Northern Lighthouse Board

The Club welcomed Mike Bullock, Chief Executive of the Northern Lighthouse Board (NLB), as its guest speaker this week. His presentation, titled "More Than Lighthouses," offered members a fascinating insight into an organisation that, as Mike was keen to emphasise, is far more wide-ranging in its work than most people realise.

Mike began by explaining the structure of the three General Lighthouse Authorities (GLAs) covering Britain and Ireland. Irish Lights, established in 1786 and based near Dublin, covers the whole of Ireland, north and south. Trinity House is responsible for England, Wales, the Channel Islands, and, by historical quirk, Gibraltar. The Northern Lighthouse Board covers Scotland and, interestingly, the Isle of Man - a responsibility that dates from 1815, when Liverpool shipowners, frustrated by wrecks on the unlit private island, lobbied Westminster for action. Both the NLB and Trinity House were invited to quote for the work. The NLB won on price - a fact Mike noted with quiet pride.

The NLB is a formal arm's-length body of the UK Department for Transport, drawing its legal authority from the Merchant Shipping Act 1995. Its funding comes through light dues, a hypothecated tax paid by ship owners and collected into the General Lighthouse Fund, with the rate set by the Secretary of State for Transport. For the rest of us, Mike noted with a smile, the service is entirely free.

The organisation employs around 200 people across its Edinburgh headquarters, operational bases in Oban, Inverness, Orkney and Shetland, two ships with crews totalling around 70 mariners, and approximately 20 Retained Lightkeepers (RLKs) stationed at accessible lighthouses around Scotland. Mike also highlighted the organisation's commitment to the future through apprenticeships, with eight apprentices - split between the ships and technical roles - expected to be in training by the end of the year.

In terms of what the NLB actually manages, the figures are impressive: 208 lighthouses, 174 buoys, numerous beacons and radio-aided navigation systems, oversight of more than 2,000 privately operated aids to navigation across Scotland and the Isle of Man, 130 oil and gas platforms, six wind farms, and around 500 fish farms. The organisation's legal duty as "superintendent" of all aids to navigation means it also inspects and regulates what others install in Scottish waters.

Mike made a compelling case for why physical lighthouses remain as relevant as ever, noting that GPS and satellite navigation systems are increasingly vulnerable to jamming, denial and spoofing - particularly in light of current conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East. A lighthouse, he argued, is a fixed, known, unjammable point. The message was clear: screens at sea are no substitute for looking out the window.

A highlight of the evening was Mike's account of the NLB's new vessel, Polestar, which arrived in Oban on Christmas Day 2025. Described as one of the greenest vessels of its kind in the world, she is hybrid-powered, capable of firefighting and towing, and built to remain operationally relevant for the next 30 years.

Mike’s closed with a nod to history, paying tribute to the Stevenson family, who served as NLB engineers for over 150 years, and to Thomas Smith, the organisation's first engineer. Smith's stepson Robert Stevenson took over the family practice - and one of Robert's grandsons, Robert Louis Stevenson, though he chose books over buoys, drew deeply on his family's lighthouse heritage throughout his writing.

PP Donald Mackay warmly thanked Mike Bullock for a fascinating presentation that was informative, genuinely eye-opening and full of wonderful photos and videos.