I'm at a loss for words...

So many things you can do on your 16th birthday; lose your virginity (legally), buy a lottery ticket, learn to ride a moped, enlist in Army basic training, get married...all in all, quite a busy day.

And now there's another to add to the list; work in an NHS swine flu call centre. Now my 16-year-old is a fairly responsible type but, leaving aside parental pride, is also the last person I'd want answering the phone if I rang up in a panic over complex medical symptoms.

Between you and me, I don't think three hours training, a GCSE in Biology and having seen a few episodes of 'House' is enough ('Well it's definitely not lupus, anyway.'). Still, I'm sure the Urchin would have enjoyed the bit where they all get to bring in games - just like the last day of term - while waiting for the phone to ring.

It's almost beyond belief, but that's not what led to the post title. No, that's inspired by a sidebar I caught when following a link to the call centre story at Ambush Predator (h/t to JuliaM, social commentator extraordinaire); the Mail online is currently displaying the attention-grabbing headline:
'Diet mad Cheeky Girls reveal how they turned yellow and grew fur'

To paraphrase Bill Bryson, whatever is the stage beyond the mind boggling is the stage I reached when I read that. I can only assume that all the Mail employees with any journalistic integrity (always assuming there are some) have gone to the seaside and left the shop in the hands of someone capable of turning anorexia-induced liver failure and hirsutism into a headline of jaw-dropping inanity.

There's Gold in Them Thar Tears

As the emotion-addicts of Britain stock up on tissues and flowers for this year's Dianniversary, I am reminded of a bizarre manifestation of business acumen I witnessed in Paris some years ago.

In the mid-nineties, the Spouse and I spent an enjoyable week in a quintessentially Parisian family-run hotel. Situated in a side-street north of the Jardin des Tuileries, it occupied the upper floors of a large 19th-century building. Guests would enter through a shared courtyard and climb the elegant staircase past the dressmaker's atelier on the first floor to arrive at Reception on the second.

In the Spring of 1998, finding myself in Paris on business, I decided to drop in to the hotel and enquire about booking a stay in the near future. The receptionist was apologetic; 'I'm sorry, but we are fully booked'.

I mentioned that we had stayed there a couple of years before and she looked thoughtful. 'I think I should tell you', she said, 'that the prices have gone up a little since then.' And so they had - by at least 50%. I asked her why and she drew aside the net curtain from the window beside her desk. 'Voila!' she said.

Seeing me none the wiser, she helpfully explained. We were looking down on the back door of the Ritz Hotel. Since the death of Princess Diana, the smaller hotel had been inundated with visitors wanting to stay as near as possible to the scene and many of the guests had booked to take the 'Diana Tours' along the route of the car journey.

Even had we wished to pay the inflated prices, the company of grief-tourism ghouls would probably have put us off our breakfast so I thanked the receptionist and left her to preside over the money-making machine that had sprung from the car accident of a few months before.

Results Day for Wildebeest

Sighs of relief all round in the Tavern as the Urchin's GCSE results appear - we shan't have to send the child up the chimneys after all. As one of those lucky, lucky people whose entire education has been in the hands of New Labour, the Urchin was naturally well aware of the obligation to be pictured in the media on results day with a big smile and shiny hair.

Sadly the cameras were absent, as they were when the Artful Dodger collected his A-level results last week. Perhaps it's just as well, since a review of the coverage suggests that the Telegraph et al are only interested in capturing the celebrations of the Wildebeest (easily recognisable by their long legs, flowing manes and inability to function without the rest of their Abercrombie&Fitch-clad herd in tow) and neither of the Tavern's junior inmates fits the profile.

The Wildebeest is the ultimate New Labour creation - photogenic and obsessed with appearances, achieving 'excellence' within clearly-defined parameters. No dangerous free-thinking here; Wildebeest are careful to like what everyone else likes, to follow the orthodox path that leads to 'year-on-year improvement' and infinite growth. Logic has no place in the Wildebeest world - all must have prizes and everyone can, should and will be above average for ever and ever, amen.

For more on the subject, I thoroughly recommend this at Unenlightened Commentary.

In absentia...

The Tavern bar will be untended for a couple of weeks - but we do value our visitors and like to keep them entertained.

Why not make yourself comfortable, pour yourself a drink and consult the archives? You're sure to find something there to divert, amuse or interest - or simply infuriate.

A Song for Greg Hands MP

Following Greg Hands' account of the attempt by a member of Ed Balls' staff to keep him out of the school in his constituency where Balls and the Prime Minister were holding court. H/T to Plato Says for providing inspiration.

(In an ambitious leap of imagination, you will have to imagine that the tenor voice belongs to Ms Izzet.)

I’d like to go in – No, you can just stay outside;
They’re about to begin – You're out of the way outside
I know you’ve got Balls – It's private; didn't you get our calls?
And Brown in there – D’you know what? I really just don’t care!
People here voted for me – You know, you're starting to bore me;
I’m acting well within my rights – Are you looking for a fight?
It must be because I’m a Tory – Oh yeah? That old story!
You could be a bit more polite – If you piss off I just might, you never know...

Please get out of my way – No, you can just stay out there,
I can’t stand here all day – You’re out of the way out there
This chat really is –And you’re not coming in;
Going nowhere – Don’t blame me if you think it’s not fair.
I’m calling the Council Leader – Oh yeah? I’ll get Ed Balls out here
I think you’ll find the law’s on my side – Or even Damian McBride
You can’t just make me wait here – If you don’t do what I tell you
                          And stay outside.

A Cancer Specialist Within Two Weeks?

Let's give a hearty two-and-a-half cheers for the guarantee of seeing a cancer specialist within two weeks - and a trip to a private consultant if the NHS can't do it.

Except that the 'pathways' in current use by GPs - accessible via NHS Direct - already state that a patient suspected of having cancer should be seen within 2 weeks. Yet again, New Labour make a song and dance about an 'initiative' that's already happening.

Ah, you may say, but now it's a concrete guarantee - infallible, surely? Well, no, actually, because you have to be 'suspected' of having cancer before they let you in through the gates, and that means having a GP who can spot the signs.

Don't get me wrong - there are many excellent GPs out there, my own included. Unfortunately every system has its flaws. As regular readers will know, members of my family have had less than ideal treatment in the past. The scenario goes something like this.

You visit your GP with a problem - or even just for a check-up - and he/she puts you on statins/HRT/steroids (despite your misgivings), citing endless studies (but not PCT targets). Your symptoms worsen but your GP puts it down to side-effects and changes the dosage/brand; this can go on for months.

You repeatedly ask for cancer tests, but are told firmly that it won't be cancer - you're not obese/sedentary/a drinker or smoker (and your GP has a shaky grasp of probability - he/she tells you that if 97% of sufferers are obese, your chances of having cancer are 3%).

Eventually you find another GP who agrees to do the test - and you win first prize: an instant trip to Oncology with added chemo and an emergency operation thrown in. And here's the kicker; you still fall within the 2-week rule because the first GP never 'suspected' it was cancer.

Freudian slip of the week

From The Spouse, feeling fragile after carousing with friends until the early hours;

'...and then I had to get up at the crap of dawn.'

Ah, the perfect phrase for a monday morning!

More on the Brentford Squatters

Despite the BBC's silence on the matter - presumably to avoid a massive gathering at the house - the story has made the Observer, albeit in a disappointingly sober and matter-of-fact way. The coverage at Demotix is much more fun.

However, I'm puzzled by the claim that the squatters got in through an open window, much having been made of the boarded-up status of the house. In a high-profile case like this where, I hope, the whole point is to get to court and force a public examination of the facts, the squatters would be fools not to do everything by the book and avoid all criminal damage.

Since photos of the protest show the house completely unboarded, I can only assume that the Keens, in an attempt to deflect criticism, 'pulled an Uddin' and showed up to demonstrate that 'it is our main home - really it is!', unboarded the windows and then forgot to close them all before leaving to go back to their luxury riverside flat - at least I'd like to think so; it would have a certain poetic justice, after all.

Update: Interesting comment here from Guido's blog suggesting the work in progress looks suspiciously like doing up to sell. Given the Keens' claim for a £520,000 mortgage on their £500,000 luxury flat, are we also subsidising the Brentford renovations, enabling the couple ultimately to pocket a large premium at our expense?

Mr & Mrs Expenses vs the Squatters (in song)

News from Guido Fawkes; Police have been called to deal with squatters at the Brentford house belonging to MP's Alan and Ann Keen.

This old house looks fairly empty,
This old house look pretty grim,
But it lets us claim expenses
For the flat we’re living in;
This old house was being mended
Then we fell into dispute
With the builders, who stopped working,
But it still brings in the loot.

We don’t live here any longer,
We don’t live here any more,
So we boarded up the windows
And we boarded up the door,
But it’s our official dwelling
You can be sure of that
So the second home allowance
Pays the mortgage on our flat.

This old house is full of rubble
And the garden’s overgrown
And we hardly ever visit
This old house that we both own
But one day we’ll move back in here
And it’s quite untrue to say
That our home’s an empty dwelling
And we’ve learned to make it pay.

We don’t live here any longer,
We don’t live here any more,
So we boarded up the windows
And we boarded up the door,
And together in the meantime,
For forty grand a year,
We’ve a flat beside the river
Just about ten miles from here.

This old house was in the papers,
This old house was on TV
Because Hounslow Borough council
Were eying it with glee,
But it seems a bunch of squatters
Saw the articles and knew
That our big old house was empty
And there’s nothing we could do

We don’t live here any longer,
We don’t live here any more,
So we boarded up the windows
And we boarded up the door,
Now we hunker down together
In our plushy Thameside flat
And we ask why our accountant
Never warned us about THAT.

UPDATE: PHOTO CREDIT TO GUIDO FAWKES

A Garden is a Lovesome Thing...

(Major h/t to JuliaM at Ambush Predator for her entertaining post on the subject)

A retired florist has been threatened with criminal prosecution by a council after planting a flower garden on a neglected patch of land in a car park.

How many nit-picking jobsworths does it take
To forbid an urban garden?

Just who exactly is offended when you make

A forbidden urban garden?

With a bit of buddleia,

Jasmine or a fuchsia,

What was a crumbling mess for thirty years

Can be turned from an eyesore into a thing of joy,
As a pretty urban garden.

"How did you think you could break the rules and make

An illicit urban garden?

We’ll let you go if you say it's a mistake

And you beg the council’s pardon.

Put back every cobblestone,
Leave the bramble stems alone,
Uproot the flowers and let it run to seed,
Or we’ll do it ourselves and we’ll make you pay the bill
To remove your urban garden."

Why should the council spoil someone's fun

And destroy an urban garden?

So they can claim that something's being done

When they destroy an urban garden?

Hoodies with their lager cans,

Graffiti scrawls and burger vans,

Litter and vandals are difficult to deal with;

Much easier to pick on one retired florist

And her little urban garden.

Mystic Ed and his Crystal Balls

The BBC’s very own news timewarp - reporting events still in the future – has been discussed before in the Tavern and elsewhere (h/t Blognor Regis) but, oblivious to criticism, they continue to offend, serving as the organ of choice for pre-emptive government leaks.

This morning, with a complete lack of irony, we were treated to a digest of an announcement Ed Balls will make next week. Next week! Not only does the man leak details of his dastardly plans before announcing them to Parliament (h/t Witterings fromWitney); he and his minions are now predicting what will happen three days hence.

The diktat from whatever the spin doctors are calling Balls’ outfit these days – the Department for Children, ASBOS and Junk Food, or something – may well have been drafted, but who’s to say Balls will actually make the speech? After all, he might be late for the meeting, stuck in traffic or suffering from food poisoning*.

The BBC’s confident assertion that Balls will make the announcement in person looks to me like a prediction of future events. Tavern regulars, mindful of the Vagrancy Act (Any person who pretends or professes to tell fortunes ....shall be guilty of an offence. ), wonder about this; after all, we know that the Today presenters have their palms liberally crossed with silver for broadcasting this stuff.

Perhaps, though, we'll forgive them on this occasion: the demise of the literacy and numeracy strategy, 'delivered' by jargonmeisters Capita (I picture it arriving in a series of cumbersome crates), and the resulting liberation of Primary Schools to adapt their teaching to the needs of pupils is a welcome development indeed.

*Please note this is neither a threat nor a suggestion; merely an hypothesis.

Presence, Passion and Panache at Kirklees Council

Kirklees Council - remember them? Won't let you be cremated in your own clothes? A £10,000 court case for a wind-blown sweet wrapper?

Well, if you fancy joining their happy band and a salary of £119,000 appeals, get yourself off to Huddersfield now, where Kirklees council wants a new Director of Organisation Development.

"A new what?" I hear you cry. Apparently this is a newly created position for an "Exceptional professional required to place communities at the heart of our services, a leader with presence, passion and panache."

The post would require 'cross-functional experience' and would involve 'making sure: That the diversity of Kirklees is understood by all in the organisation; is valued as a strength but a strength that challenges us to respond to its complex implications; and is reflected in the career structures within the organisation.'

I hope that's sufficiently clear. Actually, according to the plain English campaign, it isn't. "The advertisement contains many examples of typical Government jargon that is perfect for confusing, hiding and misleading the reader."

The Taxpayers' Alliance goes one better: "This is a classic example of management gobbledegook. It is bad enough that Kirklees is spending so much money in the middle of a recession, but at the very least the job description should make some sense."

But Cliff Stewart, human resources director at the council, doesn't see a problem; "The terms used in the advert will mean a lot to the sort of people who are looking at this."

Says all you need to know, really, doesn't it!