IT'S TIME FOR A LEADERSHIP CHANGE

It's Wednesday, and that means only one thing.
Half-day closing.

As per usual, I donned my Hush Puppies and set about hobbling down to the Beccles & District Museum, to avail myself of my weekly fix; the majesty and beauty of the 1632 Shadingfield altar cloth.

And if you've been listening to Radio FiveLive's intelligent wall-to-wall commentary, interspersed with 'Sport, Weather & Travel' every ten minutes, you'll probably have no problem guessing what happened next?
The bally museum was closed!

And why?
Because some snivelling little Trot has politicised the part-time voluntary workers into a collective expression of their dissatisfaction at the hard work that Dave, IDS and Vinny Cable have done over the past 18months.

Pensions?!
They're already in receipt of their bloody pensions, and have been spending them quite happily in the post-office. the garden centre and Rosie's Tearooms for many years!
Like me, most of them will be dead before most NQTs get their first school department.
It's the feckless 'Want Want Want' generation again, stealing eye-pods and helping themselves to EMUs and tuition fees.

I'm all for gay rugby players 'coming out' to the Daily Mail on days like these, but this sort of gerrymandering will only lead to civil unrest, and an overall confusion with regard to museum opening hours.

It's madness.
Bring back Norman Tebbit and hunting with dogs.

Ruddy pinkos.

LEGALISE POT!

No.
Again, I was only joking.
But there has to be something said about the whole decriminalisation thing.
It's not very well thought out.
I mean, it's actually a bally minefield.

Had another telephone interview with Personal Adviser, Lowestoft-John last week, and what a ruddy nice fellow.
Didn't achieve much.
Both had a bit of a moan.
It doesn't look particularly inspiring for either of us, but we swapped a few numbers and anecdotes, and from what I can gather, we'll meet up again in January 2013.

Free of both chronic pain and time-consuming bus travel, I popped down to the common to see Allotment Alan.
I've recently been partaking of some of his organic leafy tobacco, on a purely medicinal basis.
According to Alan it's all above board and it does wonders for my lumbago.
He has to keep it under lock & key due to local riff-raff and the wrong sorts, and that entails some artificial light thingy that plays havoc with my bifocals,
but I have to say, it's a bloody marvellous painkiller, and who has the right anyway to say whether a man can grow his own pleasure? (man)**
Growing is great, and gardening should be made compulsory on all Free School curriculums.
I mean, it's not like anyone is being harmed.

It's also got me back into watching television again.

Waybuloo is genius programming; something for everyone there.

And who would've thought that they still manufacture 'Space Raiders'?
Ten bags for a pound!

Slowly going off Dave though.
He doesn't seem to know what he's doing.
It's almost like he's trying to please everyone, and that's just silly.

I like Meryl Streep.
And I like the new filly on Countdown too.


I might wash the windows later.


After Police Academy.

Yep.



**obviously all home-growers should be credit-checked and licensed and affiliated to an allotments growers association, similar to Allotment Alan's.

The Not So Personal Advice

The dream appears to be over before it's begun.

The bally DWP won't foot the bill for a Hackney carriage next week, and have opted for a telephone interview instead.
The old war wounds have given me a bit of a wobble today, so I thought it only correct & proper to check on the travel-expense situation.
Bit of a heads-up before a balls-up, as they say.

Apparently taxis & hotels are a no-go these days.
I can fully understand.
If the system were more flexible, the work-shy layabouts next door would abuse it;
hiring a stretch limo and racking up lines of moo-moo on the back of their raspberry phones no doubt.

It's a bloody awful shame though.
I was really looking forward to cold-calling a few blue-chips with John, my Personal Adviser.
Thought we could rattle off a few CVs, smash a few Pyrex ceilings, burn some midnight oil, in sweat stained nylon shirt sleeves.
But never mind.

It turns out I have THREE Personal Advisers anyway.
One of them's called Janet, and she's a woman.

I just can't help thinking I may've lost a good friend in John.
Sad times.

OCCUPY LOWESTOFT (No. Not really. Lol!)

I'm still in bed.
I have to say, these pills are bloody marvellous.
I can see why the sixties happened and that.

Been listening to that Vine fellow on Radio Two, and although he talks a lot of sense, I think he sometimes takes the moral high-ground with regard to defending stupid people.
If you're constantly getting burgled, move house!
The market's flat enough to do a side-shift, and if like me, you actually need to live in rural Suffolk, sell the Cherokee and downsize.
The winters are getting milder, and the kids are probably old enough to walk to university now.

Anyway.
That's all a bit of a hub-bub and bally hoo.
The real reason for putting pen to paper today, is to thank the Right Honourable Dave Cameron for his recent thoughts on complicit and fraudulent doctors.
According to the Daily Mail, something like 80 or 90% of medical professionals are in cahoots with the bad-back brigade, and the loss to our economy in sicknote man-hours is the price of a small African coup!
Thankfully Dave wants to replace them all with Independent Advisers, something we should've done in 1945.

An Independent Adviser will be answerable to no-one other than the shareholders (and possibly IDS).
There'll be less need for empathy or bedside manner, and more emphasis on getting shirkers to earn their keep, possibly in a lesser role than they're used to, but positively boosting the economy to greater heights than Australia's.
It's important that sickness absence is eradicated from our culture, if we're all to live above our means and in the manner to which we are accustomed.

If a civil servant has to pick asparagus in springtime, more power to his elbow.
If a teacher has to stuff giblets into turkey carcasses, then why not?
An active workforce will not only provide encouragement for future generations, it will also reduce the amount of vacancies for migrant workers.
And the queues at the local health centre will improve too.

Bloody good idea DC.
Next week I will ask my Personal Adviser, John, about applying for these positions.

Not this week though.
Let me just finish off this amitriptyline...........

IDEAS FOR IDS

After yesterday's escapade I find myself bedridden again.
It's the only downside to these marvellous drugs that those boffin chaps at Pfizer and Glaxo keep creating.
The quack says I'm immuno-suppressed, but I've never really taken much advice from a woman.
It would appear however, that if I get coughed on or touched up by the great unwashed, I do seem to inherit their filth rather regularly.
My encounter with the hoi polloi in Lowestoft's JobCentrePlus could only be described as " a lot of ill people with illnesses being ill all over other ill people".
I've no idea what I've contracted but I'm sure it's a symptom of the underclass.

So it got me thinking about this ruddy well-needed shake up of the whole benefits system.
Shirkers and idlers will always embrace a tickly throat, if a session on the sofa with 'Cash In The Attic' and a bag of Haribo are considered convalescing.
This will lead to further unemployment and an economy so far up the Swanee that it moors itself at Thessaloniki.

I propose to Mr Duncan Smith that those receiving income-related ESA (what we used to call the dole before Blair & Brown) go into the JobCentrePlus on one day, and those receiving contribution-based ESA (what we used to call Incapacity Benefit before Clegg & Cable) go into the JobCentrePlus, on an entirely different day.

The work-shy scroungers on the dole all receive FREE prescriptions (as well as dental, eyes & wigs) and therefore have no excuse when poorly.
They should be healthy & at work, or chucking-up their Lidl lunch at home.

Those of us who still have to pay for our prescriptions, seemingly due to paying N.I. subscriptions for many years, should have a one-on-one appointment with our Personal Adviser, who should be medically tested before each interview.
Contracting communicable diseases will not get any of us back to work.
Especially when we can ill afford the multiple £7-40s to combat them.

I commend this to the House, via the Daily Mail Letters page.


NEXT WEEK:
Why Most Americans Have Got It Right
http://www.butyoudontlooksick.com/articles/personal-essays/when-youre-not-sick-enough/

Premature In Occupation

I only got the date wrong!
And to be fair to the DWP, they won't cover my hotel bill or taxi as the mistake was all mine.
What a sausage!

But bloody hell, I have witnessed some carnage today.

It would appear that I'm not the only one capable of returning to work.
In Lowestoft alone, there are literally thousands of us!
Admittedly, a lot of them don't have long-term chronic illnesses or disability, but a few could do with a bit of a bally brush-up.

And the language!
My word.
Now I spent many a year moving in military circles, and I've heard a few choice words that would make even the Queen blush, but this was just nonsense.

At one point, John (my Personal Adviser) asked the fellow ahead of me if he'd filled out his Appeal Form?
The answer went something like this:

"Nah, fuckin hent. Iss loik, fuckin arkskin me if loik, y'knew, I need loik anuvva piss of fuckin' paper 'n I hent, y'knew, fuckin' got a cuntin one, not diddly-squat y'knew, you nob-jockin' a-hole"

At this point I asked the gentleman in the supermarket security-guard outfit if I was actually in the right queue, and he informed me that I was, but I was also ten days too early.
We both laughed, and then the loquacious fellow threw-up on his Appeal Form, demonstrably qualifying his sickness, and inability to work today.

As I fought my way through the melee, I couldn't help but think I had made a shrewd move by not appealing.
It's going to take John, IDS and the rest of the DWP quite a while to find these chaps a suitable career.
I might just have a steal on them.

WHO WILL RID US OF THESE TURBULENT PRIESTS?

I see the bally church bods are having their ten penn'orth again.

There was a time when bishops knew their place.

Neighbours, Corrie and chessboards were littered with them, but in general they saved their pontificating for the pulpit.

R.Williams should stick to duetting with Nicole Kidman, and keep his trotty nose out of Ian Duncan Smith's affairs.

And what IS their problem?

Of course we should cap weekly benefits at £500.

There's only so many Peperami's one can eat over the course of fifteen Jeremy Kyle shows.

And if you smoked a whole pack of Mayfair every day, you'd still only need £35.

Cider has never been cheaper, and kids should be at school, not having tax-payers' money lavished on them to the tune of a few hundred quid!

If we're all expected to sort out this financial deficit then the work-shy dole bludgers should suffer too.
It's not fair that I can recognise a positive gearshift in socio-economic policy, when the feckless are watching X Factor and doing nothing about improving their status.
We should cap benefits at £60 per week, send all children to boarding school, and supply each & every individual with a Personal Adviser.

We all know the economy is fragile and cuts are needed.

We are all in this together, whether we like it or not.

A friend of mine has not only given up his membership of the golf-club, he has sold all his gear too!

On eBay!

Got quite a pretty penny for it all.

And he bloody loved golf, but the poor fellow is grief-stricken to the point of paralysis.

Perhaps if the jobless spent more time online, and less time in the bookies, they too could do their bit for society.

And if they can't afford the cost of living in London, then ruddy well move!
I've seen how wonderfully cheap housing can be in rural East Anglia.
There's some bloody lovely cottages on the Suffolk coast that would appear to be empty most of the time.
I wouldn't advise telling the landlords you're in receipt of benefits or poor; it's probably best to say you're a freelance poet and you work from home.

And call me cynical, but I notice the bishops of Norwich, Ipswich & St.Edmundsbury are all getting on their soap-boxes about this. I wonder if that has something to do with East Anglia having the largest incremental rent increase year on year (2010/11)?
Caring clergy?
Penny-pinching landlords more like!
It really has come to something when the Church collection plate is being topped-up by recycled taxes.

I'm going to put all of these points to John, my Personal Adviser tomorrow.
I'm sure he's not on £500 a week, and I bet he copes admirably.
I'm hoping we can get all the paperwork out of the way by lunchtime, and then maybe share a round of golf.

I'll head for the hotel once I've watched 'Songs of Praise'........

I HAVE A PERSONAL ADVISER!

On the very day that my appeal period ceased, I received a letter from the DWP informing me that I have an interview with my Personal Adviser next week!
The efficiency of the DWP Capability For Work system is ruddy awe-inspiring!
Well done IDS. Well done C&C. Well done JobCentrePlus.

My Personal Adviser's name is 'John' (as in Osborne or Bull).
I was rather hoping I'd be assigned a young filly, because like it or not, I tend to make more of my physical appearance with regard to the ladies.
But I tapped in 'DWP, Personal Adviser, John' into my personal computer's search engine 'Images' gizmo, and I was pleasantly surprised.
In the photo, I'm not sure which one is John, but both of them look like the sort of go-getting, action type that I crave, and neither of them has a moustache, which I'm finding unappealing on both of the sexes at the moment.

Inspired by Victoria Derbyshire's telephone-in (this morning she is inviting work-shy layabouts to explain why they can't find work), I set about creating an action-plan for next Monday.

I have to get to Lowestoft, so in order to avoid being jiggled, jolted & bruised by the commoners on the X2 bus, I've decided to book into a hotel the night before.
Unfortunately, most hotels on the east coast are closed for the season now, but I was assured by the receptionist at the 'Moon in the Spoon' that I could have a room with a disabled toilet AND coffee-making facilities.
I didn't ask her for a quote, as the DWP have offered to pay all expenses to ensure prompt arrival at appointments. They also offer childcare expenses, but the poorly wife doesn't qualify as a 'child under the age of one' as such, so she'll just have to wait until I get home if she wants her bedpan emptying.
She won't do much in 24hrs.

John wants to discuss all the available job opportunities in the area and which ones would be more suited to me;
about returning to college/university to retrain, 'Permitted Work' (which sounds interesting!) and tax-credits for all of my children.
And if John can't help me, he can then arrange another appointment for me with a Disability Employment Adviser, presumably because the advising that John specialises in, isn't anything to do with jobs or disability.

I have to say that I'm excited about all this.
Xmas really does seem to have come early this year!
But I'm aware that excitement or stress can bring on a flare-up, and I don't want to ruin what seems like the ultimate opportunity to finally get me back to work.

As a consequence, I will be taking a slumber-cocktail of amitriptyline, distalgesics, anti-inflammatories, methotrexate and fluoxetine, and retiring to my bed until Sunday evening.
The wife can do her own bedpan for a bit.
It'll be good training.

Goodnight All!


NEXT WEEK:

Would a hard-labour renaissance be a better incentive for petty-criminals?
and
Why ban smoking in cars when the car itself is the real enemy of asthma?

IAN 'LL FIX IT

Great to hear IDS on the wireless today, doling out priceless motivational talk to the feckless youth of, I dunno;
it sounded like South London (lots of innits & like).

And in the light of Sir Jimmy Saville's passing, I think our lord & saviour could do a lot worse than having a prime-time TV slot, in which he shows the 'yoof' just how easy it really IS to get work.

There was one chap on there saying he couldn't get a bag-packing job at Sainsburys, because of his criminal record, and I thought rightly so!
I certainly don't want my Nectar Point vouchers being stolen by him, whilst I'm spending my £400 ESA on a Xmas shop.
He said he'd been for several interviews.
I bet he hadn't tried applying for a bag-packing job in Lidl or Asda though!

The deadline for my 'appeal' against my capability for work decision is tomorrow.
I'm going to leave it, because as long as we all stay out of the way of the Greeks, the Italians and protesting students, I reckon we'll be out of this double-dip blip by New Year's Eve.

IDS interviewed another chap who sounded a little brighter than the crim ( a lot less demanding 'y'know's ), and decided there & then, that he could have this fella in employment within 3hrs, despite this lad being out of work for 11months.
And I bet he bloody did it too!
Marvellously inspirational man.

If only more people had the protestant work-ethic of Mr Duncan Smith, instead of being work-shy scroungers.
Can he fix it?
Of course he can.
And he won't even charge you.