"Currants Bw..."

[Niall_Quinn]

Third Runway approved at Heathrow

End of the day, if you don't believe in man made climate change (which seems to be more about making an argument for convenience) than it won't make a difference. If you do believe in it, then people should be honest enough to admit that we've passed the point of no return anyway and any carbon tackling measures is just a futile attempt to slow down the inevitable.

Not really just an argument of convenience though. There's pesky reality involved too. There's also the dishonesty of the ex global warming and now climate change disciples. That Adam Curtis documentary is actually very good. Ignore Curtis' typically shameless propaganda and focus on the behaviour of our leaders over the past decades and it's very simple to answer the question, how could so many people buy into this man made climate change fantasy. Well fantasies are what makes the world go around, as it turns out.

Meanwhile, what's being done about global pollution? Anything? Or food pollution? Or DNA pollution?

Nothing, you say?

[Niall_Quinn]

When candidates come to do an exam paper there have to be various staff members present. Invigilators, obviously, but there will be a supervisor who runs the day (more than one in bigger operations) and there are other roles like Marshall who herd the candidates around and tell them where to go.

All those people need paying. At the moment they still fill in paper timesheets so they know how long everyone has worked for. We have built a back office system where they do all the planning - say how many invigilators etc they need, assign people to do those roles. We've written a mobile app which will link to our back office system, the supervisor will log in and it will show them who they're expecting to work that day. We've printed cards for the staff with a photo and QR code on and the staff will come in and the app will read the QR codes, show the person's photo so the supervisor can check their identity and automatically record the time they've clocked in and, later clocked out and capture any exception reasons (if they're late, or whatever). All that will then be synced with the back office system so we can automate the staff payments.


Anyway...we're going to trial the app in Sri Lanka this Saturday and Vietnam the Saturday after. Hanging out in Dubai for a couple of days in between.
I don't think I owe the British tax-payer an apology, I don't think they're paying, but I do feel I should say sorry to the Ozone layer.

This all sounds like a complete waste of time. From where has the state derived a mandate to do any of this stuff at the citizen's expense?

[Letters]

This all sounds like a complete waste of time. From where has the state derived a mandate to do any of this stuff at the citizen's expense?

Not sure how else to explain this is being funded by exams which is run as a business

[Niall_Quinn]

Not sure how else to explain this is being funded by exams which is run as a business

Well it's not being run as a business if the government is involved. Why is the government involved?

[Letters]

This particular work isn't. We are public sector and some of our funding does come from tax but there is quite a large exams business which is run as such, this work is to do with and funded by that.

[Niall_Quinn]

This particular work isn't. We are public sector and some of our funding does come from tax but there is quite a large exams business which is run as such, this work is to do with and funded by that.

Obviously I'm not talking about this one particular instance. I'm talking about whatever it is that you do in general. Why is the public having a portion of the proceeds of their labour taken under duress in order to fund this self-evidently non-essential operation? There can be no justification for it. And considering this is a "free country", how do I opt out of paying for you to swan around the place performing non-essential activities? I would rather my money be spent on the poor and the sick and the elderly. Who do I vote for to ensure all non-essential services are shut down immediately? May or Corbyn? Please advise urgently.

[Letters]

Obviously you're on the wind up but if you think there's no value in cultural relations with other countries (which is the British Council's brief, English teaching and exams is a part of that) then we'll have to agree to disagree.
There is a lot of waste in the Public Sector and probably in this organisation but there are better targets for your wrath than me

[Herbert_Chapman's_Zombie]

if you see the world through the eyes of NQ, you think of any public sector, government, taxation, voting as a crime....so probably best not to consider it a wind up

I often find NQ hard to debate with, it's a bit like a human and a germ debating with each other over who has the right to exist given that the existence of one usually means the denial of existence of the other. One view can only exist with the total negation of the other.

I find NQ's opinions and his solutions interesting although ultimately impractical to the point where they aren't worth considering, he presumably finds me to be a slave who is glad of his chains happy to be one of the doped and lied to masses by a clandestine minority of the implacably evil.

[Letters]

I'm not sure he actually ever proposes any solutions.

[Herbert_Chapman's_Zombie]

I'm not sure he actually ever proposes any solutions.

He does, he's a libertarian so his solutions are to remove government, authority, laws etc as they are all oppression

The solution therefore is ultimately individual liberty - totally unconstrained - an individual can do whatever they want to do because cooperation is coercion.