It is really too easy to knock banks. Yes, of course they pay themselves eye-watering bonuses but that is because they are 'the best people' and without that quality of people, they would not be able to provide the superb level of service that they do.
We have the good-fortune to use two different on-line banking systems.The one from Barclays comes from the same Disney-inspired design stable as some of Microsoft's work, narrowly avoiding putting everything into Comic Sans. The wonderful pop-up screen that fills 2/3 of the screen contains lots of logos and other unhelpful information while leaving the 'OK' button just below the bottom of the screen so that you have to scroll down to find it; every time. Has no one told them or have those 'best people' not listened?
Then there is the RBS Bankline one which allows you to give your accounts a 'Alias' which is more memorable than their abbreviation of the account name but then does not allow you to use it and expects you to remember the numbers of all your business accounts. They too have a problem with things fitting on the screen and have produced something which looks like a techie's first rough.
Working with these streamlined, customer-friendly organisations is straightforward too: witness this recent message when we tried to set up a new Direct Debit payment system:
Notification of AUDDIS Migration Date - Service User Number : XXXX
Further to the submission of the above application form to Vocalink Ltd, and completion of successful testing I am pleased to confirm your Service User Number has been allocated a ‘Migration’ date for DD/MM/YYY(note; this date is the BACS Processing date and the Migration file should be submitted the working day before).
IMPORTANT : An AUDDIS 'migration' file must contain ALL DDIs held against the SUN(Service User Number). The file must be sent as a 'live' file and only the AUDDIS special transaction code of 0S is to be used. - Please refer to the AUDDIS migration guide page 17 for details.
Please also note that after being in 'migrate' status for 4 weeks you need to be set to full 'live' status. To go fully live you must ensure ALL DDI's are converted onto AUDDIS, and that you do not post D/D mandates to banks when setting up new instructions. We will contact you at this time to check these items before we make the change on the bacs site. Please refer to the AUDDIS migration guide for further details.
Should you have any queries regarding this please contact our Help Desk as soon as possible on 0870 240 5544/156 6680 option 1.
Thank You
The layout and spacing is exactly as it came through by email and it was not from a front-line person. It was from the 'second level of support'. Exciting eh? It certainly made it easy to set up the new arrangement.
Sunday, 11 May 2014
Monday, 3 February 2014
Computer systems
A chum sent us this 'delightful' story of the problems of installing a new computer system to help colleges determining their funding levels.
During 2013 the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) introduced a new Data Collections and Funding Transformation Programme (DCFT), the adverse consequences of which have spilled over into 2014.
In an attempt to explain the purpose of the new system, Skills Minister Matthew Hancock said that the SFA was moving to a new data collection system that would underpin a more streamlined and less complex funding system. The new system would remove the need for thousands of different funding values for each course and qualification, and that it would replace earlier complex funding formulas and funding systems.
The intention is that the DCFT will replace the:
In addition, the new Learning Aim Reference System (LARS), that should have been available since last August to help college staff check whether qualifications are eligible for funding, and how much per learner providers should receive, is still not available. Providers have to use ‘Lars Lite’ instead. This is a temporary downloadable database from the SFA that apparently is also producing unreliable data.
Initially, Mr Hancock seems to have laid the blame for the failures on inadequacies in colleges’ own internal management information systems. In a written answer to a parliamentary question about DCFT, Mr. Hancock claimed that there had been some issues for colleges and other providers in the calculating funding due to them where their own internal management information systems have not been able to report accurately their management position. This was even after the SFA had admitted that there were serious problems with the DCFT system and had apologised to providers for the inconvenience caused.
Eventually, Mr Hancock was brought up to speed with the real reason for the difficulties and has now gone so far as to say that that he personally takes full responsibility for the disruption the new system has caused to providers.
The four computer contracts for a system that does not work cost over £11.3m.
Let's look on the bright side, this is nowhere near as much as NHS England and the Ministry of Defence have spent on IT systems that don’t work and we can look forward to the Margaret Hodge and her Public Accounts Committee asking what Mr Hancock means when he says 'personally responsible'.
During 2013 the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) introduced a new Data Collections and Funding Transformation Programme (DCFT), the adverse consequences of which have spilled over into 2014.
In an attempt to explain the purpose of the new system, Skills Minister Matthew Hancock said that the SFA was moving to a new data collection system that would underpin a more streamlined and less complex funding system. The new system would remove the need for thousands of different funding values for each course and qualification, and that it would replace earlier complex funding formulas and funding systems.
The intention is that the DCFT will replace the:
- Learner Information Suite (LIS)
- Learning Aim Reference Application (LARA)
- Online Data Collection (OLDC) system
- Provider Online (POL)
- Provider Information Management System (PIMS)
- The LIS has become the ‘Funding Information System’ (FIS)
- The LARA has become the ‘Learning Aim Reference Service’ (LARS)
- The OLDC has become the ‘Data Exchange Service’ (DES)
In addition, the new Learning Aim Reference System (LARS), that should have been available since last August to help college staff check whether qualifications are eligible for funding, and how much per learner providers should receive, is still not available. Providers have to use ‘Lars Lite’ instead. This is a temporary downloadable database from the SFA that apparently is also producing unreliable data.
Initially, Mr Hancock seems to have laid the blame for the failures on inadequacies in colleges’ own internal management information systems. In a written answer to a parliamentary question about DCFT, Mr. Hancock claimed that there had been some issues for colleges and other providers in the calculating funding due to them where their own internal management information systems have not been able to report accurately their management position. This was even after the SFA had admitted that there were serious problems with the DCFT system and had apologised to providers for the inconvenience caused.
Eventually, Mr Hancock was brought up to speed with the real reason for the difficulties and has now gone so far as to say that that he personally takes full responsibility for the disruption the new system has caused to providers.
The four computer contracts for a system that does not work cost over £11.3m.
Let's look on the bright side, this is nowhere near as much as NHS England and the Ministry of Defence have spent on IT systems that don’t work and we can look forward to the Margaret Hodge and her Public Accounts Committee asking what Mr Hancock means when he says 'personally responsible'.
Saturday, 11 January 2014
A transport policy?
Enjoy this collection of headlines/reports:
Ministers to consult on 80 mph motorway speed limit - BBC headline 29 September 2011
It is awfully difficult to get one's Chelsea Tractor past all those plebs in the slow lane, yah. I say, my old bus just won't go under 70, you know.
M4 hard shoulder plans criticised by road safety charity - BBC headline 10 May 2012
The government could be set to abandon plans to raise the motorway speed limit in England and Wales to 80 mph - BBC report 17 December 2012
Motorway speed limit may not rise from 70 mph to 80 mph - BBC headline 7 June 2013
So it took them six months to get round to announcing what had been leaked in December
60 mph speed limit proposal for stretch of M1 motorway - BBC headline 6 January 2014
So now the speed limit is going to go down. It is OK, it is not in our Thames valley. It will only apply to 'people' near Birmingham.
The Highways Agency is planning to remove the hard shoulder from more than 100 miles of motorway in order to ease congestion. Critics say that removing the hard shoulder would be unsafe. BBC report 6 January 2014
So much for a 'listening government' (see 10 May 2012)
Ministers to consult on 80 mph motorway speed limit - BBC headline 29 September 2011
It is awfully difficult to get one's Chelsea Tractor past all those plebs in the slow lane, yah. I say, my old bus just won't go under 70, you know.
M4 hard shoulder plans criticised by road safety charity - BBC headline 10 May 2012
The government could be set to abandon plans to raise the motorway speed limit in England and Wales to 80 mph - BBC report 17 December 2012
Motorway speed limit may not rise from 70 mph to 80 mph - BBC headline 7 June 2013
So it took them six months to get round to announcing what had been leaked in December
60 mph speed limit proposal for stretch of M1 motorway - BBC headline 6 January 2014
So now the speed limit is going to go down. It is OK, it is not in our Thames valley. It will only apply to 'people' near Birmingham.
The Highways Agency is planning to remove the hard shoulder from more than 100 miles of motorway in order to ease congestion. Critics say that removing the hard shoulder would be unsafe. BBC report 6 January 2014
So much for a 'listening government' (see 10 May 2012)
Tuesday, 7 January 2014
Happy New Year
It is customary for newspapers to indulge us with fascinating quizzes of the year around the Christmas season but since our memories fade with each passing minute - that is if we ever knew who won the All-England Marbles Championship back in June - these do little more than depress us.
Looking back at 2013, however, we can readily identify our stale sandwich of the year (previous winner Eric Pickles), if this is not far too kind a description for a man who is acting in such a perverse way and who has some influence on future generations. His ability to ignore the wisdom of experts; his upside-down thinking - no Michael, it was not 'out of the box' - on academies; his inability to see the lack of logic in almost any proposal he has brought forward; and, if we are to believe what we are told, his inability to manage or control his department who seems bent on ignoring any civilised request for information or clarification ... yes, by several lengths, it is Michael Gove. A Facebook picture summed him up well.
What is so sad is that he seems to believe that education is best achieved by a Gradgrind devotion to facts. Learn the facts, spew them out in the exam and you will do just fine. This is the right answer if you want to maintain a nation of worker bees who will do what you tell them and not challenge your divine right to rule but not terribly sensible if you want to inspire people to make the best of themselves.
His new curriculum expresses a view of history so simplistic that a generation of children will know something of Ancient Egypt - a curiously dead-end civilisation - and almost nothing of the Age of Enlightenment or the Industrial Revolution.
We make no apologies for once again quoting the man who always thought and expressed himself with such great clarity and invite MG to spend some time contemplating Einstein's message in the New Year.
If we are accused of displaying our grumpy side then let us also praise the star of 2013 and here there is no competition. It was those poor beleagured badgers who so cunningly moved the goalposts when our enlightened government were out to destroy them using and misusing the word 'science' as often as they could to give the illusion that the policy was pre-ordained. Lord Krebs, the government's own Science Advisor who did the original work on the possibility of a cull, dismissed the pilot as 'crazy'. A recent commentator called it one of the most disastrous and expensive wildlife culls in history.
This was a year when the government had to put up with the Mail and Telegraph - the Express was carried off to the funny farm too long ago ever to be taken seriously - as well as a resurgent Ukip. None of these have ever let facts get in the way of a 'good [mean-minded, little England] story'.
The same disease afflicted those adolescents who rejoice in the name of special ministerial advisors or Spads, thinking up ever-more dastardly plans to make their ministers look tough/creative/imaginative, thus enhancing their reputations with the backswoodmen.
It was the year in which we were told that the perfectly legal process of tax avoidance - not to be confused with the deeply reprehensible tax evasion - was re-categorised as immoral. We waited in vain for a Minister to put up his hands and say that he had paid 100% of the tax owing on his income, earned and unearned, and that he had not taken out an ISA, paid an enhanced pension contribution, claimed his expenses or a Gift Aid rebate ... especially so that he could make a bigger contribution to the Exchequer.
Much better to slag off the unidentified 'scroungers' - a phrase that also came to be a pejorative adjective for anyone who claims any sort of benefit and certainly not to be compared with any 'hard-working family' (aka someone who votes for us). This was reassuring to the self-satisfied.
It was a year in which it took the unexpected intervention of an otherwise frivolous comedian to bring a degree of reality to the political scene for a fleeting moment. Russell Brand guest-edited the New Statesman and was shortly afterwards interviewed by Jeremy Paxman who proved himself uncharacteristically unable to cope with Brand's novel take on don't vote, it only encourages them. Brand was like Bob Geldof at his best but has faded from our front pages (A mixed blessing in Brand's case).
By the end of the year, the hate-mail attitude reached epidemic proportions with the news that people from Romania and Bulgaria (combined population 27m), who were now allowed into the country like any other citizen of the European Union (population 500m), were going to flood in. Anyone would think that the Huns were at the gate but we let them in a long time ago and have lived to tell the tale.
Goodness knows why the Romanians should have been singled out; no doubt they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. The racist overtones were horrid. The more informed might perhaps have been disguising their concern or confusion at the term Romanian with the title 'Roma': the semi-autonomous community of Central European gypsies who are a far-cry from the familiar British/Irish travellers. But if so, then no one was bold enough to say this.
A result was the delightful sight of Keith Vaz meeting a confused Romanian at the airport on 1 January. Well, you would be confused to be met by a random politician when you arrived at an international airport, would you not. Was he going to use the NHS? What is NHS? he asked. Another cheering insertion of reality.
A charming and random fact: with the admission of Romania and Bulgaria we can at last drive across mainland Europe without leaving the EU. Greece is at last joined to the rest of 'Europe'. It sounds worryingly joined-up.
Back to Keith Vaz. He and Margaret Hodge, respectively chairs of the Home Affairs Select Committee and Public Accounts Committee, have had storming years in the spotlight, grilling all sorts and conditions of random physicians about matters 'of public interest'. If they have occasionally strayed from their briefs or drawn unwarranted conclusions then they have certainly provided good copy, coverage and televisual moments. They are elected our parliamentarians of the year.
As well as quizzes, Christmas is a good time to bury bad news or fly a few kites. Lynton Crosby and the Spads were hard at work over the break.
The usual formula is to whisper in the ear of a journalist something speculative up to and including the confirmation that ministers are thinking terms of ...The journalist rushes off, writes an article and the Spad measures the reaction and coverage to see if the policy is worth working up. This also sends all the right messages to the backwoods that the party is thinking novel thoughts and is only held back by its coalition partner - spit, spit - from carrying out the sort of things that we would like to implement ...
Another journalistic technique is to carry out a 'survey' and then announce the results. This ruse was used with the idea that we might all be charged £10 to attend A&E with the money refunded if the need was genuine. This was wrapped around with more glib and pejorative cocktail party phrases such as the worried well and free at the point of abuse. Nearly one third of GPs agreed with the idea ... read the 'survey'.
Oh please! The idea is so manifestly absurd in an age when we are constantly being exhorted to speak to our doctor about anything that concerns us: that cough that has lasted one week might be ... that chest pain might be the early signs of ... that fever and rash sound suspiciously like ... and you need to get it checked out quickly. Will we all have to pay on entry - further delay before treatment as they take £10 from the man rolled in on an ambulance trolley, with blood pouring from his head wound? Still, collecting the money will pass the time during the four hour wait to be seen.
Though where the figure of £10 came from, goodness knows: less than a check-up at the dentist and barely a round of drinks. If a small administrative charge is generally around £30 then this figure seems strangely low and not much of a deterrent if the vast majority will get their money back.
With A&E under pressure all over the country, probably from the Lansley/Hunt re-organisations as much as the budget cuts. No one seem to have pointed out the obvious connection between the rise of demand on A&E and the difficulty of getting an appointment at a convenient time with your doctor. 750,000 patients a year cannot be seen because these doctors don't exist said a headline.
And talking of NHS re-organisation, we enjoyed the recent report that the Department had said that further efficiency savings were possible in hospitals in response to a report from consultants that no further savings were possible. Of course the Department is in a better place to judge such things.
The end of year flow of bright ideas continued with the floated proposal that the planning system might be amended in two areas. Firstly, making it easier for property owners to divert footpaths. The report that this was being proposed in response to requests from community groups was the least-believable lie of the new year when set against the well-known hate of major land-owners for historic rights of way.
It also reminds one of the titles to Have I Got News For You which thoughtfully show a new railway line - don't even think of asking why we need HS2, how it benefits the whole country or what the real cost will be - being diverted to avoid My Lord's estate.
The second, floated by our enlightened Secretary of State for the Environment, that land-owners could be given permission to destroy ancient woodland in order to enhance development, provided they replaced this with new planting elsewhere: and that elsewhere could be up to an hour's drive away. One hour away - why that would still be on their own estates or do they intend to buy up some wasteland near some plebs' houses so that they can get a warm feeling of having provided social benefit for others. Another absurd sop to the land-owning backwoodsmen.
What one never knows is whether these are serious proposals. If they are not then one can sleep at night. If they are, then effort will have to be put into objecting and campaigning, diverting energy from more productive matters.
One hate-figure, or hate-organisation if there is such a thing - is the BBC who, to quote the head of the Countryside Alliance, thinks we [people in the countryside] are all Neanderthals. He quotes the Countryfile programme as giving a metropolitan view of the countryside. Um ... is one of the presenters not a farmer showing off his own farm? He went on to say that the badger cull had not been a failure, and hankered after a lifting on the ban on hunting so the BBC might have been right. But he did praise the use of migrant labour on farms and so perhaps it seems harsh.
Some of us might argue that the BBC is actually a voice of normality in an increasingly mean-spirited world. Perhaps he really means that the BBC has dared to question things and has not slavishly and uncritically recycled party press releases or maybe he had in mind that title sequence to Have I Got News For You.
Mind you, the BBC has had its management problems this year and some of its management decisions, if that is what they were, seem open to question.
Talking of the BBC brings us back to the teaching of history for it was their Head of Religious Broadcasting who famously said during the year that people should study Religious Knowledge in order to understand the jokes in the film The Life of Brian.
There was an echo of the same idea at the end of the year when Mr Gove said that he was worried that people would interpret the history of World War I through films like Oh What a Lovely War! or Blackadder Goes Forth. It would be very wrong to imagine that the incredible death toll of the war was caused by an out-of-touch leadership.
Where does one start with such a comment? Is it the fear of the strength of mass media? Is it the recognition that the majority of school children will, under his new curriculum, never study World War I in their history lessons unless there is a specially-funded initiative to engage them; or is it simply a fear that parallels will be drawn between WWI generals safely eating smart meals disengaged from the mud and guts of the front line and the current generation of Ministers, insulated in their ivory towers? Perish the thought.
In practice, of course, the BBC is simply the most obvious whipping boy in the fight between the political classes and the media. Ever since the Telegraph, of all papers, broke the news about MPs expenses, the atmosphere has been even more poisonous than usual with each side desperate to be holier-than-thou. No one likes being caught with their trousers down and MPs were: comprehensively. The gloves have been off.
Of the print media the Guardian has borne the brunt of the pressure thanks to their work with Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. One boarding school even banned the Guardian, presumably on the basis of its left-wing views: quite something for the soft old liberal Manchester Guardian but maybe it shows how far right the 'average' view has moved in the country.
Leaks about our lack of civil liberties highlighted by the Guardian and others led even President Obama to wonder whether his country had perhaps gone too far; not just embarrassment at having his dirty washing revealed through leaks but the revelation that the USA had been monitoring the mobile phone calls of foreign leaders.
And another piece of breaking news is that a quango that has never been heard of is attempting to recruit new school governors: a voluntary activity which used to be fulfilled by the public-spirited person. We wonder why there is such a shortage when people care so much about children's education. Could it be something to do with the constant criticism from people like Ofsted and the Secretary of State for Education? Who would honestly want to give up their time to carry out such a responsible job when there was pretty much zero support from the centre? Pass the sherry and turn on the box, dear. Let's watch the golf.
But we cannot go on about the excellent Mr Gove and so let us introduce the new fall guy: our learned and apparently climate-sceptic Secretary of State for the Environment who openly states that his task is as much about enhancing the economic benefit of the environment as protecting it. Step forward the man who thinks we should cut down ancient woodland with all its well-developed eco-systems: Owen Paterson.
As we write he has been at the front of the news, trying to square the impossible circle of why the country is being inundated by storms of horrendous magnitude and large swathes of the country are without power, underwater or both. His task has been very simple: simultaneously to demonstrate that the government is in complete control and that all failings are the fault of everyone except the government.
The lack of power is due to the incompetence of the privatised energy suppliers - threats of a public haranguing by Parliamentary Enquiry is being held over them - who naturally do what suits them as they do not have a contract with the government. Maggie's revenge. The flooding is nothing to do with the cuts being imposed on the Environment Agency by the government as those cuts apparently only apply to behind-the-scenes activities. And the weather is nothing to do with a change in climate caused by our love of fossil fuels as climate change is not happening. But the government is on top of the situation and its policies are working.
Newspaper quizzes are followed by predictions for the year: the up-and-coming actors, presenters, models chefs, musicians and the like. Like many other celebrities, many of these will be despatched to the jungle of oblivion. So let's look ahead and make our predictions.
What is so sad is that he seems to believe that education is best achieved by a Gradgrind devotion to facts. Learn the facts, spew them out in the exam and you will do just fine. This is the right answer if you want to maintain a nation of worker bees who will do what you tell them and not challenge your divine right to rule but not terribly sensible if you want to inspire people to make the best of themselves.
His new curriculum expresses a view of history so simplistic that a generation of children will know something of Ancient Egypt - a curiously dead-end civilisation - and almost nothing of the Age of Enlightenment or the Industrial Revolution.We make no apologies for once again quoting the man who always thought and expressed himself with such great clarity and invite MG to spend some time contemplating Einstein's message in the New Year.
If we are accused of displaying our grumpy side then let us also praise the star of 2013 and here there is no competition. It was those poor beleagured badgers who so cunningly moved the goalposts when our enlightened government were out to destroy them using and misusing the word 'science' as often as they could to give the illusion that the policy was pre-ordained. Lord Krebs, the government's own Science Advisor who did the original work on the possibility of a cull, dismissed the pilot as 'crazy'. A recent commentator called it one of the most disastrous and expensive wildlife culls in history.
This was a year when the government had to put up with the Mail and Telegraph - the Express was carried off to the funny farm too long ago ever to be taken seriously - as well as a resurgent Ukip. None of these have ever let facts get in the way of a 'good [mean-minded, little England] story'.
The same disease afflicted those adolescents who rejoice in the name of special ministerial advisors or Spads, thinking up ever-more dastardly plans to make their ministers look tough/creative/imaginative, thus enhancing their reputations with the backswoodmen.
It was the year in which we were told that the perfectly legal process of tax avoidance - not to be confused with the deeply reprehensible tax evasion - was re-categorised as immoral. We waited in vain for a Minister to put up his hands and say that he had paid 100% of the tax owing on his income, earned and unearned, and that he had not taken out an ISA, paid an enhanced pension contribution, claimed his expenses or a Gift Aid rebate ... especially so that he could make a bigger contribution to the Exchequer.
Much better to slag off the unidentified 'scroungers' - a phrase that also came to be a pejorative adjective for anyone who claims any sort of benefit and certainly not to be compared with any 'hard-working family' (aka someone who votes for us). This was reassuring to the self-satisfied.
It was a year in which it took the unexpected intervention of an otherwise frivolous comedian to bring a degree of reality to the political scene for a fleeting moment. Russell Brand guest-edited the New Statesman and was shortly afterwards interviewed by Jeremy Paxman who proved himself uncharacteristically unable to cope with Brand's novel take on don't vote, it only encourages them. Brand was like Bob Geldof at his best but has faded from our front pages (A mixed blessing in Brand's case).
By the end of the year, the hate-mail attitude reached epidemic proportions with the news that people from Romania and Bulgaria (combined population 27m), who were now allowed into the country like any other citizen of the European Union (population 500m), were going to flood in. Anyone would think that the Huns were at the gate but we let them in a long time ago and have lived to tell the tale.
Goodness knows why the Romanians should have been singled out; no doubt they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. The racist overtones were horrid. The more informed might perhaps have been disguising their concern or confusion at the term Romanian with the title 'Roma': the semi-autonomous community of Central European gypsies who are a far-cry from the familiar British/Irish travellers. But if so, then no one was bold enough to say this.
A result was the delightful sight of Keith Vaz meeting a confused Romanian at the airport on 1 January. Well, you would be confused to be met by a random politician when you arrived at an international airport, would you not. Was he going to use the NHS? What is NHS? he asked. Another cheering insertion of reality.
A charming and random fact: with the admission of Romania and Bulgaria we can at last drive across mainland Europe without leaving the EU. Greece is at last joined to the rest of 'Europe'. It sounds worryingly joined-up.
Back to Keith Vaz. He and Margaret Hodge, respectively chairs of the Home Affairs Select Committee and Public Accounts Committee, have had storming years in the spotlight, grilling all sorts and conditions of random physicians about matters 'of public interest'. If they have occasionally strayed from their briefs or drawn unwarranted conclusions then they have certainly provided good copy, coverage and televisual moments. They are elected our parliamentarians of the year.
As well as quizzes, Christmas is a good time to bury bad news or fly a few kites. Lynton Crosby and the Spads were hard at work over the break.
The usual formula is to whisper in the ear of a journalist something speculative up to and including the confirmation that ministers are thinking terms of ...The journalist rushes off, writes an article and the Spad measures the reaction and coverage to see if the policy is worth working up. This also sends all the right messages to the backwoods that the party is thinking novel thoughts and is only held back by its coalition partner - spit, spit - from carrying out the sort of things that we would like to implement ...
Another journalistic technique is to carry out a 'survey' and then announce the results. This ruse was used with the idea that we might all be charged £10 to attend A&E with the money refunded if the need was genuine. This was wrapped around with more glib and pejorative cocktail party phrases such as the worried well and free at the point of abuse. Nearly one third of GPs agreed with the idea ... read the 'survey'.
Oh please! The idea is so manifestly absurd in an age when we are constantly being exhorted to speak to our doctor about anything that concerns us: that cough that has lasted one week might be ... that chest pain might be the early signs of ... that fever and rash sound suspiciously like ... and you need to get it checked out quickly. Will we all have to pay on entry - further delay before treatment as they take £10 from the man rolled in on an ambulance trolley, with blood pouring from his head wound? Still, collecting the money will pass the time during the four hour wait to be seen.
Though where the figure of £10 came from, goodness knows: less than a check-up at the dentist and barely a round of drinks. If a small administrative charge is generally around £30 then this figure seems strangely low and not much of a deterrent if the vast majority will get their money back.
With A&E under pressure all over the country, probably from the Lansley/Hunt re-organisations as much as the budget cuts. No one seem to have pointed out the obvious connection between the rise of demand on A&E and the difficulty of getting an appointment at a convenient time with your doctor. 750,000 patients a year cannot be seen because these doctors don't exist said a headline.
And talking of NHS re-organisation, we enjoyed the recent report that the Department had said that further efficiency savings were possible in hospitals in response to a report from consultants that no further savings were possible. Of course the Department is in a better place to judge such things.
The end of year flow of bright ideas continued with the floated proposal that the planning system might be amended in two areas. Firstly, making it easier for property owners to divert footpaths. The report that this was being proposed in response to requests from community groups was the least-believable lie of the new year when set against the well-known hate of major land-owners for historic rights of way.
It also reminds one of the titles to Have I Got News For You which thoughtfully show a new railway line - don't even think of asking why we need HS2, how it benefits the whole country or what the real cost will be - being diverted to avoid My Lord's estate.
The second, floated by our enlightened Secretary of State for the Environment, that land-owners could be given permission to destroy ancient woodland in order to enhance development, provided they replaced this with new planting elsewhere: and that elsewhere could be up to an hour's drive away. One hour away - why that would still be on their own estates or do they intend to buy up some wasteland near some plebs' houses so that they can get a warm feeling of having provided social benefit for others. Another absurd sop to the land-owning backwoodsmen.
What one never knows is whether these are serious proposals. If they are not then one can sleep at night. If they are, then effort will have to be put into objecting and campaigning, diverting energy from more productive matters.
One hate-figure, or hate-organisation if there is such a thing - is the BBC who, to quote the head of the Countryside Alliance, thinks we [people in the countryside] are all Neanderthals. He quotes the Countryfile programme as giving a metropolitan view of the countryside. Um ... is one of the presenters not a farmer showing off his own farm? He went on to say that the badger cull had not been a failure, and hankered after a lifting on the ban on hunting so the BBC might have been right. But he did praise the use of migrant labour on farms and so perhaps it seems harsh.
Some of us might argue that the BBC is actually a voice of normality in an increasingly mean-spirited world. Perhaps he really means that the BBC has dared to question things and has not slavishly and uncritically recycled party press releases or maybe he had in mind that title sequence to Have I Got News For You.
Mind you, the BBC has had its management problems this year and some of its management decisions, if that is what they were, seem open to question.
Talking of the BBC brings us back to the teaching of history for it was their Head of Religious Broadcasting who famously said during the year that people should study Religious Knowledge in order to understand the jokes in the film The Life of Brian.
There was an echo of the same idea at the end of the year when Mr Gove said that he was worried that people would interpret the history of World War I through films like Oh What a Lovely War! or Blackadder Goes Forth. It would be very wrong to imagine that the incredible death toll of the war was caused by an out-of-touch leadership.
Where does one start with such a comment? Is it the fear of the strength of mass media? Is it the recognition that the majority of school children will, under his new curriculum, never study World War I in their history lessons unless there is a specially-funded initiative to engage them; or is it simply a fear that parallels will be drawn between WWI generals safely eating smart meals disengaged from the mud and guts of the front line and the current generation of Ministers, insulated in their ivory towers? Perish the thought.
In practice, of course, the BBC is simply the most obvious whipping boy in the fight between the political classes and the media. Ever since the Telegraph, of all papers, broke the news about MPs expenses, the atmosphere has been even more poisonous than usual with each side desperate to be holier-than-thou. No one likes being caught with their trousers down and MPs were: comprehensively. The gloves have been off.
Of the print media the Guardian has borne the brunt of the pressure thanks to their work with Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. One boarding school even banned the Guardian, presumably on the basis of its left-wing views: quite something for the soft old liberal Manchester Guardian but maybe it shows how far right the 'average' view has moved in the country.
Leaks about our lack of civil liberties highlighted by the Guardian and others led even President Obama to wonder whether his country had perhaps gone too far; not just embarrassment at having his dirty washing revealed through leaks but the revelation that the USA had been monitoring the mobile phone calls of foreign leaders.
And another piece of breaking news is that a quango that has never been heard of is attempting to recruit new school governors: a voluntary activity which used to be fulfilled by the public-spirited person. We wonder why there is such a shortage when people care so much about children's education. Could it be something to do with the constant criticism from people like Ofsted and the Secretary of State for Education? Who would honestly want to give up their time to carry out such a responsible job when there was pretty much zero support from the centre? Pass the sherry and turn on the box, dear. Let's watch the golf.
But we cannot go on about the excellent Mr Gove and so let us introduce the new fall guy: our learned and apparently climate-sceptic Secretary of State for the Environment who openly states that his task is as much about enhancing the economic benefit of the environment as protecting it. Step forward the man who thinks we should cut down ancient woodland with all its well-developed eco-systems: Owen Paterson.
As we write he has been at the front of the news, trying to square the impossible circle of why the country is being inundated by storms of horrendous magnitude and large swathes of the country are without power, underwater or both. His task has been very simple: simultaneously to demonstrate that the government is in complete control and that all failings are the fault of everyone except the government.
The lack of power is due to the incompetence of the privatised energy suppliers - threats of a public haranguing by Parliamentary Enquiry is being held over them - who naturally do what suits them as they do not have a contract with the government. Maggie's revenge. The flooding is nothing to do with the cuts being imposed on the Environment Agency by the government as those cuts apparently only apply to behind-the-scenes activities. And the weather is nothing to do with a change in climate caused by our love of fossil fuels as climate change is not happening. But the government is on top of the situation and its policies are working.
Newspaper quizzes are followed by predictions for the year: the up-and-coming actors, presenters, models chefs, musicians and the like. Like many other celebrities, many of these will be despatched to the jungle of oblivion. So let's look ahead and make our predictions.
- There is the easy one: in the run up to the election the coalition will be come increasingly strained
- Government ministers will continue to undermine and denigrate reactionary forces objecting to their ill-thought through proposals: so that is the teachers, health workers, firemen, in fact any public sector worker and now even lawyers ...
- Foreigners - re-titled migrants - will increasingly be despised and the calls for a referendum on EU membership will continue to grow
- Scroungers, benefit claimants and migrants will continue to be the cause of most of our ills
- The global financial meltdown will continue to have been caused single-handedly by Gordon Brown and the Labour Party
- Scotland will hold its referendum on independence and, on present showing, the Scottish people will willingly shrug off government by Westminster through ineptitude of the 'No' campaign and frankly, what would your heart say if you were in Scotland? Historical note: Scotland is only happy when it is running the UK unless those Scots - cf 1997 onwards - go native and pretend to be Brits
- There will be a continued flow of ideas worthy of 12 year olds flowing out of Westminster as Spads climb over each other to out-Ukip Ukip
- No one will whisper Big Society or the Greenest Government Ever, or We are all in it together
- There will be an increasing and surreal gap between the rulers and the ruled
- The sense of two nations - the haves and the rest - inhabiting one country will increase. Ah, Madiba, how we need a man with your ability to unite people under a common cause
Have a good year.
Wednesday, 18 December 2013
Helping those that help themselves
Should we help those that help themselves or rescue those who are struggling? You can make an argument for either course, no doubt depending on the situation, but let us consider two cases.
A funding body, let us call it Lottery, only likes to pay for a proportion of a project: let us say 50%. They also have a rule that 'work done so far cannot be counted as match-funding in your bid'. This is understandable otherwise all those in possession of a picture by Leonardo da Vinci would never have to provide any match funding since the 'value' of the work done so far would be so transcendent.
What are the consequences of this rule?
An enthusiast finds a box of pictures in his attic and settles down to catalogue these, working many hours as a volunteer. At the end of the project, it appears that the collection is unique and there would be benefit in the collection and the catalogue being more widely available. He approaches Lottery for financial support to get them on line. But Lottery's rules kick in and it asks for match-funding which our enthusiast cannot afford. All his meticulous cataloguing work does not count. The project cannot go ahead.
In the attic next door is a canny individual who discovers another box of pictures. He opens the box, casts an eye over them, judges them to be worthy of publication and applies, immediately, to Lottery for financial support both to catalogue the pictures and to put them on line. 'Fine in principle', says Lottery, 'where is the match-funding?' 'Oh', says Canny, 'I shall catalogue them myself and that is the match funding.' 'OK' says Lottery, 'we will pay for them to be put on line.' The project goes ahead.
Which, as the prophet might ask, is the better case? Should Lottery be supporting those who have already shown effort and contributed volunteer effort, or should it be encouraging a dependency culture where no one does anything without putting in a bid?
It is galling for those of us who have shown effort and contributed voluntary time to be seeing neighbours who haven't, being fully funded for similar work. Talk about rewarding historic failure. They may need help but it does not do much for our morale or encourage us to put in more voluntary effort.
A funding body, let us call it Lottery, only likes to pay for a proportion of a project: let us say 50%. They also have a rule that 'work done so far cannot be counted as match-funding in your bid'. This is understandable otherwise all those in possession of a picture by Leonardo da Vinci would never have to provide any match funding since the 'value' of the work done so far would be so transcendent.
What are the consequences of this rule?
An enthusiast finds a box of pictures in his attic and settles down to catalogue these, working many hours as a volunteer. At the end of the project, it appears that the collection is unique and there would be benefit in the collection and the catalogue being more widely available. He approaches Lottery for financial support to get them on line. But Lottery's rules kick in and it asks for match-funding which our enthusiast cannot afford. All his meticulous cataloguing work does not count. The project cannot go ahead.
In the attic next door is a canny individual who discovers another box of pictures. He opens the box, casts an eye over them, judges them to be worthy of publication and applies, immediately, to Lottery for financial support both to catalogue the pictures and to put them on line. 'Fine in principle', says Lottery, 'where is the match-funding?' 'Oh', says Canny, 'I shall catalogue them myself and that is the match funding.' 'OK' says Lottery, 'we will pay for them to be put on line.' The project goes ahead.
Which, as the prophet might ask, is the better case? Should Lottery be supporting those who have already shown effort and contributed volunteer effort, or should it be encouraging a dependency culture where no one does anything without putting in a bid?
It is galling for those of us who have shown effort and contributed voluntary time to be seeing neighbours who haven't, being fully funded for similar work. Talk about rewarding historic failure. They may need help but it does not do much for our morale or encourage us to put in more voluntary effort.
Monday, 16 December 2013
Christmas spirit
We do, occasionally, enjoy the wry. A recent email gave us much joy. It related to a 'Living Nativity' which was planned for our town. Contrary to expectations, this was not to be the sight of an under-age unmarried mother giving birth in a stable, but was a procession through the town with various 'stations' much like the stations of the cross.
'Can you help us?' started the email, 'the rabbits that were to appear in the Living Nativity are unwell and we need to replace them. Can anyone help?'
Now forgive me, it is is some time since we read the four gospels and our knowledge of the Christmas story is largely based on the words of various carols which we know are not original material, but we cannot, just at the moment, recall that rabbits featured in any significant way in the Bible story. That is not to say that there were no rabbits there, after all the Romans introduced rabbits to Britain and there is no reason to believe that rabbits were not domesticated and living in Palestine in the year 0 AD.
This email was followed a day or two later by another one with the programme. The sixth stage of the journey was to involve the 3 Wise Women and their horses ...
Well, in a modern world of equality, why should they not be Wise Women, despite the images of the stoning in the Life of Brian that come flooding to the mind.
Challenged after the event, the organiser admitted that the camels had actually been Alpacas. Well, at least he had got a camelid but not even our flexible approach to history could quite encompass the idea of a South American mammal having attended the Nativity.
We can't wait to hear the reaction to our Earnest Cleric's question at the next Sunday School: 'Now Johnny, who appeared at the Nativity?'
'Of course there is a lobster. Dnh!' You know the film.
'Can you help us?' started the email, 'the rabbits that were to appear in the Living Nativity are unwell and we need to replace them. Can anyone help?'
Now forgive me, it is is some time since we read the four gospels and our knowledge of the Christmas story is largely based on the words of various carols which we know are not original material, but we cannot, just at the moment, recall that rabbits featured in any significant way in the Bible story. That is not to say that there were no rabbits there, after all the Romans introduced rabbits to Britain and there is no reason to believe that rabbits were not domesticated and living in Palestine in the year 0 AD.
This email was followed a day or two later by another one with the programme. The sixth stage of the journey was to involve the 3 Wise Women and their horses ...
Well, in a modern world of equality, why should they not be Wise Women, despite the images of the stoning in the Life of Brian that come flooding to the mind.
Challenged after the event, the organiser admitted that the camels had actually been Alpacas. Well, at least he had got a camelid but not even our flexible approach to history could quite encompass the idea of a South American mammal having attended the Nativity.
We can't wait to hear the reaction to our Earnest Cleric's question at the next Sunday School: 'Now Johnny, who appeared at the Nativity?'
'Of course there is a lobster. Dnh!' You know the film.
Saturday, 30 November 2013
Dealing with a customer
Dealing with a customer complaint is an art.
We have the great joy of running a car park. One day, when we have the time and energy, we will gather together some of the excuses that folks use to justify why they should not pay a parking fine and publish them here. Many produce the most wonderfully convoluted arguments which double back on themselves to avoid the simple admission 'OK, guv. It's a fair cop.'
The wind turns tickets face down or blows up through the air conditioning units to blow them into the foot well. Then here are the sob stories: 'I had two children and a pushchair and I had just got back from shopping and one of the children was screaming and ...'
Then there are the urban myths 'Your clock was wrong' or 'I only overstayed by two minutes and ...' not knowing there are actually fifteen minutes' grace. Or the malicious one 'The wardens are known to open car doors which have been left unlocked and ...'
But I digress. Here is one of our own about which we are still puzzling. It was from an investment house we will call simply Nice Unit Trust. To precis it, the story runs:
December 2012 - Us: Please close our account. Nice Unit Trust: Will do
March 2013 - NUT sent through the usual vast wodge of papers showing that we still had about £40. Us: Please close this account. NUT: Will do, here is a cheque for the balance
June - NUT sent through the usual vast wodge of papers showing that we now had £0.17 in our account
August - NUT: Here is a fascinating magazine all about how we invest your money. Us: It is awfully difficult to close an account with you, isn't it. Please close this account. Don't bother to send us the £0.17, simply give it to charity. NUT: Thank you for your instructions, here is a piece of paper confirming that we have closed the account
November - this is where it gets surreal - NUT: Thank you for your complaint (?). Please accept apologies for the delay in replying. we will 'investigate' your complaint. As your complaint was received 8 weeks ago mutter, mutter Ombudsman ... enclosed were a leaflet and a Complaint Handling Policy
NUT (in a letter dated two days later): Apologies ... appreciate your patience ... list of the dates on which things happened ... accept apologies for any inconvenience ... and here is a cheque for £25 'in recognition of the fact that we failed to investigate and respond to the complaint within an acceptable time period'
Collapse of stout parties. So we now have a cheque for £25 for a complaint that we did not make. Nice Unit Trust have spent far too much money chopping down trees and on postage and now they compound the problem by spending another £25. Know any good charities anyone?
Now back to my car park letters: 'And precisely why did you leave your Doberman in your car with your parking ticket in its jaws ...?'
We have the great joy of running a car park. One day, when we have the time and energy, we will gather together some of the excuses that folks use to justify why they should not pay a parking fine and publish them here. Many produce the most wonderfully convoluted arguments which double back on themselves to avoid the simple admission 'OK, guv. It's a fair cop.'
The wind turns tickets face down or blows up through the air conditioning units to blow them into the foot well. Then here are the sob stories: 'I had two children and a pushchair and I had just got back from shopping and one of the children was screaming and ...'
Then there are the urban myths 'Your clock was wrong' or 'I only overstayed by two minutes and ...' not knowing there are actually fifteen minutes' grace. Or the malicious one 'The wardens are known to open car doors which have been left unlocked and ...'
But I digress. Here is one of our own about which we are still puzzling. It was from an investment house we will call simply Nice Unit Trust. To precis it, the story runs:
December 2012 - Us: Please close our account. Nice Unit Trust: Will do
March 2013 - NUT sent through the usual vast wodge of papers showing that we still had about £40. Us: Please close this account. NUT: Will do, here is a cheque for the balance
June - NUT sent through the usual vast wodge of papers showing that we now had £0.17 in our account
August - NUT: Here is a fascinating magazine all about how we invest your money. Us: It is awfully difficult to close an account with you, isn't it. Please close this account. Don't bother to send us the £0.17, simply give it to charity. NUT: Thank you for your instructions, here is a piece of paper confirming that we have closed the account
November - this is where it gets surreal - NUT: Thank you for your complaint (?). Please accept apologies for the delay in replying. we will 'investigate' your complaint. As your complaint was received 8 weeks ago mutter, mutter Ombudsman ... enclosed were a leaflet and a Complaint Handling Policy
NUT (in a letter dated two days later): Apologies ... appreciate your patience ... list of the dates on which things happened ... accept apologies for any inconvenience ... and here is a cheque for £25 'in recognition of the fact that we failed to investigate and respond to the complaint within an acceptable time period'
Collapse of stout parties. So we now have a cheque for £25 for a complaint that we did not make. Nice Unit Trust have spent far too much money chopping down trees and on postage and now they compound the problem by spending another £25. Know any good charities anyone?
Now back to my car park letters: 'And precisely why did you leave your Doberman in your car with your parking ticket in its jaws ...?'
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