Wheeze

A Horton clockwise day yesterday. Blackberries nearly over, dandelion flowers sparse but a good showing of clusters of tall, closed & flaky white mushrooms in the verges. No idea what they are called. Might be edible but despite looking quite big I don't think there would have been very much to them, not much meat on the cap.

In between whiles I was working up my latest wheeze to save the country from spongers.

Step 1, add a rule to the benefit bible which says that all long term claimants for benefit have to do 30 hours unpaid community work a week. Consider the option of giving them the alternative of service in the winter sprouts fields of darkest Lincolnshire (with free baked beans to give them good protection against the sub-zero per-dawn temperatures then prevailing. Can't say fairer than that).

Step 2, contact a couple of friends who provide care services to the infirm, the elderly & the disabled and who specialise in employing unskilled & unmotivated workers.

Step 3, contract with the couple of friends to use the new community workers to provide said care services to the infirm etc, for whom they pay me, the government that is, half the minimum wage. Charge the customers for care 75% of the normal rate, a generous discount of 25% to allow for the lack of experience, motivation etc.

Step 4, make an appropriate number of skilled, experienced and fully minimum waged care workers redundant. Most of them will be middle aged married women who are unlikely to try and claim benefit on their own account.

Step 5, can any care customer satisfaction surveys that we might have on the go. I can rely on my friends to provide quality care at quality prices, so there is no need for any additional bureaucracy.

Step 6, sit back and trouser the profits accruing to government, hopefully financing another tax break for a rather larger number of friends.

I don't think I have got it quite right yet, but it is a good scheme, one with some clear winners and just a modest number of small losers. I am pleased to be able to say that I know that the Prime Minister is on the case and he should have it all up and running in short order.

PS: Professor Google suggests that the mushrooms might be coprinus comatus.