Arcadia, twelve years on... the donkey died

First published here in 2009 as 'Who Runs Britain?'

https://theylaughedatnoah.blogspot.com/2009/04/who-ruins-britain.html

__________________________________________________________________________________

It's not just the bankers and the politicians. I'm reading Robert Peston's book "Who runs Britain?" and I'm wondering about the social benefits of private equity entrepreneurs. 

Take store group Arcadia, for example. In the year 2000, it was acquired by Stuart Rose, at which time it had a turnover of £2.5 billion, debts £250 million and a market capital value somewhere around £100 million. "The business was viewed as dead meat when he arrived." Two years later, the turnover was down to £2 billion, but all the debt was cleared and the group was making an annual profit of £106 million. 

Rose then sold out to Philip Green for a reported £850 million (Peston says £775 million), of which Green's personal investment was only £9.2 million. 

In 2005/2006, Arcadia's sales were down to £1.8 billion, but profits had risen to £300 million, according to Peston. Green then made it declare a £1.3 billion dividend, £1.2 billion of which went to his wife - who by then was, technically, domiciled in tax-free Monaco. This record-breaking payout was funded by bank loans to Arcadia totalling £1.35 billion, with the result that the group's net asset position went from plus £303 million (in August 2004) way into the red - minus £807 million. You'll see that the dividend accounted for the decline in Arcadia's net worth, and more besides. 

Stuart Rose is like a man who buys a sick donkey, nurses it back to health and sells it at a profit. Green appears to me like the new owner who nurtures it further, then suddenly puts back-breaking quantities of heavy stone in its panniers and wanders off on other business, whistling merrily while the poor, over-laden beast staggers behind him in the wilderness. If it should stumble... 

I can see what's in it for the bankers (less so, their shareholders). I can certainly see what's in it for Philip Green. But what's in it for us? We work, earn money, pay taxes and what is left we spend in stores that export our capital. 

If this is to be the pattern for British business, we are finished. I don't see Johnny Foreigner making plans to take on the obligations of our Welfare State when we no longer make anything he wants; if he's looking for maltreated, ill-bred, indolent slaves, he'll find all he needs closer to home. 

Are we making a nation fit for Marxists?

Adam Curtis and the Oozlum Bird, by Sackerson

 I've just frittered away seven hours or so watching Adam Curtis' latest six-part video essay 'Can't Get You Out Of My Head' (available on BBC iPlayer, also on Youtube for non-UK residents: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHFrhIAj0ME .)

It tries to cover a lot of ground - mass movements, resistance to elites, whether humans can be manipulated and so on. But I think it stretches too far, generalises terribly and ends up with no definite conclusion, disappearing up itself like the Oozlum Bird https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oozlum_bird.

It gives us lots of interesting snippets, and looks as though it's making coherent sense because Curtis uses his familar tricks - strange dissociative music, lively footage of frightening events and so on. I think a corrective would be to publish the transcripts so we could spot the use of emotive language, insecurely founded assertions, questionable linkages.

Just for example, I pluck a couple of dubious statements and references from the fifth episode - I'm sure others could find more, throughout the series:

1. Curtis appears to suggest that the Brexiteers voted Out from some nostalgia for lost Empire. I have never heard anybody here, let alone a Brexiteer, state that they wanted to recolonise India and so on. On the other hand Curtis says nothing of the malign domestic socio-economic effects of our EU membership and globalisation generally, which in my view would go much further to explain ordinary people's frustration with the cosy cross-party pro-internationalism setup in Westminster.

2. Curtis quite rightly talks about the evils of the opium trade which Britain foisted on China; but in referring to the flood of silver this raised and returned to Britain, he fails to make mention of another trade that was a major factor: tea, payment for which the Chinese government insisted had to be in silver only, thus causing a monetary problem for Britain.

I'm not sure what the transcripts, presented as an Oxbridge undergraduate essay, would score from the dons. Sooner or later we must recognise that the 'flight from language' or the use of audio-visuals to override the critical faculty, has its limitations and pernicious tendencies.

FRIDAY MUSIC: Music for donkeys (Christopher Ameruoso), by JD

 Since we have now gone 'through the looking glass' to an upside down, back to front world, it is time for some light relief. We are in desperate need of some!

Music for Animals & Swamp Rock Music and this is provided by Christopher Ameruoso who plays a home made guitar fashioned from a cigar box. His guitar has three strings only (who needs more than three?) and from it he produces some wonderful slide blues with which he entertains his various animals in his animal rescue sanctuary. It looks as though they enjoy his music and join in occasionally! As well as being a fine musician he is or was a well known photographer of 'stars' with their pets. https://www.last.fm/music/Christopher+Ameruoso/+wiki

















There are more videos at this link, some of them less than one minute long and featuring music with lots of different animals, even a tame(?) brown bear!
https://www.youtube.com/c/ChristopherAmeruoso/videos

FRIDAY MUSIC: John Jacob Niles, by JD

 This week it is John Jacob Niles who was a major influence on all of the well known names in the 50s and 60s folk music 'scene' in the USA. You will either love his style or hate it, there is no in between!

John Jacob Niles (April 28, 1892—March 1, 1980) was an American composer, singer, and collector of traditional ballads. Called the "Dean of American Balladeers", Niles was an important influence on the American folk music revival of the 1950s and 1960s, with Joan Baez, Burl Ives, and Peter, Paul and Mary, among others, recording his songs.

In the 1920s, Niles began publishing music. He made four extended trips into the southern Appalachians as an assistant to photographer Doris Ulmann, again transcribing traditional songs from oral sources, including the ballads "Pretty Polly", "Barbara Allen", and "He's Goin' Away". On other occasions, he transcribed songs he heard sung by African Americans and by fellow soldiers in World War I.

Starting in 1938, he recorded a number of his compositions and transcribed songs, performing the material in an intense, dramatic manner. He employed a trademark very high falsetto to portray female characters, and often accompanied himself on an Appalachian dulcimer, lute, or other plucked stringed instrument.

Niles died in Lexington, Kentucky on March 1, 1980 at age 87. He is buried at the nearby St. Hubert's Episcopal Church. The John Jacob Niles Center for American Music at the University of Kentucky is named after him, and displays a number of traditional instruments he handcrafted.
https://www.wikiwand.com/en/John_Jacob_Niles



The above clip is taken from Martin Scorsese's film No Direction Home about Bob Dylan. As far as I know it is the only film of Niles performing. In the 70s the BeeGees sang falsetto in their 'disco' period and earlier The Stylistics and Aaron Neville had made falsetto their signature style of singing. But Niles had the advantage of having been an opera singer with, one presumes, the correct training of the voice and so his unique sound is much purer than other untrained singers. The style may take some getting used to because it is so distinctive but it is also electrifying or as Niles himself described it as the "electrifying effect of the male C# alto.

FRIDAY MUSIC: Sant Andreu Jazz Band, by JD

As well as an artist in his own right, the superb Spanish multi-instrumentalist Joan Chamorro, is the founder and director of the incredible Sant Andreu Jazz Band, a Jazz youth band based in Barcelona. But this is no ordinary youth band. The band have toured the world, playing festivals and events to packed out houses, recorded many albums and given birth to some stars, such as Andrea Motis. Having dedicated himself to the band for the past 14 years, it is very clear that the magic behind the band is Joan. The work he does is exciting, inspirational, innovative and he is exactly what the world needs right now.

JC describes his 'mission' in life as follows -

"The Sant Andreu jazz band started at a municipal music school in 2006. In 2012 the project grew a lot and we had to leave the School. Since that year, we are now a totally independent project. We do not receive any kind of help and the musicians who are members of the project (more than 60 young people between the ages of 6 and 22 have already passed) do not pay anything for the classes, or for the recordings, trips or anything. We can continue with everything we do because we have concerts that allow us to continue doing what we do (new arrangements, inviting international musicians, recordings, videos, my small salary, etc etc.)

"My passion is music and life in general. I like to believe that things can be done differently, with enthusiasm and with a lot of love. Of course, with a lot of work and dedication. Seeing how young boys and girls fall in love with this music and dedicate their time to it, achieving the result they achieve, it fills me with happiness and gives me the energy to continue working tirelessly on it."

https://jazzineurope.mfmmedia.nl/2020/04/the-magical-joan-chamorro/

BURNS NIGHT MUSIC, by JD

 Burns Night tonight - but any suppers will be clandestine affairs! However we can enjoy a selection of his songs as compensation accompanied by a wee dram of course.

As you can see from the list here he wrote a lot of songs!
http://www.robertburns.org/completesongs.shtml

(Just a note about the song "My heart's in the highlands" The poem is included in English language curriculum in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus hence all the comments in Russian to that particular video.)

SOMETHING FOR THE WEEKEND: Jab, by Wiggia

Vaccine salvation...

I wasn’t going to do a post for a while as we are embroiled in moving house or maybe moving house soon and there is a mega post in the not too distant future about the farce, and often a very expensive one, that constitutes the act of moving.

No, this about getting a vaccine jab. Since we are defined as extremely vulnerable, whatever that means these days, we got the call that we were being given a slot to receive our first jab, and were given times of 3.45 and 3.50 respectively, I naturally assumed it was to be like the normal flu jab, in and out at the chosen time in five minutes; how wrong I was.

No comment from me on the efficacy of the vaccine or any long term effects or whether we should be taking it at all; that bit has been done to death on social media blogs; even the MSM have had a small bite at it. The only reason I went along was because my wife wanted it and I have to drive her to the venue - difficult to just leave her there - and as it turned out, just as well.

When I received the phone call with our appointment I naturally assumed it was to be given at our large two-storey medical centre. As it has been and still is grossly underused it seemed the ideal place, but no, the authorities in their wisdom have decided we will have regional ‘hubs’. Buzz words abound since the pandemic arrived and are used in an attempt to confuse and amaze us at every opportunity, after all this time I have no idea what a ‘support bubble’ is and frankly don’t care, the whole thing has become rather amateurish, plain English has been sidelined in favour of woke phrases.

Anyway, the hub is not far from us and is itself another medical centre which adjoins a supermarket car park used by both and I assume is the reason for the choice.

On arrival we find a space and wander towards the medical centre or 'surgery' in old-speak, only to see an enormous queue stretching out from the entrance past the island flower beds, round the same and up to the walls of the supermarket. This can’t be right, I say, we have a dedicated slot and will never get in at that time despite being ten minutes early.

Alas dear reader the queue was indeed full of people with dedicated slots; it appears that they only give you a time to spread arrivals. Still it did appear to be moving and it was a lovely sunny winter's afternoon.

The queue of course was full of elderly people up to the age of eighty including my good self who is nudging in that direction far too quickly. Some were in wheelchairs, walking sticks were on parade and chairs, an ominous sign, were spread out along the queue line for those with ‘problems’.

It took over an hour in rapidly falling temperatures to reach the door, and even once inside the queue continued to snake round the entrance foyer until eventually the sliding door opened and you were given a ticket and ushered in to register, given a sheet of paper printed with yes/no questions on, 'have you recently been or are you susceptible to' etc. And then told to sit sit in a chair until called to one of the half a dozen desks to be assessed and signed off for the jab.

By now those outside were in the dark and plunging temperatures. What would have happened if it was pouring with rain or snowing as well, as it has been, I have no idea and nor do the people who think this is a good way to achieve their aim I suspect, a classic British fudge. No, it isn’t easy but during that shuffling hour outside, taking advantage of the scattered chairs because standing still is about the worst thing I can do with my arthritic hips, I had plenty of time to think of several ways this process could have been speeded up and improved; but who am I to complain, it’s free! And we are stoic and British.

The queue by the way was entirely white and if it had been viewed by the authorities I am sure they would have bussed in some BAME people to make it more representative and diverse and they could have sent them to the front of the queue to show grateful and humble we are as a nation.

We got talking to a lone lady in front of us who was a sharp as a tack. She was now on her own having lost her husband a couple of years back and has been suffering from cataracts; as is the norm now they won't even refer you until you are nearly blind and she was referred earlier this year. Still waiting, she is going private in a couple of weeks as the sight is so bad. What a nation, that can dump all ailments and diseases, many fatal if not treated, in favour of a flu virus. Something is very wrong indeed whereby that can be deemed acceptable in order to save the NHS, the same NHS that is in crisis every single winter.

Back inside we are called to the screening station which has a large poster of a hypodermic above the desk just to let you know why you are here, in case by that time hyperthermia had set in and you really didn’t care any more.

We passed scrutiny and a female doctor came read the paperwork and signed it releasing us for the next phase.

All the while as we shifted along some poor sod had to wipe the chairs with medicated wipes after we got up and moved. This applied to every person there and every time someone got up and was replaced; someone in the wipes manufacturing industry is making a fortune.

The lady doctor in charge of signing everyone off was working her backside off. She was literally running this arrival area alone. As I stood up to go to the jab area my bad hip almost gave way and she supported me as it looked like I was going to fall over; it was not that bad but something struck me as we spoke: she was the only person in the whole place not wearing a mask!

She was tireless and every now and then would go outside to the queue to see if any one needed to brought inside; several did.

The mask-wearing was interesting. In the outside queue I didn’t wear a mask but everyone else did, apart from one other rebel I spied some way back; people, especially the elderly. have been scared stiff by this incapable government and it increasingly shows.

Onto another wait area with numbers on seats. You are given a seat, eventually called and the seat is wiped again for the next recipient. Jab at last! Not quite: another small queue on a seat just wiped outside the jab area.

At last we were called in. Another young lady doctor received us, she was a rare thing in this day and age, ‘old school’, a sense of humour and a work ethic were evident. I asked out of curiosity why our medical centre was not being used to spread the load; she said the decision for regional hubs had come from above and anyway the doctors at our place would not want to interrupt their coffee break to help - 'refreshingly candid', I filed that under.

We replaced our coats and outside we had to wait for fifteen minutes in case of any reaction. Yes, you guessed it, more seat wiping before and after we left.

Making our way out into the dark you could just make out the queue in the glow of a couple of small street lights: it was as long as when we arrived. When we got back in the car the screen had frozen and the temperature gauge showed just over zero; by the time we got home it was minus one. That queue was in danger of giving people frost bite, utterly ridiculous - and we have to return for a second jab in twelve weeks.

Reaction to the jab: a bit woosy when I got home for about half an hour and a non stop streaming nose this morning. Was it all worthwhile? Not a clue.

One last thing about the regional hu:, my wife spoke to a lady who had come from a seaside town forty miles away for her jab, despite there being two regional hospitals nearby. Others had obviously travelled a distance also, as two mini buses drew up and disgorged their elderly passengers to join the long snake; they had addresses from far out villages. I would imagine some would find the journey a strain never mind a shuffling queue taking an hour to reach the door in the freezing temperatures and a total of two hours before leaving.

I am pretty sure Mr Hancock or his advisors will not be required to wait for their jabs under such circumstances so why should he think it is OK for the elderly to endure it? There is absolutely no sound reason our underused GP surgeries could not help out and spread the vaccination process; a bit more thought about the logistics is all that is required. Yet instead of that there is talk of bringing pharmacies into the process; now, since the pharmacist as it stands in this mad world is the only one regulated to give jabs. what will happen to all the medication dished out by the same pharmacist? The phrase 'run by idiots' comes to mind.

Not sure if they are jabbing today, but it is freezing and has been snowing, can’t think of a better way to bump off some more elderly people - perhaps that is the plan? They have been doing quite well in that area up to now; a final push!

The answer to the mystery of the single hub is that they are using the Pfizer vaccine. Because of the abnormal low temperatures it has to be stored at, this venue was decided on as the most suitable (?) Hence the people coming from far and wide for a jab.

As the Pfizer vaccine costs three times the AstraZeneca one and the latter can be used and stored normally, thereby lending itself to be used in many more locations, perhaps further purchases of the Pfizer one should be stopped; we could always use up the Pfizer one on politicians!