Exposure

Thank you Mr Darling.

I could have said: "VAT'll do nicely," (remember the American Express ad of the late 1970s?)*

Except it doesn't do nicley at all.

Next week , as a result of the chancellor's generosity, I'll save an utterly insignificant 45p on my big shop.

I've just returned from my regular outing to the evil emporium.

I usually leave supermarket receipts in a pocket so they get all mashed up in the washing.

But this time I held onto it and scanned the list of groceries to see what an economy-boosting difference this week's cut in VAT to 15% will make when it comes into force on Monday.

The answer is barely more than zero.

Pretty much everything that on your typical grocery list is zero-rated for VAT, ensuring that shoppers like me save virtually nowt.

Except, bizarrely, for the savings on toilet paper.

Next week, you'll be relieved to learn, a dozen rolls of Andrex will cost you 11p less.

Don't spend it all at once.

The most expensive item in my trolley was a very pleasant bottle of Scotch whisky - the Bailie Nicol Jarvie - which has lots of old-fashioned writing on the label but is dead cheap.

Down next week from a bargain £12.19 to £11.93, saving 26p.

Kitchen roll - an unquestionable luxury - tumbles from £1.15 to a jaw-dropping £1.13.

Chocolate buttons, the giant ones of course because they taste much nicer, will plummet from 98p to 96p.

And a big carton of lovely orange juice is about to drop off a price cliff from £2.00 to £1.96.

By the way, if you want to this yourself, just multiply the current price of a VAT item by 0.9787234 and you'll get the price with VAT at 15%.

No really. (My remarkably clever wife worked this out for me).

So little of the stuff we regularly buy to fill our bellies is VAT-able - which is a good thing, of course.

It just means that the chancellor's grand gesture makes virtually no difference.

*And the Pamela Stephenson take-off on Not The Nine O'Clock News? Can't find it on youtube unfortunately.

Posted by John Jeffay at 09:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The world is full of lunatics with conspiracy theories.

. . . as well as one or two sensible people.

Here's mine:

It's called "How to avoid spending money on public transport improvements for one of Britain's largest cities without looking like you're the bad guy."

First dream up a fantastic array of improvements, worth, let's say, the best part of £3bn.

Then dangle them in front of the people of Manchester.

But introduce a catch, a really big catch.

You can only have the money if you agree to a punitive tax called the congestion charge.

The catch is so enormous and so blatantly unjust that despite a clever propoganda programme designed to make us think maybe we should vote for it, common sense prevails and it is rejected.

And so the £3bn is snatched off the table, our creaking public transport system slowly grinds to a halt and the government points an accusing finger as if to say: "Look, it's your own fault for voting no."

Roll on 10 December.

Posted by John Jeffay at 10:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The lovely people at Tesco can't be too chuffed.

They took out a full page ad in yesterday's Daily Mail. Spend £30 and you can buy the new Indiana Jones DVD for £9.

Turn over the page and there's an ad for their rivals Morrisons.

Buy the same DVD for £8. And with no strings.

As Tesco themselves say, every little helps.

Posted by John Jeffay at 03:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A leaflet entitled "Your congestion charge exemption. Important information." dropped through my door.

It starts with these words: "The Association of Greater Manchester Authorities is proposing to invest . . . "

It looks official. But it is no such thing.

I turn to the back and find it is propoganda by The Greater Manchester Yes Campaign.

It attempts to make the congestion charge sound nice and cosy by listing all the groups who won't have to pay.

The proud boast is that 9 out 10 people will not be required to pay the charge.

Well, I have to say that with so many people not paying, it hardly seems setting the thing up for a tiny minority of Mancunians.

For the 10% who somehow deserve to be punished becuase they have a 9-5 job in the city.

Clearly this 9 out of 10 claim is not true.

The Yes leaflet is designed as a form to "help you to see whether you will be affected by the charge".

Tick the right boxes and it tells you that won't have to pay. Fine.

So people who don't drive to work have a box to tick. Insomniacs, shift workers or journalists who are at work in the city before 7am tick a box, and so on.

There are eight boxes here, which make it look like a huge list of exemptions, but in reality it tells you that the charge is at peak hours and doesn't affect blue badge holders and motorcyclists.

But then it lists another 13 supposed exceptions under "Friends and family" and "Leisure". These are, frankly laughable.

"My parents sometimes come to visit at weekends" Tick the box.

"I drive to have Sunday lunch with the rest of the family" Tick the box.

"I shop at the Trafford Centre between 10am mand 4pm" Tick the box.

"I drive into Manchester to socialise in the evenings and the weekends" Tick the box.

. . . .You get the message. By the time you've ticked all the boxes - assuming there are no more pressing demands on your time - you could be forgiven for imagining that somehow you are actually exempt from the charge.

They've dreamt up so many boxes to tick - all associated with positive parts of your life - that you may, by association, just begin to imagine that there's something worthwhile about the charge itself.

Do not be deceived.

However many boxes you've ticked, you will end up paying sooner or later.

The "9 out of 10 won't pay" claim is simply wrong.

Do the Yes campaigners have secret stash of data on our relationships withj our parents, where we shop and when, our Sunday lunch preferences?

Of course not.

And yet this leaflet - cleverly concocted to look like an authoritative despatch - suggests that these are all known facts, which have allowed them to come up with their 9 out of 10 figure.

There's little more than a month left until we have our chance to accept or reject the proposals. Vote wisely!

Posted by John Jeffay at 08:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Shopping in the dark.

It Asda be one of the daftest green gestures so far.

Supermarkets seem desperate to take the lead in eco-nonsense stuff and Asda deserve some sort of negative recognition for this awesome initiative.

I went to their Pilsworth store, in Bury, after dark, only to find customers groping their way down the aisles because they're turned off so many lights.

An assistant confirmed that this was designed to "save the planet". She shrugged. I shrugged.

Then I peered into the fridge, trying to work out what vegetables I was buying in the gloomy half-light.

Making your shop look like it's closed doesn't encourage customers. It doesn't make them think you're worthy and caring. It just makes you look stupid.

Please put the lights back on.

PS I have railed in this blog against the plastic bag crusade before and will, no doubt, do so again. Today it was reported that the Welsh Assembly wants to persecute shoppers who ask for a plastic bag by charging them 20p. Yes 20p.

Posted by John Jeffay at 06:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"ROBBIE Williams stayed in room five."

We're wandering around Rockfield, the residential recording studios, where we're staying for the weekend.

Friends sleeping in room four are visibly disappointed.

The owner, Kingsley Ward, (also a hobby farmer) stands there in his wellies and muddy jeans.

"Freddie Mercury played this piano. You can have a go if you like. They recorded Bohemian Rhapsody here."

It's all very matter of fact. Surreal almost. My sister in law is tickling the late Freddie's ivories and my nephew is bashing hell out of a set of drums.

The converted stables at a farm near Monmouth, South Wales, don't look like much.

But anybody who's anybody has recorded here, and probably stayed in the Coach House that is currently our (weekend) home.

Last month the Manic Street Preachers were here. Black Sabbath are coming. KT Tunstall and Simple Minds were here a while ago, as was Badly Drawn Boy.

Kingsley, founder and owner, stands in the middle of his very famous recording studio and tries to recall who else has - or more to the point who hasn't - recorded here.

The Gallagher brothers sat on the wall outside and took it as their inspiration for Wonderwall, he tells us.

Motorhead, The Stranglers, Paul Weller, Kasabian, The Stone Roses, New Order, Coldplay, Julian Lennon. Iggy Pop - they were a bit difficult - er New Order, er The Pogues.

He's got a proper list somewhere, but he only started it in the early 80s. (Click here for more.) There were loads before then.

Rockfield is the name of the village - and it took a while before he realised it wouldn't be such a bad name for a studio, when he set the thing up, almost by accident in the late 50s.

It's been a hit ever since.

Stick Rockfiled into Google and you'll see it's one of the world's most famous recording studios.

Bands love coming here. It's remote, it's quiet, it's rural, it's a great place to spend a few weeks doing whatever it is musicians to make records, or MP3 things.

But the place is available as a very modestly-priced short-term self-catering holiday let.

Seven big en suite rooms clustered around a dining, lounge and kitchen area. Comfortable, but not fancy.

As a residential recording studio it's almost unique, especially in an era when kids with a laptop can do what olden times people did with a mixing desk the size of a double bed.

But it has charm, and a lack of pretension all of its own.

One favourite detail of mine is the sign asking musicians to make sure there are no cats inside before they lock the studios for the night.

Posted by John Jeffay at 09:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

There's blood on the carpet at the BBC, at last.

Radio 2 controller Lesley Douglas, has, very nobly, quit.

Russell Brand has quit.

Jonathan Ross has been suspended without pay for 12 weeks.

And everybody has said how terribly sorry they are.

Or, put another way, two outrageous comedians have been sacked for being outrageous, while their bosses wring their hands and wonder how it could all have come to this.

Ross and Brand both have a track record - one which the BBC has unashamedly rewarded and encouraged with vast amounts of money.

These two ain't Morecambe and Wise, they ain't The Two Ronnies.

They are rude, they go too far, they cause offence, they overstep the mark.

They are children. They need looking after.

Where on earth were the grown-ups while these two naughty boys were left home alone playing with matches in the studio?

They need babysitting, for goodness sake. They need some sense of discipline.

You can't reward bad behaviour with loads of sweets and then be surprised when your kids start showing off.

You don't pay someone £18m to be outrageous, then get all upset when he's a bit more outrageous than you expected.

Get real.

The bad boys deserved a good slap, and they've now had one.

But it's the absent parents who need a real kicking from social services for failing to keep any sort of an eye on them. For leaving them with a fridge full of food while they fly off to party in Ayia Napa.

Lesley Douglas has fallen on her sword, but what about every tier of management between her and the studio producer who, knowingly or otherwise, allowed this programme to air?

Posted by John Jeffay at 09:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Stand by for the latest and most ridiculous item of green nonsense I have ever encountered.

Lest you forget to re-use your shopping bags, Sainsbury's has introduced a text message reminder service.

You tell them the time and day of your regular shopping trip and they'll send a message saying something like: "Remember to bring carriers. The planet depends on you!"

I thought I was relatively unshockable when it comes to hardcore examples of environmental ridiculousness.

But I had to look twice - and felt I had to offer photographic proof. See above.

I was not mistaken. This is not an April Fool's joke.

Nor is it the runner's up entry in the National Eco-Lunacy Awards 2008.

It is reality.

The director of corporate greenness has decreed that little leaflets be printed (recyle-ability of paper not stated) to publicise this service and to advise customers that Sainsbury's values make us different".

Well I can't argue with that. But my interpretation of "different" in this case is er, bonkers.

Words fail me. I only wish their zeal were put to proper use.

. . . Or maybe, just maybe . . . .

The cynic in me just begins to wonder whether this holier-than-thou, non-profit, see-the-light initiative has nowt to do with global tepidness.

And everything to do with simple mechanics conditioning customers into a regular pattern of visiting their stores and spending their dosh. In a very clever disguise.

Hmmm.

Posted by John Jeffay at 09:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Everyone else has had their say on the Andrew Sachs incident - or Manuelgate as nobody else apart from me has dubbed it.

Gordon Brown and David Cameron have joined the fray.

Thousands of non-listeners have complained to the Beeb. And even some of the people who heard the offending show have complained. Now it's my turn.

The whole thing has attracted more worldwide news coverage in the last 24 hours than Barack Obama (real non-made up fact researched by me: Google news articles on Obama earlier today 2,731; on Andrew Sachs 2,769).

It's been a slow-burn story. The media took a good long while before they whipped up some moral outrage.

And my guess is that now that the BBC has removed the sting by suspending Brand and Woss, it'll start to die down.

No sane person would condone what these two amusing fellows did. Taunting an elderly man - former Fawlty Towers actor or not - about his granddaughter's exploits ain't funny.

And while I have no sympathy for a pair of rude, self-indulgent, overpaid presenters, I think somebody higher up the food chain should carry the can.

Ross and Brand make their (very good) living by pushing it to - and beyond - the limit. It's their job to be outrageous.

It's their boss's job to keep them under control.

In all the acres of newsprint the point has been made again and again that this was not a live broadcast that went horribly wrong.

Ther two guys themselves realised they may have overstepped the mark. Why else would they offer a half-hearted musical apology.

So the warning bell was sounded, and still the high-ups didn't act. The story broke, and still they didn't act. Only when five national papers led on the story this morning did they feel sufficiently cornered that they took some action.

Not the sacking that the Mail and others demanded. But suspensions. Which can easily become reinstatements when all the fuss has died down.

Posted by John Jeffay at 04:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

. . . Or Great Green Gestures Volume 29.

Returned from reluctant shopping episode at TK Maxx, the retailer that doesn't seem able to spell its own name proprely.

I can have a bag for my purchases, but only if I pay, the assistant tells me.

Personally, she says, she wouldn't bother. It's a bit cheeky, she says.

Echoes my views, but I suspect she's not quite sticking to the TK Maxxx scrpit on this.

They cost 2p, 4p or 6p, depending on size, she says. And no, the money doesn't go to TK Mazx, it goes to a green charity that is saving the world.

A fellow shopper has been listening in on our exchange, takes pity on me - not that I need pity, of course - and offers me a spare Morrsions plastic bag she has about her person.

I say thanxx and gladly accept, pleased in my own tiny-minded way that I've not been cheated out of coppers for a bag, yet at the same time feeling that despite my best endeavour I have actually succumbed and done the very thing the crusaders wanted. I have joined their war on global tepidness.

Sometimes, even with the worst of intentions, you ending up winning.

Posted by John Jeffay at 08:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)