The MD's Blog

I spent a couple of days in London last week, just before the looting and riots, it's pretty scary looking back that it was only 24 hours before the horrific events.

Everyone is trying to find reasons for the madness, much of it is down to sheer criminality judging from the ages and occupations of many of the participants

The biggest problems firstly are the real youngsters, many of these probably came from backgrounds where neither of the parents work and in many cases have never worked, these kids in many cases have no concept of right or wrong and are left like feral animals to fend for themselves

The second problem is the failure of our educational system, we are producing school leavers who are not only unable to write but are also in many cases unable to string a sentance together, in a work enviroment where most jobs now are service industry related they have no prospect of ever finding employment, in the past they may have found jobs in labouring or repetitive manufacturing processes, their lack of literacy or social skills would not have handicapped them, it's a terrible damnation of our schools that I see many job applicants who I couldn't risk employing even as a car cleaner in case they ever came into contact with a customer

The first step to improve the situation has to address the benefit culture, we need to stop paying benefits to people who have no desire to work or who are claiming disability falsely, what we should replace this with is a programme of low paid work in the community with a clear explanation that if they fail to comply or take part fully they will recieve no future income, in many cases this programme would be enough to encourage them to find jobs

This change should not be done to save money overall, what should happen is that the money saved from paying mindless claimants should be spent in paying improved benefits to the genuinely disabled and to provide training and support for those who genuinely want to work, at the same time we need to properly sort the education system

This months recommendations

Music

Ritual Union by Little Dragon, this appears to be a Japanese vocalist supported by Scandinavian musicians, very different in many respects but with a couple of plays is incredibly good

Wine

Champteloup Rose from Waitrose, a really well balanced wine great for the last day's of summer barbecues

Eating Out

Samphire in Falmouth, owned and run by a really enthusiastic couple, superb fish and good atmosphere, worth booking as they do get pretty busy 01326210759
 

I probably first read the News of the World at boarding school, there was something racey about it then and as a fifteen year old it was seen as a window on a different world, I don't think I've ever had a copy since then

The phone hacking scandal that engulfed it and finally caused it's demise was obviously the fault of poor management (whether one can aportion blame to a clearly shaky 80 year old Aussie is another matter) and obviously Rebekah Brooks may have had some knowledge of some fairly shady practices, by the way her hairstyle reminds me of King Charles the First.

Part of the blame must to a  degreee fall on part of the customer base of the paper, they demanded ever more scurillous stories which the paper had to resort to more and more underhand methods to supply, there is after all a limit to how much smut a reporter can find by legitimate methods, the phone hacking was the tabloid equivalent of a trawler dragging the sea bed in a desperate attempt for bigger catches.

The people I feel really sorry for are the employees who had nothing to do with any illegal practices and who lost their jobs

This Months recommendations

Wine

If you want a really special red wine I can recommend a 2006 St Emilion that's currently available from 'Wine World' in Honiton, they only have a limited amount at £9.99 a bottle (which really is good value), Grab a few bottles whilst it's available

Reading

'The War that never was' is a fascinating book about Britain's exploits in the Yemen in the 1960's, a very small group of ex SAS soldiers managed with no official help to pin down a very large part of the Egyptian army, it's an amazing tribute to the British way of 'muddling through'


Music

'The Buddy Rich collection' was released over 10 years ago, I picked up a copy from Amazon recently, it's a great collection of music from a big band led unusually by a drummer, what makes it so good is that Buddy was one of the greatest drummers in the world and he's accompanied by some brilliant musicians, he was a difficult man whose most famous one liner was whilst being admitted to hospital after a massive heart attack was asked if he had any allergies ' Country and Western music was his terse reply!