Ford Zephyrs not good enough for them these days
It's been too long since we did a round-up, for which we apologise. Frankly, events at The Golden Trough in Westminster have been so extraordinary and so distracting that everything else has sort of paled in comparison. But that's no excuse - we have to stay on the waste case, because it sure ain't gone away.
1. NHS "Productivity" Unit
DM Andy has the story of this... er... "efficiency" unit. It costs us £350 grand pa, for which we get one highly paid quangocrat director and one part-time secretary.
That's it.
Lifelong socialist Andy works down at the sharp-end of the NHS, and he's tearing his hair out. He asks: "Why are we wasting money like this and giving the Tories and the likes of Burning Our Money such an easy target?"
An excellent question, Andy.
2. Public Sector Pensions
The S Times has been back probing this old favourite:
"ALMOST 34,000 public sector workers have retired with £1m pension pots, twice as many as previously thought...
...Almost 400 retired staff from Glasgow city council and 223 from Kent county council have pension pots worth £1m or more...
... Mervyn King, governor of the Bank of England, has a pension now worth £5.4m, the largest in the public sector. He is among more than 20 civil servants and quango bosses who have accumulated pensions worth £2m or more.
Three BBC board directors also feature in the top five. John Smith, who heads BBC Worldwide, the corporation’s commercial arm, has accumulated a £3.1m pension pot after 18 years’ service."
So let me see... 34,000 times at least £1m equals at least £34bn.
(HTP Steve B)
3. Troughing Quangocrats
Also in the S Times:
"The head of a government regeneration agency ate 112 meals at taxpayers’ expense as he visited some of the country’s finest restaurants over 20 months... John Walker, the former head of English Partnerships, sent in a bill of £1,152 for service in a Belgravia pub and restaurant, charged £843 for service at Shepherds, the Westminster restaurant, and £569 at Pomegranates in Pimlico.
He spent nearly £3,500 in one eaterie alone as he racked up costs of more than £18,000 on restaurant and food bills.
Those on Walker’s guest list from April 2007 to November 2008 included the former cabinet ministers John Prescott and Hazel Blears, civil servants from the communities and local government department, a civil servant from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, three executives from the Olympic Delivery Authority, the chief executive of the Housing Corporation and the director of policy at English Heritage...
The expenses of the most senior officials at more than 120 nondepartmental public bodies reveal how some, such as Walker, spend big sums on dining out with employees from other taxpayer-funded organisations."
Remember that as you tuck into your Great Depression beanz on toast.
(HTP mister hungry)
4. Troughing MPs
It's way beyond parody, but Michael Chapman-Pincher has produced his own singalong tribute on YouTube. Here's Part 1 of 3:
5. Cops in Jags
From a breathless MSN Cars:
"Watch out, watch out, there's a big cat about...
Jaguar is now offering police forces across the UK the chance to go hunting criminal in style.
Police-spec 3.0-litre Diesel S XFs are out being evaluated by the UK's blue light brigade right at this very moment.
We reckon the slinky 275hp Jaguar will become one of the most powerful diesel police cars to ever roam the British mean streets - unless there are any bobbies out there rocking BMW's 286hp 535d. Either way, the XF's parallel sequential turbocharging should provide all the necessary in-gear, as well as emergency, response."
Yeah.
Enraged BOM correspondent Scott W says:
"My local force seems to have a love affair with high end BMW's so I bet they will be on this gravy train. Totally unjustified when the majority of their policing is done in an urban area.
How can we allow this waste to continue? How many bobbies could we get on the beat if we prised the police out of their premium motors? Do you see the police in other countries driving around in such things? No."
And now that Morse is sadly departed, our cops have no need for Jags either.
Fun at night
Tyler needs to leave it there in order to watch the Euro results.
Just how badly will Labour do?
Will their hopeless wibbling "plotters" summon up the balls to do something? Anything.
Will the quite superb Mandy crush some more BBC pundits like he crushed his old Labour mate Andy Marr this morning?
How perfectly delicious.
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