Hours Taking Minutes

Very seldom in my life have I ever brushed with bureaucracy. My
encounters with the Town Hall have been few and far between.

Only on one occasion did I ever really get involved.

I had bought this piece of land behind my house and needed permission
to build on it. Without boring readers with the circumstances, suffice
it to say that the likelihood of getting permission was very Iffy. The
plan, the location and the difficulties in actually achieving what I
wanted to do were all against me.

The District Planning Officers were all sitting on the fence...that is
they would be if the Planning Committee gave me permission to build
one!

It was therefore with some trepidation that I sat in the Public Gallery
of the Council Chamber to hear my fate. I was given a copy of the
agenda for the meeting which had no fewer than one hundred and twenty
seven items on it with mine being number one hundred and
fourteen...

After the first hour..by which time the meeting had heard less than
forty applications, I wished I'd taken a flask and some sandwiches. I
sank lower and lower in my seat as some poor reprobate had his plans
rejected because he'd submitted them in "mirror image" having
accidentally copied his drawings upside down and the wrong way
up.

The man next to me went into rapturous despair when the committee
decided that the pitch of the roof he'd built was a gnats cock of an
angle too steep and would have to be demolished. By the time number one
hundred and fourteen came up, two and a half hours later, I was
desperate. The proposal was read. No objections were raised. Heads were
nodded. Number one hundred and fifteen was called. I was totally
gobsmacked. I didn't actually say so but the sentiment was close.

To think of the hours of work that both I and the District Planning
people had put in..and the whole thing was over and decided in less
than ten seconds.

Our next Chronicle, therefore, is dedicated to the Bureaucrats.

A MINUTE OR TWO IN MIDDLETHORPE

N
estling in its own peculiar brand of congenial squalor, deep within the
rural obscurity of the County Borough of Toddlesworth on the Pee, lies
the picturesque urban nonentity known colloquially as Middlethorpe in
the Mire.

It could never be said of Middlethorpe that there was "Trouble a'
t'mill" principally because Middlethorpe didn't have a mill. There was,
however trouble a' t' Town 'all

Albert Stoic, Worshipful Mayor of Middlethorpe looked disparagingly at
the papers strewn across his desk. The look of resignation on his face
betraying exactly what he wished the author of said papers would
do.

"He's got to go you know." he opined.

"Who?" replied his wife.

"Cecil Arbuthnott..the Town Clerk."

"Dear Old Cecil..But he's an institution."

"He ought to be in an institution...Just take a look at these minutes
will you...This 'ere is supposed to be a true reflection of the
Planning Sub Committee Meeting held last Thursday week.... Now I
remember quite distinctly what was said at said meetin'. That daft old
codger Bertram Withers...."

"What you mean that old fellow in the flasher mac who carries that
placard around Toddlesworth market every Saturday emblazoned with "The
end of the World is nigh" ?"

"That's him."

"But he's been doin' that for twenty years..."

"I know. We said that to him but he reckons the sentiment is right but
he just got the timing wrong...He's now totally convinced that some mad
usurping little superpower despot is about to get trigger
happy...

Anyway, he tried for the umpteenth time to convince the committee to
let him build his own nuclear fallout shelter in the middle of the high
street next door to Clarence Braithwaite's chip shop. I said at the
meeting that I thought the whole thing was half baked....that is the
scheme not Clarence's chips...anyway.."

"I don't really see the point." replied the Lady Mayoress..a point
made, one assumes, because she didn't see the point. "Old Cecil takes
hours over the minutes."

"That's part of the problem. Cecil takes hours over the minutes when he
should take minutes over the minutes, anyhow it's not so much as to how
long the minutes take, it's what the minutes say when the minutes have
taken however long the minutes have taken to minute." replied his
Worshipfulness assuming all would become clear but serving the opposite
effect of confusing his lady wife even further."

"Ah but just hold on a minute."...his spouse interrupted.

"No. You just hang on a second." replied His Worshipfulness, keeping
the time theme going and now in full swing....

"The committee resolved that the proposed building was grotesque, out
of character with the surrounding environs and that forms should be
completed, the applicant should be personally told in one sentence of
the Committees final decision whereupon the case should be filed and
shut....That's what the minuted minutes should have been minuted as.
But what do the Minutes say?..and remember the minutes took
hours.

Quote:
The Committee resolved that the applicant was grotesque, half baked,
out of touch and should filled in fired and shot!"

"It also says 'ere that the vote against was unanimous. It certainly
wasn't. When it came to votes FOR the scheme that Rebecca Cloutworth
and the other members of the lunatic fringe shot their hands up so fast
you'd have thought their hairy armpits were on fire. Thank Heaven for
old Percy Golightly."

"But Percy's not on the Committee. He's not even a member of the
Council."

"Have you ever heard the expression..Stand up and be counted?"

"Of Course."

"Well 'e did and 'e was.

"By Cecil?"

"By Cecil."

"I still don't see the point" replied his confused spouse who still
couldn't see the point.

"Well, old Percy stuck his hand up to as a question when the NO votes
were being counted and the application was thrown out."

"I still don't understand it." replied the Lady Mayoress, still not
understanding it. "Cecil's been the Town Clerk for years..I mean he
might be ninety two but he's still full of enthusiasm..."

"The trouble with our Cecil" responded the Mayor "is that he's half
full of enthusiasm, and the other half's usually full of that Fred
Floggit's Apricot lager...and you know what that stuff's like...One
spoonful gives you heartburn, two spoonfuls cures foot and mouth
disease and after half a pint you haven't got the faintest idea whether
you're dancing the conga half naked on this earth or Fullers."

"So what are you going to do?" questioned the Lady Mayoress, who had
now finally got the point.

"Well I withdrew the minutes the minute I saw them." came the reply. "I
don't think old Withers could have seen them...least I hope not."

"'Fraid he must have. His solicitor's been on the phone...a minute or
two ago."

"Any message?"

"Only that he'll call back in a minute or two."

"Well that's it then. Old Cecil's got to go. I'll go upstairs for an
hour or two and work out how we can do it without hurting his feelings
too much...Of course the final decision will rest with the Resources
Committee...."

"And if this solicitor calls back?....No, don't tell me...you've had to
go out for a few minutes.

Albert nodded.

"Couldn't you just approach Cecil on your own dear? You know...a gentle
hint...a subtle word or two...?"

"My beloved" began the Mayor, in his most patronising tone, "You may be
the Lady Mayoress by marriage, but you know so little of politics. This
is a democracy dear. Decisions like that have to be taken by majority
view."

"But," replied the Lady Mayoress, in her most sarcastic tone, "If you
put such a decision to the Resources Committee, there'll have to be a
Committee meeting and someone will have to take the minutes!!!!"