30/06/2009 by admin.

If I hear another editor complain about a tight budget, I’ll scream!

Perhaps I was just too optimistic when I left my previous employment. But looking back, the slide had already begun. Here are the critical stages:

1) Offer of a retainer is withdrawn in the week leading to my last day

2) “Special” rate withdrawn when I make it known that I am filing stories to rival publications.

3) Page lead plus internet content paid for with a cheque for £9.50 by a well known weekly newspaper. Editor increases it to £25 after I complain but nothing else is ever used.

4) Former employer uses fewer and fewer stories, prefering to beaten to them by smaller rivals than pay.

5) Once prompt payers wait an extra month before settling invoices

6) Top story sent to regional title greeted by email from a reporter “looking forward to working with you”.

7) Claims for payment for photographs ignored

Press releases used in preference to live copy which arrives first

9) Magazine asks if I can supply pictures - “otherwise we’ll have to pay for them”.

10)…and the best yet: “Oh, we thought you had sent us a press release. You mean it was a story???”

but are we downhearted?

Posted in Journalism | Print | 1 Comment »

24/06/2009 by admin.

The sad death of vet Liz Crowsley, 49,who was walking her dogs along a stretch of the Pennine Way, Gayle in upper Wensleydale, North Yorkshire, calls into question the responsibilities of farmers.

All walkers have a responsibility, of course, to respect the stock in the fields they are crossing but I have come across some pretty angry cattle. The bullocks below (the picture is taken from the style I had escaped over in the Yorkshire Dales last week) were quite craven when faced down…but still pretty alarming.

https://share.acrobat.com/adc/document.do?docid=3f74a462-b1d9-4440-9531-4469b74335ff

Heifers, strangely, can be even bolder and the worst experience I have had involved a group of older cows in Northumberland. They had just been moved in the field by the farmer – by chasing them with a West Highland White Terrier – and that had prepared them nicely for the sight of our two Jack Russells.

They charged, I faced them - which usually does the trick – but there was one which almost didn’t stop. It did… just….and let out the most venomous bellow in my face you could imagine.

Posted in Outdoors | Print | No Comments »

20/06/2009 by admin.

Not only, has Labour MP Ian Stewart managed to avoid the expenses scandal, but he has proved himself a bit of a hero to boot. He had to be  prevented by police from diving into the River Thames to try to rescue a man who jumped off Westminster Bridge outside the House of Commons.

The Eccles MP had kicked off his shoes and was preparing to go into the river as the man disappeared under the water was being carried downstream by the fast-flowing current.

But armed officers who were guarding MPs and their guests on the Commons Terrace outside the Strangers Bar which overlooks the Thames stepped in and ordered Mr Stewart not to enter the water.

A fire brigade rescue boat and a river police boat arrived within minutes and managed to snatch the man from the river, guided by onlookers from the terrace,  before taking him to hospital.

Mr Stewart, whose constituency will disappear at the next election, was entertaining visitors from Greater Manchester and Merseyside after a parliamentary reception for the North West Rail Campaign and Merseytravel which was hosted by Liverpool MP and Transport Select Committee Chairman Louise Elman and attended by new transport minister Chris Mole.

He said afterwards: “Nobody seemed to be doing anything so I thought I had better go in but  the police stopped me.”

Earlier in the day, he had rescued me when he spied me trying to get through a locked glass door in Portcullis House. I was in the process of being told by a policeman: “You can’t just wander around this place, sir”, when Ian opened the door from the inside and let me through.

Posted in Politics | Print | No Comments »

20/06/2009 by admin.

A VETERAN airport campaigner and a Manchester MP clashed at a meeting of the Commons Transport Select Committee over to cost of air travel.

Jeff Gazzard, who lives near Manchester Airport and is a long-time opponent of the second runway, claimed that it is now as cheap to fly to Prague as catch a taxi into Manchester and demanded that air fares should be put up to discourage people from flying.

He was called to give evidence to the Committee - which is preparing a report into the future of aviation – as a director of the Aviation Environment Federation…and faced Blackley MP Graham Stringer who once led Manchester City Council - the airport’s biggest shareholder.

Submitting, Manchester Airport’s passenger figures, Mr Gazzard said: “We have some concerns that regional airports are overstating their case for expansion.

“The airport’s forecasts when seeking to build a second runway were a target of almost 30 million passengers by 2005 – actual numbers were 22 million representing a staggering 27 per cent shortfall.

“Similarly, aircraft movements are way below forecast too. This means that the economic benefits claimed at the time construction permission for the second runway was sought and obtained will also be significantly lower than predicted.

“We would ask the committee to note this underperformance by the UK’s largest airport outside London and the South East.”

Mr Stringer told him: “You do not like aviation and you are targeting it even though it only contributes five per cent of the pollution.

“How do you say to my constituents earning £15,000 a year and can just about manage one holiday a year to the Costa Brava that they should pay more?”

Mr Gazzard, who had also clashed with Sheffield MP Angela Smith about raising fares for ordinary people by imposing air passenger duty, replied: “People who fly once a year to the Costa Brava need have anything to fear from between £3 and £30 of the price of air tickets.”

Posted in Politics, Transport | Print | No Comments »

12/06/2009 by admin.

I thought I would be a bit richer by now. Not necessarily a private jet but perhaps a Mercedes or two.
But all is not lost. After almost two years as an entrepreneur, I am enrolling for the Chamber’s “Exciting business opportunities for SME’s in the public sector” seminar. So this time next year, I’ll be a millionaire.
In a former life, I was once approached by a foreign transport company bidding for a public contract in Greater Manchester. They thought that a rival was being unfairly favoured and after an investigation, I agreed.
Sadly, my superiors dithered and while the article mouldered in the “pending” tray, the foreign company gave up, obviously doubting our courage, and dropped their complaints. The story was eventually used on the business pages but by then, it was seriously devalued.
I should have been warned by that episode of the misery which lay ahead. That same company told me it had spent 10 YEARS pitching for large project in South America, only to lose it.
Fast forward, and here I am tendering for my own company…and what a nightmare. Over the last two years, I have probably wasted as much time on preparing pqq’s and tenders as actually doing any useful work.
I have forked out for £5m of employee liability insurance, even though my only employees below board level are two Jack Russell dogs. And one of those has adopted a consultant’s role, lying around on the bed all day waiting to alert me to the arrival of the mail. I would sack him but for my Equality and Diversity Policy.
I have £10m of public liability insurance – and a Health and Safety Policy to avoid ever having to draw on it. Rochdale Council insists I recycle all my household waste. Does that count as an Environmental Management Policy? I’m good at what I do but apparently I need a Quality Assurance Certificate to prove it.

The blurb for my Chamber course speaks of “difficulties in identifying contracts and overly bureaucratic tendering processes” which have put off many small businesses from “getting a slice of this lucrative market”.
Well, I’ve identified the contracts but that is only half the battle. Consider this latest email exchange with a public body with which I have had a long association:
THEM: Dear All, We have now completed the evaluation of the PQQ submissions which we received. Unfortunately, I have to inform you that your submissions have not passed the evaluation process with sufficiently high a score to be able to be passed to the ITT stage.I would like to thank you for the effort which went into the submissions and for providing us with the opportunity to review them. Regards, XXXXXXProcurement Category Manager
ME: Is there to be any feedback?
THEM: Alan, My apologies - on looking for your scores I now realise that although we have a record of issuing a PQQ to yourselves, we did not receive a submission. Please ignore my earlier e-mail. Regards, XXXXX
I am considering my position on that one. I’ve found the completed pqq on my laptop. It was submitted EIGHT months ago. There is little chance of proving that they lost it as all I did was put it in the post. I guess hand delivery is the way forward…though it’s difficult when you are reaching out to the north of Scotland one minute and Cornwall the next.
Then there are the stupid things you do – like spend most of a holiday finishing of the forms for one tender and then taking the word of the woman in Smiths that the envelope you buy is not a “large” and only needs an ordinary first class stamp. Only when we got home – after the closing date - did I check it against the GPO template and discovered that it was, in fact, a “large” and is probably still waiting in a post office in Middlesbrough awaiting the excess payment.
Still, it’s marginally better than applying for jobs. I have a growing blacklist of large public organisations – including Manchester and Salford councils and Salford University - who don’t even bother replying. And my seminar will, I am sure, help me get over the Catch 22 of public organisations demanding a huge turnover before handing out a contract.
And then, who knows, this time next year….

Posted in Journalism, Business | Print | 1 Comment »

10/06/2009 by admin.

Very amusing piece on BBC news about their discovery that an MP was being paid by the Caravan Club and asking questions about caravans and the Olympics.

It was a long piece and they had got somebody to drive a Jeep across Westminster Bridge so they could get the House in the background. There must have been a convenient turnaround somewhere because the same car and carvan drove past about six times!

Posted in Media, Travels, Motors, Politics, Transport | Print | 1 Comment »

10/06/2009 by admin.

Another train driver has just escaped with his life when a swamp dweller dropped a block of concrete from a bridge. Let’s hope he is caught and put away for attempted murder.

It reminds me of something the great Lew Adams once said: “When I was a train driver, boys ysed to stand on the embankments and wave. Now they throw stones.”

How sad is that?

Posted in Transport | Print | 1 Comment »

10/06/2009 by admin.

I took the government’s Station Champion, Chris Green, out to lunch yesterday. Her was full of p[raise for Piccadilly. Then I showed him Victoria and he reckoned it was THE worst major station he had seen.

Just a year ago, I agreed not to reveal the detailed plans for redevelopment because they were so commercially sensitive.

So commercially sensitive, in fact, that they have now been abandoned.

Posted in Transport | Print | 1 Comment »

08/06/2009 by admin.

 I am having to pass on the chance of an interview with the great Yosser Hughes himself on Wednesday to go to a conference.  Bernard Hill has voiced over a stunning tv and cinema ad for the West Coast Main Line.

Below is Network Rail’s press release and I have put the ad onto youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgLkYLbYpGs

Manchester-born Bernard Hill, who is one of Britain’s best loved actors, (Théoden in The Lord of the Rings film trilogy; Yosser Hughes in Boys from the Blackstuff) provides the voiceover for a television commercial which airs for the first time today (Monday 8 June 2009), as Network Rail marks the completion of one of its biggest re-building projects and ramps up the work on its £35bn five year plan to improve Britain’s railway. The campaign showcases the major upgrade on the West Coast main line which has slashed journey times and resulted in more trains with more seats for passengers. It celebrates British engineering at its best and underlines the fact that Network Rail has a massive array of projects ongoing across the country and is looking for high calibre people to help deliver them. Network Rail’s chief executive, Iain Coucher said: “We are justifiably proud of what we have achieved on the West Coast main line – Europe’s busiest mixed use railway. Built in the 19th century, we have rebuilt it for the 21st. The campaign highlights the huge benefits for passengers and we hope this will persuade more people to get out of their car, shun internal flights and get on the train – the most environmentally-friendly option. “Passengers are voting with their feet already – in 2004 rail only took a one third share of London to Manchester journeys. Today it takes two-thirds and is still growing.” Mr Coucher added: “The West Coast programme shows that Network Rail can deliver on major projects. It was difficult at times and we have built on these experiences to improve our delivery ever since. In the next few years we will transform Britain’s railways with schemes such as Thameslink, Airdrie-Bathgate, Reading and the Great Western line, Crossrail, Birmingham New Street, King’s Cross and the Glasgow airport link. This is an exciting time to work on the railway and we are looking for world class people to join our team to make this a reality.”

Posted in Uncategorized | Print | 1 Comment »

05/06/2009 by admin.

Andrew Adonis has just become the first Transport Secretary since John Prescott to want the job, understand the job, to deserve the job.

I remember he agreed with me when I suggested that his peerage prevented him from ever rising above the rank of junior minister. We were both wrong, of course, but how fortunate is that?

The Labour government may not have long to go, but don’e be surprised if David Cameron asks him to stay on!

Posted in Uncategorized | Print | 1 Comment »