Me and Daff went to visit poor old Albert in the loonybin yesterday. The old git is still in a catatonic state and repeating over and over again: “Lies! Lies! It vas all LIES!”
Later on, back at the Dog & Duck, we went over the events that led up to Al’s nervous breakdown.
“Well of course it’s all lies,” said Pat, “that’s what our £4million pays for. The truth would speak for itself. It’d not be value for our money if all they did was repeat it, would it like?”
“Hang on a second,” said Daffer Jones, “pass me that calculator.”
Now when an old salt like Daffer asks for a calculator, you know something is up. Last year he tore a strip off some young whippersnapper who dared to ask if he used GPS when he was at sea….
“We’ve missed one!” he said, “an absolute whopper, the biggest one of all!”
And we had, too.
Worse than 140,000,000 + 17,000,000 = 200,000,000 (rounding difference)
Worse than 0.53 x 190,000 x 52 x 3 = 200,000,000 (rounding difference plus an issue around where to put the decimal point)
Much worse….
Showing posts with label enormous investments. Show all posts
Showing posts with label enormous investments. Show all posts
Monday, 23 February 2009
Friday, 13 February 2009
Einstein suffers apoplectic fit
SCC’s £4million per year spin machine seems determined to give our auditor a nervous breakdown.
Apparently the Executive Committee doesn’t know about the hundreds of millions of pounds in savings that Jonesy & Co. have been announcing, and are actually proposing to put the Council Tax UP!
Unlike the rest of the regulars down the Dog n’ Duck (who are still confidently expecting a decrease of £100+), Albert was not actually surprised by this. That’s because he never believed all that stuff, and even refused to sign up to our summary.
The bit he took exception to this time went as follows:
“For a typical Band D household the increase will be just 53p extra per week … For such a small amount of extra money from each household the Council is able to plan over £200 million of investment in key services such as roads, schools and social care over the next three years.”
[There it is again! That famous £200million! SCC’s favourite number! Ed.]
Anyway, according to the SCC website there are 190,000 households in the county. And according to Albert Einstein, 0.53x52x190,000x3 does not equal 200,000,000.
“Zis time it is out by more zan a factor of 10!” He squawked at the bar last night.
“So what?”, said Daffer (who’s got the maths “O” Level, remember), “That just means they’ve put the decimal point in the wrong place again.”
“But zis is not “investment”, it is “running costs”, zey can NOT use such language…” said Albert. “It is misleading, nein! it is vorse, it is FRAUD!”
Now, when an accountant who also happens to be a famous mathematical genius uses the “F” word, people notice. Especially in a popular local pub that hasn’t even been shut down yet.
Which is how Carla Young came to join in the conversation, and ended up talking about “Excellence” into the small hours, long after the men in white coats had turned up to haul poor old Albert off to the local nuthouse.
A very interesting young lady, Carla - believe it or not she just happens to be a Public Sector Transformer from London who has recently moved into our area.
What a coincidence!
Apparently the Executive Committee doesn’t know about the hundreds of millions of pounds in savings that Jonesy & Co. have been announcing, and are actually proposing to put the Council Tax UP!
Unlike the rest of the regulars down the Dog n’ Duck (who are still confidently expecting a decrease of £100+), Albert was not actually surprised by this. That’s because he never believed all that stuff, and even refused to sign up to our summary.
The bit he took exception to this time went as follows:
“For a typical Band D household the increase will be just 53p extra per week … For such a small amount of extra money from each household the Council is able to plan over £200 million of investment in key services such as roads, schools and social care over the next three years.”
[There it is again! That famous £200million! SCC’s favourite number! Ed.]
Anyway, according to the SCC website there are 190,000 households in the county. And according to Albert Einstein, 0.53x52x190,000x3 does not equal 200,000,000.
“Zis time it is out by more zan a factor of 10!” He squawked at the bar last night.
“So what?”, said Daffer (who’s got the maths “O” Level, remember), “That just means they’ve put the decimal point in the wrong place again.”
“But zis is not “investment”, it is “running costs”, zey can NOT use such language…” said Albert. “It is misleading, nein! it is vorse, it is FRAUD!”
Now, when an accountant who also happens to be a famous mathematical genius uses the “F” word, people notice. Especially in a popular local pub that hasn’t even been shut down yet.
Which is how Carla Young came to join in the conversation, and ended up talking about “Excellence” into the small hours, long after the men in white coats had turned up to haul poor old Albert off to the local nuthouse.
A very interesting young lady, Carla - believe it or not she just happens to be a Public Sector Transformer from London who has recently moved into our area.
What a coincidence!
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