Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow! You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout Till you have drench’d our steeples, drown’d the cocks!

The BBC revelled in Hurricane Melissa which has caused devastation in Jamaica and led to dozens of deaths, describing it as ‘the worst storm in modern history’.

The clear implication is this is another ‘extreme weather event’ caused by man-made climate change and we must brace ourselves for a return to the Middle Ages to rid ourselves of all polluting energy sources before it’s too late and we’re all doomed.

But note the use of the word ‘modern’ because these 185 mph winds are not the worst in history. Back in 1780, the Caribbean was hit by no fewer than three hurricanes in one month.

The first October hurricane ‘decimated Jamaica’s Montego Bay to the extent that scarcely a vestige remained’. The second, the Great Storm, saw winds of 200 mph, threw cannons through the air, deposited a warship on the top of a Barbados hospital and stripped bark from the trees. It left 22,000 people dead. The third hit Cuba and Barbados where 6,000 people were killed, according to historian Nathaniel Philbrick’s “In the Hurricane’s Eye”.

Philbrick says the devastation caused the Spanish, French and British navies to change their strategies, which contributed to the United States winning independence. The point being that ‘extreme weather events’ are not a modern phenomenon. Even if the climate is changing, and even if we are partly responsible for it, the weather has always been with us. It’s always been fearsome, unpredictable and beyond our control. It’s wise to be a BBC-sceptic even if you’re not a climate-change sceptic.

https://allthingsliberty.com/2022/07/the-great-hurricanes-of-1780/

Jess and the disappearing majority

It’s very unfair making Yardley MP Jess Phillips take responsibility for the grooming gangs inquiry especially as there’s no chance it will come to any conclusion that states the bleedin’ obvious.

That would be more than Jess’s job’s worth because she will be fighting not merely the grooming-gang victims but a large proportion of her own Birmingham electorate.

Jess has seen her majority fall from 16,574 in 2017 to a mere 693 last year after a campaign of fear and intimidation against her and her supporters.

Given the state of politics in Birmingham, it seems unlikely Jess could have been given a more exposed role than that of Minister for Safeguarding and Violence Against Women and Girls.

Quite why another grooming gangs inquiry is necessary is open to question. We all know the terrible truth. We all know nobody will do anything about it. We all know an inquiry will take ages, cost a fortune and change nothing.

And in the meantime Jess Phillips, a decent MP worthy of respect, will lose her seat to some violent non-entity.

Whoops

Client ICAEW
Region UK
Sector Public Sector, Health and Not For Profit
Offering Organisation Design
Buzzwords
ActivityQ Data analytics Organisation design Organisation effectiveness OrgMaps Target Operating Model (TOM)
The Challenge

ICAEW – the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales – is the leading professional membership organisation for accountants and finance professionals in the UK.​

ICAEW was struggling to maintain it’s competitive edge, driven by a lack of member focus and an unclear value proposition. At the same time, the organisation was suffering from siloed working, outdated processes, and widespread duplication of activity, impacting efficiency and effectiveness. Recent organisation design efforts had been driven by individual preferences and had led to increased confusion and a lack of accountability, highlighting the need for an organisation-wide review using OD best practice.​

Q5 was asked to review the organisation and develop a new Target Operating Model, aligned to their new strategy, and design the organisational structure for the leadership teams down to two layers below the CEO. ​

Our Approach

Conducted 45+ stakeholder interviews​

Held three half-day workshops with the ‘Design Team’ comprised of all ICAEW leadership team members​

Developed a set of design principles and identified five key value drivers to guide the OD​

Analysed ICAEW’s People Data using Q5’s OrgMaps tool, deep-diving into spans and layers, tenure, salary and grading​

Surveyed the whole organisation using Q5’s Organisational Effectiveness survey (76% response rate) to uncover key pain points and themes to explore further​

Quantified activities for the top 60 managers in the organisation using ActivityQ to quantify and justify design decisions​

Presented a series of significant design recommendations to the Steering Group, as findings emerged from our quantitative and qualitative analysis

Key Outcomes

Developed a new Target Operating Model, centred around ‘Member experience’, organised across eight key pillars, each led by an executive team member​

Defined organisational structures for all roles down to N-2 (two layers below the CEO), encompassing the key leadership roles in the organisation​

Identified opportunities for cost-saving, to be explored further in detailed design​

Developed 30+ team charters for the key teams experiencing the most change​

Developed a high-level implementation plan, including a People Impact Assessment and Comms plan

The enemy within

Do we really have any state secrets worth stealing? I somehow doubt it.

Our Prime Minister may have misled Parliament and so on but the idea that we have top secret intelligence the Chinese are desperate to acquire seems a bit far-fetched to me.

Yes, they nick all our innovations and then reproduce them much more cheaply (a friend is seriously tempted by a Land Rover clone at half the price of the British-made vehicle).

But once a product is on the open market, it’s difficult to stop competitors fashioning their own cut-price versions which may, or may not, be inferior to the original.

But, serious though industrial espionage may be, that’s not the issue with the collapsed trial.

It just seems unlikely there’s anything much the Chinese or any other not-enemies might covertly glean that would somehow undermine our country and our way of life.

That’s happening already without any help from China or other not-enemies of the state.

All that glitters with our gold

Isn’t it great to see Richard Parker, Mayor of the West Midlands, supporting local consultants to the tune of well over £800,000 in August alone?

From big companies to small digital marketing experts, Mayor Parker continues to spread our money far and wide.

He even paid £27,500 to the Trades Union Congress for its advice on adult education not to mention £72,500 for Oxford Innovation to dispense business advice to small companies.

Then there’s August’s £297,000 spent on agency staff not to mention the £38,800 which went to our very own LinkedIn for staff recruitment costs.

Oh and he’s just paid £253,000 to Wolverhampton Council to meet its Mayoral election costs which is obviously a bargain.

Probably the most exciting payment was the £650 spent marketing ‘cycling for everyone’ with Amanda’s Face Painting, Glitter and Gems. I’m sure everyone looked lovely.

https://www.facebook.com/Amandasfacepaintingglitterandgems/?locale=en_GBThe

Brum coughs up for its own clean-air zone

While drivers entering Birmingham’s ‘clean air zone’ have paid out more than £100 million, it seems one group of motorists is exempt from the charge – the council’s own employees.

Since June 2021, they have used the bankrupt city council credit cards 2,500 times to meet the cost of the £8-a-day charge for using an old banger (£50 for HGVs, buses and coaches) in the city centre. This comes in at £388,084.

In October 2021, the council paid £19,766 in clean air zone credit card claims and the figure has been falling ever since, presumably because employees now walk to work to save the planet. However, even this August the city forked out £4,752 on its credit cards in clean air charges on employees’ vehicles.

The credit cards’ travels include £19,293-worth of Uber rides and £4,425 on taxis as well as £10,438 on Eurostar journeys and £4,500 with Virgin Atlantic.

I wonder if staff zapped by the council’s anti-car speed-limit reductions – apparently a ‘road-safety emergency’ and nothing to do with raising money – will get their fines paid by the taxpayer as well.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/motors/36885229/speed-limits-changed-birmingham-city-road-laws/

Andy Burnham's chauffeur-driven car habit

Andy Burnham, the Man Who Would Be PM, certainly knows how to live like a king if his £4,000-a-month chauffeur-driven limousine habit is anything to go by.

The alleged ‘King of the North’, ‘Prince Over the Manchester Ship Canal’ and ‘Old Pretender’ racked up a £12,765 bill with Prestige Chauffeurs Ltd between April and June this year.

In the first quarter of this year, he spent £9,315 on Prestige cars (the fleet includes Volvo V90 Estates and E Class Mercedes). In the last quarter of 2024, the bill was £12,416.

Oddly, the Mayor’s ‘transparency reports’ for June to September have been ‘cleansed’ to reveal only £333,000 of ‘legal liabilities’ out of an apparent total spend of £205 million.

Still, between April and June last year, the Mayor spent £11,940 on Prestige Chauffeurs bringing the total for four (non-consecutive) quarters to £44,711.

In the most recent quarter, this spending is mostly listed as being incurred by the Mayor’s Office. In earlier spreadsheets it’s listed as ‘Officers Travel & Subsistence’ so it’s possible the cars are being used by the Head of Paperclips or some other important functionary.

Otherwise, the Manchester Mayor’s spending is on a depressing par with his counterpart in the West Midlands with tens, or hundreds of thousands, doled out to organisations which seem to have been set up with the sole aim of providing a safe space for taxpayers’ money to be thrown in the vague hope that some of their pious promises may actually amount to something.

For instance, Greater Manchester Combined Authority paid £392,000 to Change Grow Live, a health and social care charity which turned over £307 million in 2023-4 and has £43 million in the bank. It coughed up £148,000 to We Are With You, a drug, alcohol and mental health charity who boast their social media content was viewed more than a million times. And another £195,000 went to Turning Point, who provide ‘free and non-judgmental support’.

Mind you, when I saw they’d paid £46,000 to a company called Squire Patton Boggs I thought it was a joke. It turns out to be a global law firm, not a purveyor of outdoor conveniences to the gentry.