Employment issues

It's not often I write on HR stuff - my employment policy is well known. Recruit from Oxford, naturally, let them do all the donkey work and clear up the mess I leave behind, which I can then take credit and knighthoods for.


The umbrella sector is lucky to be able to attract highly talented and committed gamps thanks to headhunters such as DONALD HOLDING. Politicians sometimes forget we employ large numbers of staff. The Brolly Sector Research Centre estimates 1.1 million! And this could grow even more if I get my way and all trustees are paid.


(I note that Sir Hubert is causing a stink about the paid trustee thing claiming that BUBB was the only sector voice shouting for it. Tough titty Hubert old fruit. If you can't get enough high profile trusteeships to make it worth your while supporting this proposal that is your look out.)


I doubt many umbrellas have given much thought to how they will be employed during the Olympics but if it pisses down like it has happily been all summer they could well need proper advice. And it is worrying that there will be a shortage of umbrellas used to provide security from wet weather at the games despite there being many available to take on this role. It is disgraceful that the Army will be used to provide precipitation cover and the controversial siting of massive umbrellas on top of Council blocks was also badly thought through. 


It is also a concern that a number of athletes have been lost on transport en route from Heathrow to Stratford and have ended up at the TfL Lost Property Office on Baker St like so many brollies do every day.


But umbrellas caught up in the whole circus can get advice thanks to an invaluable corporate partner BUBB has used to develop HR sagacity as a free service. So it is only right that I should give Trellis Shittam a free plug in my blog though they have begged me not to for fear of negative publicity by association.

Hotchpotch review of canopies!

Well done to Lord Hotchpotch who has published his scattergun review of the Canopies Act. On the whole a very sensible set of recommendations and proposals as they agree with stuff what I have been championing - indeed Hotchpotch nicked all of the stuff on the history of umbrellas from my own lectures (which I actually made up but there you go).

I am delighted about the suggestion that people can be paid to look after large umbrellas without needing permission from the Umbrella Commission. Not large sums of course. After all if you look after lots of umbrellas even small payments will soon rack up. I for one will be seeking to make a tidy packet as a professional trustee of brollies.

Also good to see gubbins to encourage more social investment which I have always been keen to promote to my members for reasons that are completely unconnected to my other entirely distinct role as chair of Brolly Investment Business.

And it is quite right that Umbrella Commission regulation should be made more flexible. After all by sometimes criticising them for doing too much regulating and sometimes saying they aren't regulating enough depending on what the issue is and how it affects me I have shown I can be flexible in how I view Umbrella Commission regulation. 


I have been very quiet recently on the blogging front as I have been working behind the scenes to try and ensure the plans to reform the House of Lords make provision for me securing a peerage. But to no avail.

Still at least that bastard Rob Diamante has been kicked out of Barclays. Though it would be incredibly amusing if I were to say without a shred of irony in my blog (as my spoofer Sir Stephen Bubb did) that it is important not to think that "if only we get rid of some at the top we will be able to move on".