I had moved from a local paper in Cumbria to one of the major news agencies in the north east of England in 1996.

As you can imagine on my first day I was quite daunted as to what I had let myself in for. I had to adjust to a number of changes including working for national newspapers and working with colour film rather than with black and white.

Having said that they let me find my feet by shadowing one of the other photographers on a visit by a Government minister.

Michael Howard, who was the then Home Secretary, visited a number of locations in the north east including Spennymoor.

I snapped a few shots of him chatting to police officers and I was surprised the following day that one of my photos was used by the Daily Telegraph.

It was such a buzz to see one of my pictures used in a national newspaper and suppose I had hit the ground running on my first day in my new job.