Working at the car wash

Those of you who have been fortunate enough to get to know Cicero’s German-made chariot will be aware that it is usually wears a patina of what is commonly known as dirt and dust and must not be approached while wearing anything dressy, pristine or light in colour, and most certainly not when wearing white. 

In an effort to rectify this, Cicero took his chariot to the hard-working east Europeans who work like dervishes to keep the nation’s chariots clean and bright and in doing so help refute Monsieur Farage’s opinions that nothing good came from Europe.

It was interesting to watch these young men from the lands beyond the Danube and the Elbe go about their business. They were working in an extremely enclosed tight space, crowded with chariots, and darting from jet wash to waxing to chamois leather with no thought for their own safety. And do you know what-not one of them wore a High Viz jacket, the fashion wear accessory of choice for anyone in any kind of work environment these days. Or so it seems.

Cicero is sure that these welcome strangers to our shores have received nothing as seemingly essential as a safety briefing. And yet despite this no one seems close to have come to anything more injurious than getting wet.

Gentlemen from the eastern tribes, Cicero salutes you all. You are our role models. Though it cannot be long before the Health and Safety Gauleiters catch up with you and force you to conform.  

And to highlight the continuing absurdities of these people, you might like to pay heed to Cicero’s recent experience. And should you suffer from health and safety OCD read no further.

For in an effort to relieve the oppressive heat under which Dear Cicero and his fellow co-workers were recently being forced to toil to fund not only their own lifestyles but also those of the Apparatchik Army who live in taxpayer funded luxury, Cicero opened the fenestration in his workplace.

How very daring.

Quicker than it takes to say litigation, his competence in this highly skilled task was being questioned why health and safety was being breached and why no yellow-green vest was being worn when fenestration fiddling. His defence that he had been opening widows without incident since long before health and safety was invented when we had common sense, cut no ice with the Gauleiters who threatened to remove all privileges.

Ridiculous.

Health and safety was invented to improve the safety in dangerous industries like mining, construction, deep sea fishing and the like. It was not designed for bureaucrats and salariats. Or even car cleaning operatives.

In this instance common sense lost out, yet again. The world is going slowly mad. Our personal freedoms are being slowly eroded, our decision making dulled and our sense of personal responsibility strangled.

Time to learn from those tribesmen from the East. Time to live a wee bit dangerously.

Sit felix. Et sit fortunatus.

Benefit of the doubt

Last week Cicero had to call to cancel a benefit on behalf of Senex Pater

Now you would think that in this day and age with the Two Caesars committed to reducing the amount of money provided by us, the taxpayer, for re-distribution to the supposedly less deserving, this would be an easy, straightforward and unquestioning thing to do. Far from it.

As always with these things Cicero had to speak to a script reading Apparatchik via the telephony device. And as always said Apparatchik was struck mute when the conversation deviated from the script.

Firstly it seems that the benefit was being cancelled a day early and supposedly could not be cancelled until and not before the change of circumstances happened ‘just in case something prevented it happening, sir.’

Does it matter? Does it really matter?

Seemingly this is vitally important to the Apparatchik minions who man these call centres who want to be 100% certain that we are all getting the taxpayer funded benefits we are entitled to. And to think that there are actually people out there who think this is a heartless government motivated by nothing except delivering painful and heartless benefit cuts. Even if this were the case the message clearly has not yet got through to the lower ranks who are clearly off script on this.

And then I had to prove that Pater’s circumstances had changed to the extent that he was no longer entitled to the benefit. It is right that people have to prove that they are entitled to taxpayer provided largesse but one would have thought that the Apparatchiks would be rubbing their hands in glee at saving a few bawbees. 

Why did they need proof?

Naturally Cicero questioned the efficacy of such a process. But seemingly these procedures have been personally put in place by one or either or even both of the Two Caesars. Yes, she genuinely and really did believe that our Two Caesars have enough time on their hands and even the inclination to develop such policies and practices. These days one of them might have time on his hands but the other most certainly does not.

Cicero did not have the heart to put her right.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus.

Rosa Parks Day

Cicero has just come off the phone and in a very exasperated, highly agitated and deeply frustrated mindset. And sometimes this is not a suitable mindset to be in when musings have to be written.

In essence Cicero is being advised to accept the way things are and deal with the world as it is, not the way he would like it to be. In other words Cicero has been asked to put up with shoddy service, a poor customer experience, a take it or leave it attitude.

‘This is just the way it is’, Cicero has been advised, ‘and you and I are not going to change it’.

Those of you fortunate to have Cicero’s acquaintance will know that comments like this are akin to a red rag to a bull.

This appeasement attitude does not go down well. And one would have thought that given the history of appeasement in this country, and it does have a wee bit of a bad reputation, there would be more people willing to stand up for what is right and to be the change the world they want to see rather than bow down in front of might.

And what was Cicero’s response.

It was challenging, forthright and obstinate. Would you have expected any less? And no doubt at this point your sympathies are switching from Cicero to the person at the other end of the telephony instrument.

Let us put this way-the person with whom Cicero was conversing had simply called to tell him the date and time of an Apparatchik meeting, a meeting which Cicero was expecting sooner not later. They were not expecting to get a lecture on Rosa Parks.

Hopefully if you are reading this you will know who Rosa Parks was. But in the rare event that there is someone who out there who doesn’t, Rosa was a black lady in the south of the United States who sat on a seat she was not entitled to because she was the wrong colour. And as a consequence helped to bring about the end of de-segregation.

And for this act of disobedience, this act of rebellion when right stood up, or in this case sat down, against might, she earned the title ‘The First Lady of Civil Rights’ and her very own day in the calendar.

She did not accept that she could not bring about change.

She did not accept that the status quo was immutable.

She did not accept things as they were.

We can all be Rosa Parks and sit on the wrong seat on the bus just because it is the right thing to do. We can all stick our head, even on the smallest of issues, above the parapet and say ‘hey hold on a bit here, but this is wrong’. We all have the right to stand up for what is right against might.

It might not make for an easy life but because unreasonable people adapt the world to themselves, and not the other way round, all change and all progress depend on people being unreasonable.

Cicero will tell you now that Apparatchiks and others in positions of power and influence won’t like it one jot if we sit on the wrong seats. But as Rosa Parks proved the wrong seat is usually the right seat in the end.

And so today’s challenge, be Rosa Parks.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus. Semper.

Whose data is it anyway?

Now it is a well-known fact that Cicero, although getting on a bit now, has the brain the size of a planet, which is good and bad. Good because his insights are always worth listening to. Bad because he doesn’t always suffer fools gladly. 

It is important to know this because he sometimes wonders whether the Apparatchiks who run and deliver many of the services that our hard earned taxes pay for, deliberately recruit from the intellectually challenged parts of society.

Not everyone, of course.

Cicero does recognise that there are some ferociously bright Apparatchiks. It is just that they tend not to be public facing and as a consequence when it is our misfortune to have to deal with these people, let us just say that their intellectual capabilities can be stretched to the limit.

Here is one example. There are however many to choose from.

For reasons that are too boring to explain, Cicero is currently enduring a relationship with a Local Apparatchik. To this person Cicero has entrusted a wealth of personal data and information without fuss, security checks and other bureaucratic niceties and nonsenses that Apparatchiks normally insist on. This bit is like a breath of fresh air.

Now this is where it gets interesting.

Cicero then decided to request a copy of the information that the Apparatchik and his cohorts held about him to ensure accuracy and veracity. This, he and the rest of the citizenry, are fully entitled by law to do.

But at this point the informality that characterized the gathering and collecting in of his personal data disappeared. To be replaced by a ruthless Kafka-ism that only Apparatchiks are capable of.

For in order to get back the data that Cicero had already supplied, Cicero was now required  to produce his passport or other photographic proof of identity and 2 bills with address details on.

Naturally Cicero queried such bureaucratic nonsense.

‘Data protection, mate’, was the response. A lazy excuse for Apparatchik thinking if ever there was one.

So let us get this right.

Cicero was required to provide photographic proof of identity to an Apparatchik he had never met or was ever likely to meet. And to provide proof of address to prove he lived at an address that he had provided.

And the really sad bit about this tale-the Apparatchiks with whom Cicero was trying to converse with this through this over-engineered bureaucracy failed to see the logic of his argument. And they wonder why we challenge their right to a taxpayer-subsidised over-stuffed pension pot.

In their defence increasingly many people in many industries are resorting to hiding behind nonsenses like security, health and safety and data protection to justify inaction, poor customer service and sloth.

These excuses justify nothing.

And to expose such sloppy thinking just ask which data protection principle or health and safety condition they are referring to when they quote and resort to Nanny Legislation such as these. Their defences will melt like butter when challenged in this way.

Cicero has taken issue in this way with the Apparatchiks with whom is he dealing and is currently challenging the Head Apparatchik. Maybe he is the brightest of bright sparks and can see the folly of his people. Or perhaps not. Time will tell.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus. Semper.

Power to the people

Cicero is feeling guilty. And fears he may be giving his devoted and loyal readers the wrong impression. And he would like to make amends.

You may from recent posts be left with the impression that Cicero has something against this country’s Apparatchik class and that in his eyes these people can do no right. But in this post Cicero would like to suggest that those working to create wealth can at times be prone to much silliness too.

A few weeks back Little Ed, to much gnashing of teeth and beating of breasts from the Two Caesars and their acolytes, promised when speaking to the Last Lot, that should the Last Lot become the Next Lot after the Two Caesars have sought the judgement of the Vulgar Mob, that they would pass a law to cap energy price rises. A very relevant topic given the inflation busting price increases that our energy companies have just announced.

Now clearly such a law is more beneficial than debating and legislating to tax carrier bags to save the odd polar bear. Even if it will have the same effect as Canute as trying to stop the waves. You can’t buck the market. You can’t nationalise capitalism by getting them to pay for it. You really must stop listening to and reading the works of Pater, Little Ed.

Now such nonsense is bad enough. But it was trumped by the nonsense of one of those affected. A classic case of shooting yourself in the foot. 

Little Ed’s Marxist cant, while loved by the Vulgar Mob not unnaturally, was received with distinct unenthusiasm by those whose job it is to risk their capital to extract the oil and gas from the ground and to transport this vast distances so that we might keep our lights on, homes warm, and our offices and factories working at full stretch. Freezing prices artificially for 2 years will destroy investment, destroy jobs, destroy the economy. You might win some cheap votes, they warned, but such a policy will lead to blackouts, food riots and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

And while Cicero might agree with the sentiments, such dire warnings might have been a wee bit over the top.

And no sooner had their apocalyptic warnings started when, in a brazen piece of marketing cheek, and it was not a bad piece of marketing, one of their number announced that it was not possible to fix your energy prices not for two years, which would clearly result in the end of civilisation, but for 4 years.

The Marketing Head Honcho who signed off this campaign clearly was not cc-ed into the Armageddon memo.

So silliness is not just an Apparatchik monopoly.

So re-arrange these words into meaningful sentences. Pot black calling kettle. Left right hand doing not what hand knowing. Billy a who’s silly.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus. Semper. 

Roadworks ahead

Is it only me...but why can’t I just have my money back?

Have you noticed how many roads are being dug up at the moment? Round where I live it seems like that every road is under construction. And no matter where I seem be going my progress is hindered by temporary traffic lights, road closures and narrow lanes. Motorways, A and B roads, streets, roads, closes, crescents and avenues are all blighted by workmen leaning on shovels and picks.

I thought that maybe in this year of the Olympics we were also hosting the World Road Digging Championships or maybe a Guinness World Record attempt or something.

But no, it seems the answer is maybe a wee bit more prosaic and also stupid at the same time.

For in conversation at the weekend with a Local Authority Apparatchik whom I’m proud to call a friend, it was revealed to me, and this was done without me having to resort to the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act, that roads were being dug up and taxpayers’ journeys disrupted, not for the common good as might have been supposed, but because the Apparatchiks had money left over as they approached the year end and that consequently the money needed spent.

No it doesn’t.

It might only be me but the money doesn’t need to be spent if it is not needed to be spent. I know that Apparatchiks, whether working for local or central government, and addicted as they are to spending other people’s money,cannot see this but it is possible to give the money back or take less from us in the following and subsequent years.

Listen very carefully, I shall say this only once....you do not need to spend my money just because it’s there.

And nor should you base subsequent budgets on what you spent the previous year plus a bit-another reason for spending on unnecessary road works and other stuff being rushed through in the dying days of a financial year.

Have you never heard of zero based budgeting? It is what those of us who are busy creating value each day do when we set budgets. Maybe the Apparatchiks should try it though heaven forbid they should take lessons from the likes of us. Methinks they would rather cut off their arms with a pen knife before they learn from us.

But maybe if they did we wouldn’t have half the country dug up at the same time. It’s just a thought.

Have a great week.

And if these words have got your brain cells working and you want more try www.themarketingcomic.blogspot.com for more. Check out ‘Have I got news for you?’.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus.