bridge too far

You're not wrong there JB - his banking buddies got us into this mess in the first place.

Strangely, I've just been showing my granddaughter some photos of me when I was dancing. I decided not to show her the ones of me with Savile and Rolf Harris

In fact, Robert Peston as published a very good article about banking on the BBC website http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24014490

It's the same beef that's applied to people running charities, hospitals etc. Large organisations in the private sector pay silly money to those responsible for large budgets and big workforces. The public sector, charities and unions have to try to compete with these salaries to attract the best people for the job. Remember too that union members have to agree to what their full-time representatives earn. Although it was way back, my ex husband doubled his salary when he left his full time Regional Secretary job for a Union to become Head of IR for a large construction company - same work in reality but different paymaster. Then again, when you read articles such as this http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24016262 and think what these accountants were paid, it seems to me that everyone thinks it's OK for the private sector to pay huge salaries but not the public sector.

Just in case we forget what the US chemical weapons did in Vietnam http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-23632245

Didn't manufacturers in this country sell the wherewithall to make sarin to the regime?

I agree with this in part. However, as ever in the public sector, 'managers' ended up doing the monitoring and enforcement in addition to their existing jobs. In the past, ward sisters and service leads for e.g. catering, cleaning, managed many of these services. Post PFI rigid KPIs were introduced and inexperienced staff were tasked with managing these. I can remember setting up a huge database of service failures, compensation events etc. etc. - how much the provider could be fined for having one anaesthetic room out of action because of the knock-on effect on Theatres and Recovery and, therefore, discharge and bed occupancy rates. Believe me, it was a full-time job doing that! To expect ward sisters (managers, remember) to cope with that as well as with their proper jobs when they are already overstretched is asking a bit too much IMO. In some instances, purportedly to save money, contractors were self-monitoring. But, since they couldn't be trusted any further than they could be thrown, someone eventually had to monitor their monitors.

Jamie has two bees in his bonnet (helmet?) One is free laptops for families on benefits and the other is the astronomical rates paid to agency nurses.

No you're wrong there I think JB. I worked on a number of PFI schemes from 1994 (John Major's government) until 2002 and I can assure you that many in house catering, cleaning and other hard and soft FMs were handed over as part of the PFI scheme (the PFI contractor comprising a number of construction companies / financial institutions / hospitality firms). This was often to the detriment of the service. I had to take my mother to QA on a number of occasions in the late 90s / early 2000s and I was struck by the deterioration in service in the hospital restaurant for example - it had been taken over by a private provider as a result of QA's PFI scheme. I saw the same thing happen in Oxford hospitals following their PFI (that I worked on ). And outsourcing of non clinical services in the NHS began in the early 90s - the heyday of 'competitive tendering'.

Many of those in catering and cleaning used to be public sector workers in hospitals and schools but were 'taken over' by private companies such as Sodexo. In theory, there's nothing to stop low paid workers in the private sector from joining unions (think USDAW) but there are often employers who aggressively discourage this.

What interests me VW is the way Trade Unionism works in Germany. From what I understand it's almost expected, by employers, that the workforce will be unionised. The unions have seats on the boards of companies and there's great rapprochement between both 'sides' that works to everyone's advantage. It's all very well criticising some unions but some employers also need to be held to account - as you no doubt well know.

I need to remind some people that many of the now low paid private sector workers were, in fact, low paid public sector workers TUPEd out when public sector work was put out to tender. It often followed that those public sector workers who were members of various unions were 'encouraged' to forego their union membership by their private sector employers. ' I don't understand why people criticise unions for looking after the interests of their members when the private sector has employer 'unions' representing the employers' interests. Some of those employer interest groups indulge in membership of dubious organisations such as the old Economic League (I can't remember its 'new' title). And employer organisations come together under the umbrella organisations e.g. Federation of Small Businesses, Institute of Directors, Confederation of British Industry etc - a rough match for the TUC. Both 'sides' recognise that there's strength in numbers.

My dad built Channon's house on the outskirts of Fair Oak (I've got a photo of the topping out ceremony) David Armstrong lived in the same close as my parents (that my dad also built) I Looked around Terry Paine's house in Bitterne when we were looking to move back down to the area in the late 60s

Never heard of BIDMAS - just worked it out as I would have done 50 years ago and got.......... 9! Yay, go me

Yes I'm disappointed too, Trousers - but I'm also heartily SICKENED by all those sycophantic good wishes from Saints supporters!

I just read this too, on the Guardian web page. One query - how can he have fielded an unregistered player? Oh hang on, it's Redkrapp we're talking about, isn't it

I've just read this very interesting article about architecture (or lack of) in our fair City. http://www.jonestheplanner.co.uk/2011/07/southampton-dreams.html Sadly I don't get 'home' anywhere near enough these days so I don't have an up-to-date view, but it does sadden me when I see so many grand old buildings demolished.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/02/chemical-export-syria-uk

Here's a look at the information being peddled on both sides of the argument http://www.fair.org/blog/2013/09/01/which-syrian-chemical-attack-account-is-more-credible/

This man's opinion and article may well dampen down enthusiasm if what he suggests is true http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/30/financial-crisis-looms-addiction-cash-injection

I went to a Wycombe Wanderers pre-season match v Chelsea just to stand very close to the touchline to watch Wayne Bridge

Guardian

How about 'prawns' then? Or is that too posh for them?

I've said this before - I have good reasons to suspect there's some truth in these allegations. Not directed at me, you must understand, but at a damce troupe I was managing. They were all 'over age' and it was all not very subtle suggestive comments, nothing more......

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23880768