Bureaucracy is when the accumulation of the paper trail becomes more important than the outcome for the underlying consumer or client.


I have a client. He's been tried to sell some stock. He's not a big punter... £200 in shares which came as a bonus from his employer. He once queried whether they had been sent, and as a result the Registrars cancelled the share certificate, which he subsequently found. Not knowing any better, he disregarded the indemnity letter. Years later he came to sell the stock. He rang me, I checked with the Registrar - he did indeed own the shares, so I sold them. He sent us the share certificate - and we paid him out.

A couple of days after settlement the registrars told us the sale could not be honoured because of the indemnity applied for. So we need a new indemnity - could the registrars send him one? Yes: They sent one - but to an address they knew to be out of date. The client (who doesn't understand the inner workings of the stockmarket) called them to be told the address can only be changed in writing. Predictably the required form nessesary never arrived at his current address - it transpires that the change of address form was sent to the old address - to join the indemnity form and, no doubt years of dividend cheques.

So - the fucking west-country yokels at computer-fucking-share are happy to send my client's cheques, indemnity forms and other vital paperwork to an address they know to be incorrect - all because they don't have a fucking signature. He has called and identified himself, as have I, and the company I work for. "data protection" is the standard excuse, as it is for every petty fucking bureaucrat who is demanding a papertrail. And they keep sending stuff to the wrong address!

This helps no-one. I can't do my job of picking stocks because I'm spending time fucking about chasing signatures. Clients feel put upon by the constant demand for signatures and, frankly, I get sick of asking. Clients are confused about why things don't work.

Basically it all boils down to the fact that no-one trusts anyone anymore. There are crooks and Shysters in every profession - this paper trail makes it easier, not harder to defraud people. No matter how much someone stinks, I can open an account if they have a passport, driving licence and Utility bill. But I can't open an account for an old lady in sheltered accomodation, who's got loads of shares saved over her long and thrifty life, that she needs to sell to pay for her treatment. No utility bill, you see.

That's fucking bureaucracy. It is when common sence goes out the window in the search for a paper trail, with every bastard thing signed in triplicate. Leave professionals - stockbrokers, solicitors, doctors, hell - plumbers too, to get on with knowing the intricacies of their chosen calling. We don't need regulation that says how many signatures we need to give people what they already own. The only regulation you need - caveat emptor.

The world has a schitzophrenic attitude to the U.S.A. Its popular culture - Friends, Desperate Housewives and Eminem are devoured the world over by people in thrall to the glamour, even in France. Meanwhile over half of French people believe America to be "the greatest threat to world peace". This is the reality of Power - you can influence attitudes more profoundly than any other nation, but you'll be hated for it. There is a Legacy of Anti-British feeling in a lot of the world (as well as some genuine goodwill) as a result of our Imperial project.

• A reign of terror leading to mass murder and famine across the whole country.
• The Rise of a Military dictator who plunged the world into a war lasting on and off 13 years.
• Bending over for the Germans 3 times is 70 years.
• Despite the fact the French were defending their own territory - they were the ones to mutiny in 1917
  
• Leaving the British Empire to do the work.
  
• Despite this and against American and British advice they pushed harsh reparations onto Germany at versailles, leading directly to the rise of Hitler.
• They Manged to lose WWII twice.
• Then Refused to give up their empire graciously leaving a mess for others to try to clean up
  
• They then refused to support the most effective military alliance in History
• They are Responsible for the CAP and the worst aspects of the EU.
• They were complicit in the Horror of Rwanda
• And were Saddam Hussein's largest western trading partner.

So I suppose I'd better link it. (Yes, even curmudgeonly political anoracks with foul mouths and worse tempers can get a Girlfriend). If anyone's nasty to her, I'll pull their arms out of their sockets and beat them to death with the soggy end.

By Order of The* Very British Dude

The following crimes will be punishable by Extended and Imaginative Torture followed by public** Hanging, Drawing and Quartering.

1. Use of the words "chairperson" or "spokesperson". It's "Spokesman" and "Chairman" whether or not the person is a Woman. "Madam Chairman" is the correct usage. With this policy in place the Ironic use of "spokesbeing" should become redundant, but will be permissable for the time being. Henry Higgins to become "minister for grammar and Correct usage"
   
2. The Following motoring offenses:
   
1. Blocking of Yellow box junctions
2. Undertaking
3. Hogging the outside lane
4. Ownership of a Porshe Cayane or BMW (any model)
   
3. Use of the word "Dialectic" in political discourse
4. Arguing with the referee in premiership football matches.
5. The Drinking of budweiser "beer" (How in fuck's name did Anheuser Busch get to be the world's largest brewer with such a grossly inadequate product?)
6. Readership of the "Daily Mail" or "Daily Mirror"
7. Having been, at any point a Labour Home Secretary
8. Having been, at any point Polly Toynbee
9. Federasty

Men play at least 3 sets, Women play at most 3 sets. TV audiences and black market prices are higher for men's tennis, probably because men's tennis is more competitive (6-0, 6-0 is wearysomly common in the opening rounds of the ladies' tournament). So men get paid more. When women play best of 5, then they deserve equal pay. Simple really.

The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club should be applauded for upholding equality by paying men more for more tennis played, not excoriated for it's "Victorian-Era attitudes".

In any case, tennis is barely a sport. It's what fat, unfit people do when they're pretending to excersise.

The EU sucks - and the devils kitchen explains why in his inimicable style.

This isn't my flag, I'm not English

This is, because I'm an anglo-scottish mongrel with an Irish Surname, and a Welsh great Grandfather.

I'm not particularly interested in this version of football, as I find the diving and play acting disgustingly unmanly. I want to administer The "boot of Justice" (as my scrummaging coach used to say) to the pansies in nylon as they roll around on the floor looking to the ref. for a yellow card.

and I regret that this version of football didn't make it to become the Global game, as it is a superior game played by superior people. It is a game that teaches teamwork, courage and respect in a way that soccer clearly does not.

Click Here

The room would suit anyone working in Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire or London. Socialists, animal rights activists and washing up phobics need not apply. The flat will be decorated tastefully in an understated traditional style, and G&T will be served at 6pm sharp on the patio.

Until recently, I have always been in favour of the crushing of the liberals. I've always thought them to be silly, leftist and unrealistic Junior Common Room wonks and sandal wierd-beards, without the nessesary skills of compromise and realpolitic to govern. Their vindictive targeting of Tory seats when they were well placed to smash into Labour at the last election indicated a want of strategic vision. There's no room for two parties of the left - there needs to be a party of the right. So I've always wanted to see the liberals die as a political force. But can they replace Labour as the Dominant force on the Left?

The Liberals are suddenly talking sense on tax - perhaps they realise that people eventually get sick of having their pockets picked. Raise personal allowances, a simpler tax system, and a scrapping of the old socialist idea of a 50p band. The Green taxation I can take or leave, but if done sensibly, could make positive contributions to the way people move. Is this an indication that the political weathervane of Liberal Democrat policy is suggesting that the people want a tax-cut? Are they thinking about what would work rather than defining themselves against the other two parties?

I think this heralds a deeper change in the British political landscape.

The Labour party is a hollowed out husk, without members or councillors it lacks the troops to fight in the trenches of a close election - something of a Liberal speciality. Both the Liberals and Tories are growing membership and, crucially have councillors to organise the campaign at the local level. Furthermore, with the Liberals becomming a "progressive" party in the European Social Democrat mould, there's nowhere for socialism's pathetic class warriors to go other than an increasingly shrill labour party, but progressives can jump ship. The Blairites are losing the argument in the Labour movement, which is itching to lurch to the Left - More tax, less market, less choice in health and education more protection, higher benefits.

Will anyone else join them?

Progressives - the reasonable left of the political spectrum are abandoning the Labour Party in droves. New Labour has pointed out the absurdity of the socialist positions on ... well... pretty much everything really. How long can a party go on with policies that are fundamentally opposed by the grass roots - who remain largely unreconstructed Jack and Deirdre Sprats, who dislike having their silly ideas derided and abandoned by their own leadership? Governing sensibly is impossible with such socialists pulling you back. The reason that progressives in the wider country are leaving their socialist allies is that the Labour Government is now demonstrating what we on the right have always known - that socialists are inherently authoritarian - to the disgust of progressives and conservatives alike. How long before progressive commentators start coming out as Liberals? Could Blairites cross the floor in a Brown government to join the liberals?

The PLP is the largest party - but 70 or so MP's have ultra-thin majorities. The Lib Dems and the Tories should benefit at the next general election. The Tories are looking good for a thin Majority. The question is - how bad can it be for labour? Without foot soldiers or councillors to marshall them, they will be unable to get out the Vote - except in the kind of constituancy which weighs the Labour vote. Constituencies like Hull, where a strategically shaved monkey could be(and is?) a Labour Candidate, and still Romp home, will continue to return Socialists. Middle England, however is aware of the inconsistency - the split if you will - at the heart of the Labour Movement and will reject it decisively.

This split between progresives and socialists - like the Tories over Europe and the Corn Laws before that - could destroy the Labour party for a generation. Most Labour people ( and I know some who actually register on my moral scale as "people") are utterly disgusted with Blair. Opposition to his regime is strongest within his own party. The Tories are itching to get their big guns out on Brown, but see in Blair someone with whom they can do business for the time being (with a clothes peg on the nose naturally). Blair or Brown: either way, Labour's doomed for the time being. Unlike previously there's somewhere for disaffected non-tribal supporters of an imploding regime to go: The Liberals - whose silly tax policies and sandals prevented them fully capitalising on Tory Malaise in the 90's.

Mass Defections of New Labour progressives, who only support this Government's Nazi authoritarianism because of mispalced tribal loyalty, could leave Labour as an extreme rump of dyed-in-the-wool sub-marxists. Could the liberals come up the middle in this environment and take their place as the second party of the UK?

There are two reasons why not: The Labour Movement (as opposed to the Party) has deep and abiding tribal loyalties to draw on. The Liberal are not yet coherent enough to be seen as party of government. They are a protest movement who underperform in close elections.

It is an abiding rule of British politics to not underestimate the Tories, however accurately they shoot at their own feet; Likewise; never overstimate the Liberals whose ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory (how disasterous was their leadership election?) beggars belief. Nevertheless, this time it could be different - it depends on whether Sir Menzies can undo the damage the election campaign inflicted on the party's reputation and rise above his mediocre commons performances to give the party a base. If Labour implodes, and socailism remains discredited, they've got an open goal to become the second party - and idealogical home to lefties and progressives. They need therefore to be ruthless - oppose the Conservatives, but go for the socialist jugular - focus your limited resources on taking key Labour Marginals. A good showing next time could fatally weaken the Labour Party in the two horse race on the left of British politics - all you need is credibility.

I disagree with much Liberal policy in a lot of areas - but they have a commitment to civil liberties. Now they're talking sense on tax. If they drop their electoral reform and Europe fetishes - hell, I might even join them (and pigs might fly...) but I seriously urge reasonable progressives to join the Lib Dems and abandon your socailist allies - for the good of the country. Labour has demonstrated unfitness to govern. It's up to you Liberals to take up the baton. Don't fluff it this time.

I learned today that a friend and former colleague, James Leal died at his home on Friday aged just 30. James was a hugely respected analyst, enthusistic councillor for Redbridge in Essex, music lover and witty and erudite company on "broker booze-ups". He was honest to his core and a good friend. My thoughts go out to his family and many friends at this very sad time.