The Broken Promise

As 2011 closes I can reflect on the promise that was broken that has dominated the year. Our Pension. Make no mistake when we started in Public Service as I did over 30 years ago there was always the issue of why you would knowingly earn less than you could equivacantly achieve in the private sector, have little in the way of perks, gym membership, shares in the company, private dental care or staff discount but you knew that by religiously paying superannuation you may retire with at least some semblance of dignity by the time you’ve paid off the mortgage and seen your kids through college. When in the early 1990′s NHS Trust’s allowed private finance advisors to come into workplaces to talk to staff and persuade them to opt out of the NHS pension scheme and go “private” most every member of staff managed to hang on to what they had got with the advisors conceding that they were actually in a good scheme. Most of the past ten years has seen claims for “mis-selling” based on those days but we got through that period intact with the unwritten promise that if we hung on to what was created in 1948 it would compensate for the years of flat pay rises whilst private sector friends and family flourished. We then saw the changes come thick and fast, the staff starting after 2008 having to work till 65 and staff retiring on health grounds unable to access full payment unless they were unable to do any job not just unable to undertake their own job. People were living longer and all of this was necessary so reluctantly it was accepted, there was a financial crisis so two years of pay freeze was reluctantly accepted, we need to plug the gap so as citizens we saw VAT rise on all our goods to 20% and it was reluctantly accepted.
Then the promise was broken.

Sign The e-petition Exempt Front Line Ambulance Staff From Working Longer

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/24722
I’ve created an e-petition
Responsible department: Department of Health

John Hutton’s report in March 2011 exempted “uniformed services” from the working longer section of his report on Public Sector Pensions. Upon further clarification during the negotiations that the uniforms in question belonged to the Army, Police and Fire Service and that the Ambulance Services were not included. Subsequently there is a real concern that if ALL frontline 999 Ambulance Staff (Paramedics, Technicians and any assistant role) will be expected to undertake the full range of duties then the number of ill health retirement applications will increase and the vulnerability to assaults by members of the public is likely to increase and the cases of stress related illnesses such as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is also likely to increase and the associated costs will need to be funded from public monies. As a representative of Ambulance Staff I call on the Government to look to exempt front line Ambulance Staff from working longer and maintain their ability to retire at aged 60.

Please sign

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/24722

Counting Down To Kate Bush’s 2nd 2011 Album

50 Words For Snow by Kate Bush 65 minutes on 2 LP’s on Fish People label.
I’ve ordered it and counting the days till 21st November.
Cannot believe it was 32 years ago on November 18th that I saw her in the Royal Albert Hall in concert.
Started the listening exercise with the title track….heaven…Steve Gadd’s hypnotic rhythm (this is the innovative 50 ways to Leave Your Lover and Steely Dan’s Aja virtuoso) and Steven Fry running down the mythological 50 words when Kate declares “Come On Joe you got 32 to go”.

It’s Called Hypermiling

Driving effeciently and maximising m.p.g. is called “hypermiling”.
Been doing it since the late 1970′s when a few of us bought reducers for the SU carbs in our Morris Minors and fitted them for the long journey to the Lake District (yes frequently drove a Morris ex GPO Minor van overnight to Cumbria) and fitted them with vacuum guages. Now I’ve got a state of the art eco-car all my thoughts back then (if only I could have a big car with 70 odd to the gallon) have materialised.

84 MPG and rising

So a couple of weeks after the electric car manages 137m.p.h. my new diesel family car pulls off an amazing 84m.p.g.
In actual conditions it was 85m.p.h. but by the time I slowed down to get the camera phone to take the picture I had “lost” one mile per gallon off the amazing readout.

Bluebird Tried To Fly

Pendine Sands a couple of Sundays ago and the long beach saw a failure of the new Bluebird to reach 150 m.p.h. and break the land speed record for an ELEC TRIC vehicle. Yes like a milk float used to be. On this occasion there was an incident at around 125 m.p.h. so back to the drawing board. However this vehicle achieved 137 m.p.h. last year. I managed to get a great photo of the body though when no-one was watching.

Surreal in Scotland

Field in Fife

We took up the kind invitation of our great friends Alan and Kate Laing who run the fantastically different log cabin style B&B in the Kingdom of Fife (see the links under “Fantastically Different Scottish B&B) and travelled for a few days of unplanned unwinding.
Within a few minutes (about 3) of my arrival following the nine hour journey I was hurdled into an estate car and driven with the rest of the band about 50 miles to a posh golf club on the edge of Edinburgh where Scotlands finest TV stars past and present and media celeb types were celebrating the launch of a new show and wedding anniversary in a sort of combined charity event. The band in question are “The Soul Kings” the leading party entertainment group with the big afro wigs, the white suits and the coolest soul tunes who set every dancefloor alight.
www.thesoulkings.com
Well I was introduced as “he’s with the band” and made myself useful catering to the bands every need (ensuring they had fresh iced water available) and carrying the massive wigs to the dressing room out of the sight of the partygoers.
The following night we repeated the whole thing except drove about 75 miles to the gig arriving at the biggest Marquee (since McCartney married Heather Mills in Ireland) I have ever seen laid out in lavish curtainage with a dancefloor, stage and bar which would shame most 5 star hotels all set up in a suburban garden on the edge of the village. For the guests entertainment and comfort there was a cast of hundreds including 3 people just to operate the lights, 2 for the P.A. system about 50 assorted waiters and waitresses and a whole raft of “organisers” with ear pieces and clip boards who were checking the schedule minute by minute to ensure every moment could be stage managed perfectly for the happy couple.
One detail that tickled me was that the speeches took place before the wedding meal as this has become the latest thing and ensures that the best man cannot get “bluttered” (a Scottish vernacular phrase encompassing inebriation). Well let’s just say it all went without a hitch and my “with the band” persona meant that I was looked after and even given a plate of Scottish beef as the rest of the wedding guests were eating except mine was eaten backstage. After the band succeeded within seconds to fill the dancefloor there was an hour and a half of Soul Kings song and banter and we left the venue to the biggest firework display this side of the Olympics for the happy couple….surreal.
As the days passed me and Alan got the ukuleles out (not a euphemism) and on one occasion when accused by the wives of messing about too much justified the time by calling it “a rehearsal”. The contrast between the £100,000 wedding and the final performance of the rehearsed item in the field with basic percussion and a ukulele was the most surreal experience of all. Listen out for the skill in incorporating a hotel bell into ELO’s epic classic.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvwX2ZDYb_A

Bloggers Night Out

I was invited this week to the Cardiff Bloggers Summer Social in the new Maldren hotel near Cardiff Central Railway Station. I had driven from Brighton to be there but didn’t put my hand up when they asked who’d travelled the furthest as I was en route to home anyway.
Well it was a pretty loose and informal affair and I didn’t realise that there was free Pimms as I drunk my cappuccino which is probably why there was a giggly atmosphere amongst most of the assembled bloggers, tweeters, face bookers, social networking consultants, P.R. advisors, media
consultants and people who blog about blogging.
However on my table which I think is where the older blogger
gravitated towards was a psychologist who has designed apps
for lowering your blood pressure and stress, an informatics
expert who uses statistics about the local community to help
causes, a local council press officer who has transformed
social networking amongst the employees, a woman who blogs
about keeping chickens, a man who helps break urban myths
about the Internet,myself and a couple of others with sports
or music blogs. I couldn’t believe how connected we all
were, 3 of us were active in UNISON,(including me), 2 of us
kept chickens (including me)apart from all the Internet
stuff. I realised on that night that I actually maintain
four blogs (Joe Blogs, Classic Album Sundays, UNISON wast
ambulance and the Friends Of Saron). When this came to the
attention of the organisers they enrolled me to become a
“surgeon” at one of their upcoming bloggers surgeries. I’m
not sure that I am qualified but I have agreed to help
charities with the non technical blog stuff like appearance and content.

White Ribbon Campaign Ambassador

I am delighted that as an Ambassador for the White Ribbon Campaign which campaigns for men to sign a pledge not committing or condoning domestic violence I have been chosen as an “example” for their website. Please see link below for further details.

http://www.whiteribboncampaign.co.uk/node/275

I’ve Adopted A Peer

In a couple of minutes this week I registered my e-mail address with the website below and they assigned me an actual peer of the realm to adopt. You don’t actually get to choose your peer but you get assigned one and that randomness and lottery is part of the appeal.
Peers don’t have constituencies like M.P’s mostly because the don’t actually get elected so don’t need one. This means they don’t have to bother with all that tiresome accountability and reporting back to ordinary people which is why we should generously adopt one.
I’m going to use my brand new 50 year old Sheaffer fountain pen to write mine two letters, one about concerns regarding the Govt. NHS White Paper and the other one to let her know some truths and bust some myths about NHS Pensions. I,m sure she’ll write back as she looks nice in the photograph they’ve sent me of her even though I realise it was taken about 40 years ago.

http://www.goingtowork.org.uk/peers/