean. “A lot of their samples are taken 2m below the surface but, as most people know, the rubbish and sewage floats on the surface of the water” argues George.

“I am sure they are working hard to clean up the river, but perhaps they should admit that at present the surface of the water is unacceptable.”

For proof, were it needed, George disappears from our room and returns with a sack of unusably dirty lifebelts. “No sewage should be entering the river.”

In Glasgow, the Clyde is teeming with life. It is certainly a way of life much changed from both the GHS’s 1790 origin and George’s father’s time in charge, but one with the river consistently at its heart.

As my time with George and Gordon comes to a close, the pair have one last treat for me.

“Do you want a world exclusive?” asks Gordon.

They take me outside and show me the latest bounty that they have pulled from the river. A collection of rusty metals, these are objects at once seemingly mundane and yet crying out to be placed in a museum. There are old boat hooks and a padlock but then two more catch my eye. It's an axe and a knife.

As George explains: “The axe head was below the barges so the chances are that was my dad’s that he was using, but the knife…that was a weapon. That’s been used for some sort of crime.”

We can only imagine what other secrets are held by the Clyde but if anyone’s going to find them, it’s the Glasgow Humane Society.