Minutes of a Meeting of the Christmas Gift Delivery Steering Committee

Date: 26th December 2009
Location: Santa’s Workshop, North Pole
Attendance: Santa Claus, Mrs. Claus, Lesley the Chief Elf, Rudolf the Reindeer.

Agenda:
1. Christmas 2009 Post Implementation Review
2. AOB

Santa opened the meeting by expressing general satisfaction that the key targets had been hit. Gift production during the year had been adequate, though admittedly it was helped by the surplus inventory of presents carried over from 2008. All the good boys and girls had received their presents by the deadline, with the final gift delivered to little Benny Benson in the Aleutian Islands at 11.59pm local time (GMT-10). However, financial resources were still stretched and the deposit in Icelandic banks had still not been recovered due to some scepticism about verifying Santa as the account holder. Identity fraud was on a par with last year, with literally thousands of imposters pretending to be Santa. This also contributed to increasing cynicism from the boys and girls about Santa’s branding and his overall mission. Although targets were met, this was helped by two favourable but troubling factors: (1) believers in Santa Claus continued to decline, and the rate of decline appears to be accelerating despite overall population growth; and (2) the naughty list is the longest it has been since records began. Because of this, total gift distribution was down 0.3% on 2008. Even with the elves going to a three-shift rotation to keep the workshops running 24 hours a day throughout December, toy stocks only reached the required level within a few minutes of the delivery run commencing. Had the ratio of good children to bad children been the same as 2008, production would have needed to overrun by two days, leading to the potentially unacceptable situation that some children would only receive their gifts on Boxing Day.

Lesley the Chief Elf highlighted that elf productivity remained high despite poor working conditions and an uncompetitive rewards package. Elf dissatisfaction was made worse by inadequate leisure opportunities at the North Pole and because old-fashioned training and work practices were not keeping pace with the newest production techniques. For example, there was inadequate use of computer-aided design for new toys. A talented young elf will typically feel that they have to move on and seek new opportunities; staying at the North Pole too long will make it virtually impossible for them to move on to a more rewarding career elsewhere. As a result, many talented young elves were choosing to leave. The elf brain drain has got significantly worse. 800 elves migrated during 2008. The elvish engagement survey showed that 1 in 10 are seriously thinking of looking for work elsewhere. Lesley believed staff needed better basic salary and not an increase in performance-related bonuses as has been Santa’s preference in recent years.

Mrs. Claus suggested outsourcing of some final assembly of toys to Chinese factories. This would be a cost-effective way to reduce the dependency on Santa’s workshop. Using component suppliers from China had already worked well and had kept costs down in 2008.

Lesley observed that 2008 had seen increased numbers of complaints about the quality of toys and he believed this was due to the lower grade production standards for the Chinese component manufacturers compared to the very high grade of work demanded in Santa’s workshop. Management should also be wary of incidents in China like the widely-publicized story about using leaded paint to decorate toys.

Santa said that procedures for the selection and quality audit of suppliers had been stepped up this year. He expected fewer complaints in 2008 than 2009.

Rudolf suggested that the practice of leaving coal for naughty children should be discontinued. A strategy of strictly focusing on good boys and girls and ignoring the naughty children would cut costs and make more sense. Delivering the coal to naughty children added to costs because coal prices are rising, the coal greatly increased the weight carried on the sleigh, and giving coal was badly out of step with the need to conserve fossil fuels and tackle global warming. Santa agreed and said he would review alternatives. He felt that naughty children should get some acknowledgment to avoid the false perception that he had failed to notice them. One idea is to send them a note in January, outlining the reasons why the children had been included on the naughty list and not received a Christmas present from Santa.

Lesley questioned if there should be an appeals process for children who found themselves on the naughty list. Perhaps naughty children could be contacted in advance, in September, to give them time to appeal. Santa said that he was open to ideas but this would be problematic, as it would mean deciding which children had been naughty or good based on significantly less than a full year’s data.

Mrs. Claus said that she believed that despite increases in the number of naughty children reported, the real level of naughtiness was the highest it had been in memory. Standards had slipped and children who would have been on the naughty list in the 1950’s or even the 1970’s are now making it on to the same list with the good boys and girls. Expectations for presents were unreasonable and unprecedented. Greedy children that made excessive requests in their letter to Santa should be immediately disqualified from inclusion in the list of who has been good. This would help to reverse the decline in behaviour and reduce the strain on production. Much of the strain is caused by making presents for boys and girls who are essentially bad and undeserving.

Lesley felt that Santa had failed to move with the times and was pouring too much effort into making and distributing old-fashioned toys. Thanks to the internet, it would be much easier to give boys and girls a gift of a video game, or of music, a movie, or a computer program. A potentially unlimited number could be delivered electronically, and the marginal unit cost of production would be zero. This would justify investment in upskilling the elves by offering courses in topics like software engineering and the editing of sound and video.

Rudolf agreed that more gifts could be delivered digitally, and that this would help him and the other reindeer. However, he felt the essential character of Santa was to be traditional and this should not be diluted by diversifying too far.

Santa finds it increasingly challenging to make a personal visit to every home in order to deliver his gifts. Only a trivial number of modern houses have a chimney, meaning precious minutes are wasted picking door locks to enter each property, and Santa set off more than one house alarm during this Christmas night as a result. He asked Mrs. Claus to get quotes to use a parcel delivery service for perhaps a third of all gifts. The idea would be to rotate personal deliveries so every good child would still have a hand-delivered gift two years out of every three. Rudolf asked if this was opening the door to competitors that did not require children to be good or believe in Santa. Outsourcing both production and delivery would leave Santa’s gift service open to the accusation that it is no different to the service offered by Amazon. Santa said his gifts always arrived on time, and more importantly that the big difference between Santa’s gift service and Amazon is that Santa gives without expecting payment in return. Lesley questioned if this wasn’t the real underlying cause of all their problems. Santa’s business model was essentially flawed. Santa responded by asserting that altruism was essential to his mission and that he would rather close the operation down if the alternative was to start seeking payment from those who receive his gifts.

Mrs. Claus proposed a staggered Christmas to ease the burden of having a single annual deadline and making all deliveries on the same night. Rudolf said that although they had started making deliveries at precisely one minute past midnight on 24th December, and had taken advantage of timezones with a progressive delivery schedule from East to West, this still left them less than 36 hours to deliver everything. Per Mrs. Claus, it would be easier if deliveries were done on a quarterly basis. Each child would be allocated to a rota with the delivery dates being 25th December, 25th March, 25th June and 25th September. Santa felt this moving away from deliveries on the 25th December was too radical, and Lesley agreed with Santa.

Lesley felt that a franchising approach might be an alternative solution to the problem of a bottleneck delivery schedule for Santa. Instead of fighting santa imposters, perhaps they could introduce an accreditation scheme and let the proxy santas make the deliveries for their region. They would still distribute toys manufactured by the real Santa according to Santa’s list. They could receive a bulk shipment of the presents and a distribution list in advance of Christmas Eve. Some advantages would be getting more stock out of the warehouse early and simplifying overall logistics for the big day. Rudolf said there was a risk of fraud and that toys might not be in delivered to the right children. Santa was uncomfortable with the idea of trusting strangers and felt it was a deceit to use fake Santas, but he was willing to allow Lesley to do some research into the idea. He suggested Lesley begin by asking the Easter Bunny what his policy was on delegating responsibility for delivery. Lesley should also ask EB about his vetting procedures.

The meeting agreed that after working hard all year, they all deserved a break and they would adjourn to the pub unless there was any other business.

Mrs. Claus asked if the idea of giving people lots of material gifts was actually the wrong message for a religious festival. She was having second thoughts about the wisdom of putting all the money and effort into the annual Christmas programme as it currently stands. Santa responded that the festival was older than Christianity and, if anything, the pursuit of meaningless stuff as a temporary and throwaway source of pleasure is perfectly in keeping with modern attitudes to life.

The meeting was then adjourned to the pub with a view to cheering everybody up after another long and arduous December. Discussion of plans for the works’ New Year party would take place down the pub. It was commented that it was poor timing to have two big party occasions within a week of each other. Santa observed that if either date needed to change, it should be New Year that changes, because the start of the year could occur at any arbitrary date but Jesus’ birthday could not change. It would be better to have New Year on June 30th, to spread out the big party events. Rudolf said that celebrating New Year’s Eve at the end of June would be great because pubs and clubs would be a lot less busy than on December 31st.

A long time ago in a galaxy not so far away… there started a saga. It was called Star Wars: Parallel Universe for it was quite like Star Wars but set in a parallel universe located half way between the imagination of George Lucas and the down to earth realities of this planet. In the last installment, which was entitled Yet More Empire Strikes Back: Parallel Universe, Han and Leia had upset Darth Vader’s tea party, and Luke was on his way to Cloud City to join them.

[Luke touches down his X-Wing at Cloud City.]

R2-D2: Beep, bleep, whistle (translates as: “why do we always have to fly towards danger?”)

Luke: (Laughs) Don’t worry R2. There won’t be any trouble. They gave us permission to land, didn’t they? That means they must be friendly. You know how hard it can be to find a parking spot in cities like this.

R2-D2: Bleep, hum-beep (translates as: “maybe so, but where do we go to get our parking validated?”)

…

[In the car alarm chamber, Chewbacca is wrestling and pulling at the bars on the ceiling. The repeated noise of a car alarm is driving him insane. The noise suddenly stops. Han Solo is thrown in through the door.]

Chewbacca: Growl-roar-growl (translates as: “how you feel, old buddy?”)

Han: Not too bad. They switched off the car alarm in my booth and put on some Country & Western music instead. Dolly Parton, I think the singer was called. I kinda liked it. That made them really mad so they punched me a few times and threw me in here with you.

Chewbacca: (Turns and attaches C-3PO’s head to his shoulders.) Roar-roar-roar-growl-whimper (translates as: “come, help me fix up C-3PO.”)

Han: (Sarcastic) Good idea. A protocol droid is just what we need to bust out of this joint. He can bore the guards to death.

C-3PO: (Coming to life) Oh no! I’ve been shot! Stormtroopers, here? I must warn the others. (Looks around) Oh hello. I seem to be a little disoriented.

Han: See what I mean. What’d we do without ‘3PO?

[Leia is brought in by two stormtroopers.]

Stormtrooper Guard One: Here. We thought you’d be happier if you could all have a chat with each other.

[The stormtroopers exit.]

Stormtrooper Guard Two: Putting them all in the same cell - that seems a bit soft, doesn’t it? Why didn’t we put each of them into solitary confinement?

Stormtrooper Guard One: New rules. Prisoners have the right to socialize with each other. I hear the next thing on the cards is giving them the right to make a phone and to have legal representation. The Empire’s not what it’s cracked up to be, I tell you. I didn’t shoot Jedis in the back just to safeguard the rights of rebel scum.

[Back in the prison cell.]

Leia: Why are they doing this? They made me listen to Country & Western music until my ears bled. In other words, they made me listen to Country & Western music for a minute-and-a-half.

Han: (Groans) They never even asked me any questions. Peculiar, huh? I mean the troopers got a board game out - ‘Trivial Pursuits’ - and it’s basically a general knowledge quiz. But they wouldn’t ask let me play and wouldn’t ask me a single question. I tell you, if they let me answer the questions, I’d have had a couple of pieces of pie by now.

Leia: It must be another form of torture they devised.

Han: It was torture. I don’t know what they teach at stormtrooper school, but those guys are ignorant. I could have beaten them standing on my head. Which was appropriate, as I was tied upside down to the wall at the time.

[In walks Lando.]

Han: Get out of here Lando.

Lando: That’s exactly what I plan to do. Now shut up and listen. We’re going to make a break for it, in the Falcon. (Reaches out his hand) Give me the keys.

Han: You sell me out to the Empire, then want the keys to my ship? No way!

Lando: Have it your own way. I’ll hotwire it instead.

[Stormtrooper guards enter.]

Stormtrooper Guard Two: Come on, socializing time is over. Exercise time.

C-3PO: Goodie. I could do with stretching my legs. Wait! Where are my legs?

Chewbacca: (Holds C-3PO’s legs above his head.) Growl-whimper (translates as “Sorry, I haven’t had chance to reconnect them yet.”)

…

[In the freezing centre.]

Lando: We only use this facility for carbon freezing. If you put him in there, you might kill him.

Darth Vader: There’s no need to worry. Carbon freezing is just what we need. Solo is a carbon-based lifeform.

…

[Stormtrooper guards escort the prisoners to the freezing centre.]

Stormtrooper Guard Two: Why are we taking all the prisoners out, when they’re only going to freeze one of them?

Stormtrooper Guard One: Another namby-pamby rule about their rights. Last kiss goodbye, that kind of thing.

Stormtrooper Guard Two: Well, I suppose if my friend was being frozen, I think I’d be curious to watch.

Stormtrooper Guard One: Why? You might as well watch them freeze a bag of peas.

Stormtrooper Guard Two: I think I’d rather watch peas be frozen then listen to that Country & Western music. What fiend thought that torture up?

Stormtrooper Guard One: That would be Darth Brooks.

…

Darth Vader: Make sure Luke Skywalker makes his way to the freezing chamber. I want to fight him there. It should make for a good test of his skills - lots of staircases and places to jump around - and after he’s defeated, we won’t have to carry him far before we put him on ice. And it’s got a great, moody, colour scheme. All deep reds and blues. Nothing like the bland industrial plant you’d expect it to be. It’s a great place to have a fight with our light sabres.

Stormtrooper Captain: How do I do that?

Darth Vader: Excuse me?

Stormtrooper Captain: How do I lead Skywalker to the freezing chamber?

Darth Vader: I don’t know, use your initiative.

[The Stormtrooper Captain tilts his head to the side.]

Darth Vader: Ah yes. You clones don’t have much initiative, do you? Leave him a note saying “your friends are being held captive in the deep freeze chamber…” And make sure there’s plenty of signs saying “this way to the freezing chamber”. That should do it.

…

[The prisoners are led into the freezing chamber. They are lined up on the gangway.]

Chewbacca: (Strains at his manacles) Growl-bark (translates as: “if they didn’t have me manacled, I’d knock at least two of these stormtroopers over the edge before they shot me down.”)

C-3PO: Well I’m glad they tied your hands. I don’t want them firing at you whilst I’m still strapped to your back.

Chewbacca: Bark bark (translates as: “if I got you a blaster, you could cover my rear.”)

C-3PO: And if you reattached my legs, I could run away! Anyway, if you want your rear covered, you should get into the habit of wearing pants, you fuzzball nudist.

Darth Vader: (To Solo) We’re going to stick you in the freezer. Per the new regulations, you get a kiss goodbye before we stick you in.

[Han and Darth Vader both look to Leia.]

Leia: Don’t look at me. (To Han) You had your chance earlier, when there was nobody around. I’m not making a public spectacle of myself now.

[Han and Darth Vader both look to Chewbacca.]

Chewbacca: Growl-whine (translates as: “you’re a good friend, but you’re not my type.”)

[Han and Darth Vader both look to Lando.]

Lando: (Shrugs his shoulders) Han, why must we always fight whenever we see each other? You’re my buddy. Let’s make up. (He grabs Han Solo by either side of his face, and plants a kiss on the lips.)

Han: Great. Now I’m going to have nightmares about that kiss for as long as I’m frozen.

Lando: Buddy, there’s been something I’ve been meaning to tell you for a long time. I love you.

Han: I know. I’ve always known. And I’m not too happy about it. Please, somebody freeze me before this gets any worse.

[Solo is lowered into the freeze chamber, gas rises from the chamber and then a big grabber lifts Solo out, frozen into a solid block of carbonite.]

Lando: (Hugs the block of carbonite. Tearful.) Solo, why’d you have to be so cold-hearted?

Darth Vader: Enough of that. All of you scram. I want this chamber cleaned up before Luke gets here.

Leia: Does that mean we’re all free to go?

Darth Vader: Scram. Get out of here, before I change my mind. And take that rusty bucket The Millennium Falcon with you. I’ll have to haul it to the junkyard otherwise.

…

[Luke follows the signs to the freezing chamber. He unexpectedly pops up into the chamber via a trick lift. As he steps off the lift platform, the chamber lights up in red and blue.]

Darth Vader: The force is with you, young Skywalker, but you are not a Jedi yet.

Luke: That’s not what it says on this certificate (holds up the certificate from Yoda’s Jedi School).

Darth Vader: How many people do you think fail Yoda’s class? The only way you can fail that class is by failing to pay the bill.

Luke: True. Becoming a Jedi did cost me an arm and a leg.

Darth Vader: (Looking at his mechanical arms and legs.) Is that some kind of a joke?

Luke: No. I didn’t mean it like that. I’m not prejudiced against disabled people.

Darth Vader: What do you mean disabled? I’m perfectly able-bodied. Look. (He does a little jig to demonstrate. As he spins on the spot, Luke kicks him in the back, hurling him off the platform.)

Luke: Maybe so, but seems to me that you’re mentally challenged.

[Luke jumps down. Darth Vader and Luke continue their fight on a narrow platform overhanging a precipitous fall.]

Darth Vader: Perfect. I love fighting in places like these. One false move and you’ll be over the edge!

Luke: I think you went over the edge long ago.

Darth Vader: You know, you shouldn’t speak to your own father like that. It’s very disrespectful.

Luke: You’re my father?

Darth Vader: Oops. I was waiting for the right moment to tell you. Now I’ve just blurted it out.

Luke: So why are you trying to kill me then?

Darth Vader: I’m not trying to kill you. I’m just trying to overpower you so I can turn you to the dark side and complete your training.

Luke: Complete my training? Would I get a certificate? Would it improve my job prospects?

Darth Vader: Of course. It is your destiny to have a top job in the Empire. You’d have your own office, a secretary and an expense account. Join me and we can rule the galaxy as father and son.

Luke: (Excited) Wow! You’re offering me the position of co-Emperor?

Darth Vader: Sub-Emperor.

Luke: That doesn’t sound so hot.

Darth Vader: Junior Emperor.

Luke: That’s not much better.

Darth Vader: How about Assistant Emperor?

Luke: Make it Vice-Emperor, and it’s a deal.

Darth Vader: Okay then. Vice-Emperor.

Luke: Great! (Offers his hand to shake.)

Darth Vader: You’ve made me a very proud father. (Vader brings his arm around and reaches for Luke’s hand. He cuts Luke’s hand off with his light sabre. Luke’s hand is sent flying, falling into the abyss.) Oh, sorry…

Luke: Nooohh! Nooohhh! You cut off my right hand. That was my favourite one.

Darth Vader: It was an accident. I forgot I was holding my light sabre. But don’t worry, we’ll get you a new hand, just like mine. (Vader waves his fingers with one hand, and points at them with the other).

Luke: I’ll look like a freak. With one gloved hand I’ll look like Michael Jackson. (Luke nearly loses his balance on the edge).

Darth Vader: Careful Luke (Vader looks down at the fall beneath). Come with me. It is the only way.

Luke: Okay. (There is a gust of wind and Luke loses his balance, falling backwards.)

Darth Vader: Luke! (Vader grabs for his right hand, but with no hand to grab, he only gets a hold of Luke’s sleeve instead).

[Luke falls, leaving his jacket in Vader's grip.]

Darth Vader: Luke!

[Luke falls and falls, end over end, for a long time. He falls feet first into a narrow tube, and slides down and around until coming to a stop, completely unharmed.]

Luke: What a stroke! I thought I’d die for sure. I must have fallen several kilometres, but there’s not a scratch on me! Guess they’re right to call me ‘Lucky Luke’ after all.

[A trap door opens beneath Luke. He is left hanging to the underside of Cloud City by a TV antenna.]

Luke: I may have spoken too soon.

[A cloud blows past and the Falcon emerges from it, directly beneath Luke.]

Luke: Then again…

[Luke jumps down on to Falcon and climbs in through the top hatch.]

Luke: Leia, Lando, how did you know where I’d be?

Leia: How did you get on board? We’re just floating around because we can’t get the forward propulsion engines started.

Chewbacca: (Pulling out wires underneath the dashboard.) Growl (translates as: “I’ll get it started.)

[The Falcon's main engines fire up. They make a speedy getaway.]

Luke: Wait! We can’t leave. I had a great job offer back there. And I left my jacket behind. Come to think about it, I left my hand behind too.

Leia: Luke, that’s the dark side talking. Don’t you know the Empire’s motto is ‘Give with one hand, take the other?’

This parallel universe will return, as will the Jedi, in Return of the Jedi: Parallel Universe. But you knew that already. Your powers are strong.

After all the trouble he caused in Davos, I am keeping my most adventurous clone, MaV-Eric, locked in the attic. Heavens forbid he should get out and cause similar trouble at the Copenhagen Climate Conference. This morning I ventured up there to see what he has been doing. It turns out that he has been working on his own projects to make the world a better place.

Eric: (Climbing up the loft ladder) Hullo, Mav-Eric? What you doin’? I’ve been hearing a lot of strange noises…

MaV-Eric: (Turns from scribbling equations on the blackboard) Hi. I’ve been experimenting with ideas, building models, that kind of thing. Take a look at this (points at the blackboard with his chalk). According to my calculations, manned spaceflight to the moon is feasible.

Eric: Hmmm. I really should have enrolled you in school after I took you out the cloning vat. Man went to the moon forty years ago.

MaV-Eric: Wow. That’s incredible. Forty years ago, you say? My work is so out of date. They must have perfected space travel by now. We should go visit the moon for a vacation. Fancy going?

Eric: You don’t understand. NASA went forty years ago but nobody’s been back since.

MaV-Eric: Why on earth not?

Eric: Too expensive, I guess. And there’s only so much demand for moon rocks.

MaV-Eric: (Disappointed) Oh. Never mind. (Cheers up) But take a look at this (reaches under his desk and pulls out a model of an aircraft).

Eric: That’s a fancy-looking plane.

MaV-Eric: Yeah, it’s my design for a supersonic airliner. With this beauty, you could go from London to New York in less than three hours.

Eric: Sorry, it’s been done before. They called it the Concorde.

MaV-Eric: You don’t say. That must be one heck of a plane. Let’s go see it.

Eric: Sure. I think there’s one at the Imperial War Museum.

MaV-Eric: A museum?

Eric: Oh yeah. They stopped flying. Too old.

MaV-Eric: You mean there’s no supersonic passenger jets any more?

Eric: Nope. They just cram people on to big slow jets instead. Anyhow, lots of people think we should fly less to help preserve the environment. I think all the world leaders will be discussing that when they meet at the climate change conference in Copenhagen. US President Obama was just saying how important it is cut carbon emissions when he made his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech in Oslo. Then he said he’ll say the same when he swings back to that part of the world to attend the Copenhagen conference, just after he pops back to the US to tell some other people to do some other important things.

MaV-Eric: No supersonic airliners? That’s a disappointment. Anyhow, I’ve got plenty of other projects to show you. Take a look at this (pulls out a Legoland model of a city street scene).

Eric: Lego?

MaV-Eric: I found it in one of your old boxes. The point is this is my vision of urban planning for road safety. Look at what I’ve done here (points at parts of the model). Here’s railings to prevent people from crossing willy-nilly, and here’s traffic lights at clearly marked pedestrian crossings activated when someone presses the button. There’s warning signs so people know to be careful and we’ve got clearly marked white lines down the middle of the road so everyone stays on their own side. It’ll be good for safety and because the cars will keep moving in an orderly fashion, good for the environment. And to further improve the environment, there’s rubbish bins to help avoid littering.

Eric: I’m afraid you’re way out of step with modern thinking. Camden council has stripped all that stuff out. The idea is that motorists will be more careful if they’re worried somebody might step out in front of their car at any moment.

MaV-Eric: What are they going to think of next - cobbled streets to slow traffic down?

Eric: Don’t joke. That’s what speed bumps are for.

MaV-Eric: Okay. But here’s a sure-fire hit of an idea. (He walks back to the blackboard). Look at these figures. With intelligent use of synthetic fertilizer, pesticide, livestock feed additives and genetic modification, we can boost the world’s food production and ensure nobody in the growing population ever goes hungry again.

Eric: Uh-uh. Organic farming is where it’s at. Crop rotation and manure. The yields are less, but people are happy to pay extra for it.

MaV-Eric: What about air con and central heating, so people can control the temperature in their home environment?

Eric: Too wasteful. Open the window if you’re hot. Put on a jumper if you’re cold.

MaV-Eric: (Throws across a document) Here’s my healthcare plan. If we invest in more hospital beds and prolong the in-hospital aftercare treatment…

Eric: People get sick in hospitals. Too many infections.

MaV-Eric: Next you’ll be telling me that motorized transport is bad and that everybody should be riding bicycles, or that personal mobility is ineffective and we’re all better off riding the train or working from home.

Eric: Well…

MaV-Eric: Has any of the progress in the last half-century been good?

Eric: Birth control. And fertility treatment. They’re both good.

MaV-Eric: I don’t think I understand the world outside. Perhaps it’s best that I stay in this attic.

Eric: Now you’re getting the right idea.

If you ever watch children playing football, the preparation for the game begins with locating a ball and picking the two teams. The kids will put down jumpers for goalposts or otherwise agree what the goals are. Then they kick-off. They run around and play football. What they do not do before the game begins is form a committee to review the rules of the game, nominate who will be the referee and his or her assistants, or sit down and familiarize themselves with the Football Association’s handbook in case of a dispute later on. Yes, youthful footballers will break the rules from time to time, but they somehow manage to handle transgressions as they go along. With kids playing football, the model of using common sense to decide who has cheated and what is fair usually works pretty darned well, in addition to saving a lot of time and bother. If children can enjoy a good kick-around like that, what then has gone wrong with adult life?

In Britain, professionalism seems to be ever more backed by rules, and ever less backed by professionalism. The nadir came when two Police Community Support Officers, demonstrating little interest in human life, nor support for their community, allowed a young boy to drown because they lacked the training to wade into the water and pull him out. You can only hope and prey that your own life never comes to depend on people who might need to show initiative in the absence of both pay and education, if this is how the professionals behave. The PCSOs had already had a good example set for them. The boy who drowned did so after climbing in to rescue his own sister, yet two adults shirked any sense of moral duty, safe in the knowledge they had no legal duty to get their feet wet. Whilst a child had learnt right from wrong, the cut-price coppers had learned the rules, and the rules said they could not risk their own lives to save another person’s life. The consequence is that they did their job, by doing nothing, and a life was lost. Sadly, this was not an instance where the exception proved the rule.

The worst rules are Health & Safety rules, of course. These rules are in turn fuelled by a litigious blame culture. In a society where every individual is expected to know the endless government rules for what benefits they can claim, what tax credits they are entitled to, and what tax they must voluntarily and cheerily give up for the greater good, it makes sense to create a grey economy based solely on the concept that if something goes wrong, then somebody should be made to pay, and hence somebody must be held to blame. Of course, there are plenty of circumstances where nobody is to blame when terrible things happen. That, however, is uninteresting, so we increasingly employ people so they can be later blamed. If you own a company and allow it to be run by greedy corrupt imbeciles, blame the company’s auditors, not yourself. If you die from heart disease, blame the people who sold you fast food; do not blame yourself for not buying jogging shoes and running off the lard that clogged both your wide ass and narrowed arteries. And if the rain pours and the wind blows, causing your riverside home to flood or the tiles to fall from your roof, blame the builder, blame the engineers who built the flood defences, blame the weatherman, blame anyone - but never blame yourself by buying a rubbish old house in a perilous location. More than anything, Britain has a service economy, and with moving money at a low ebb, the top dog in services is the service in legal advice. We need an economy that keeps lawyers in business. Otherwise, the aspirations of the middle class will be shown to be uncomfortably ill-founded. The foundations are weak because Britain’s service industry is built on a quicksand of its diminished real industry. Lawyers need to be given the right conditions to thrive and multiply, and rules are to lawyers what sh*t is to mushrooms. The greater the number of rules, the greater the need and advantage in engaging lawyers, so obviously we are all better off if there are more rules. All of which means there should be no surprises that lawyers are so keen to be in government, and governments are so keen on adding to society’s inventory of rules.

There is a clue in the world ‘ruler’. Rulers make rules, and they claim to have the measure fo all things. The news is always full of stories of government passing new laws in order to crack down on this and that. But do you remember the occasion when government reduced the number rules, making the rulebook of life lighter, for a change? Despite my ranting, I can think of an example. Small companies no longer need a company secretary that is separate to its single director. That is a good rule change – the company secretary was a cost but not a benefit to anybody but the people who made money from being company secretary. The upshot is that a company can perfectly well exist with only one employee. But even when the rules are changed by government, some institutions reinstate those rules for the back door. Take Britain’s Royal Mail, for example, well-known monopoly supplier of postal services and net drain on the economy because they always make a loss. They charge about £80 to forward business mail for a year. Yet Royal Mail expect businesses to provide signatures from two employees if redirecting a company’s mail. This is despite the fact the service is identical to forwarding a person’s mail, including a sole trader’s mail, yet you do not need two people to say that one person’s mail should be forwarded. If a company with just one employee wants their mail forwarded, they need to get somebody else to write a letter saying everything is okay. The reason given by the Royal Mail for this rule? They want to prevent fraud. Presumably no fraudster has the imagination or resources to provide a Mickey Mouse letter in order to hijack a business’ mail. Or, rather, Royal Mail can contemptuously say they have done everything they could to prevent such fraud. Of course, it is easier for many modern business to just shift all correspondence with banks and suppliers on-line, and avoid relying on the Royal Mail altogether. Hmmm… now what were those Royal Mail strikers saying about the vital service they provided and how they deserve to be subsidized as a result?

The ultimate in rule-driven paradoxes is when Government, the highest rule-imposing body in the land, sets rules for itself. It is the metaphorical equivalent of somebody who counts the calories whilst shoving another cream pie into their face. However ridiculous it is to set rules for yourself, that is what the British government is preoccupied with doing. For example, they intend to introduce a rule which will bind them to pay off the huge national debt they have run up. What is the point of this rule? It is to say they trust themselves to manage the economy, but they do not trust themselves to manage the economy, so they will manage the economy by imposing a rule that they will follow no matter how much they do not want to follow it. This is from the same people who promised an end to boom and bust. Either government needs to borrow or it does not. If they need to borrow, they should, and if not, they should not. Setting a rule blindly of the circumstances is meaningless. The same government already had a rule about borrowing over the economic cycle. First they stretched it, then they broke it, and they justified this by saying they needed to. Fair enough, but that means the rule itself is pointless. Now the government offers a new rule, which is a rule to pay off the debt. It may be a rule, but is not a consistent yardstick for how they will behave.

The irony is that this is a government well versed in bending and breaking rules, such as the rules on when you can start a war. The Iraq Enquiry plods along. The inevitable revelations focus on how government lawyers thought the government was breaking international law by instigating an attack on Iraq without a UN resolution. The absurdity of rules is exemplified by they interplay. For example, wars cost money. They cost lots of money (as well as lives). That is why troops get killed for want of helicopters and body armour, because troops are cheap but helicopters and body armour are expensive. And now we have a rule on paying down the national debt. Does this mean that, if the situation were the same and there was another Saddam Hussein pretending to have WMDs, we would not go to war? International law on starting wars would not be the impediment, but heavens forbid we break our own rules on managing public sector borrowing and find ourselves unable to pay the price of more military intervention.

There are rules everywhere you look these days. Keep off the grass. Maximum speed 20 miles per hour. No parking between the hours of 8am and 8pm. Inform the dentist of the need to cancel an appointment 48 hours in advance. Tick the box to agree to the personal user licence for this software. Read this summary of the changes in the terms and conditions for your credit card. On top of the rules, there are yet more rules. If you do not read the reams of paperwork explaining the rules for your bank account, then what of it? You can rely on the reams of rules created by Government and the reams of rules created by the banking regulator to ensure the bank’s rules are reasonable after all. If the government’s rules are no good, then go to Europe’s rules. And if America’s rules get broken, they can also be applied to British citizens, ensuring international rule subservience. Subservience, that is, for common people. Politicians tend to be exempt from the rules, reportedly for the good of everyone they represent.

Remarkably, for all the rules in force in Britain, there is never a rule when you need one. In Doha I queued five hours for tickets to a football game, and not a single person pushed in. If only visitors to the Anish Kapoor exhibition at the Royal Academy were as well behaved as those footy fanatics. On a rainy day, the security guard repeatedly asked people to budge forward in the long and winding queue, for the sake of ensuring everyone was under shelter and the building entrance was not blocked. Without complaint, they did so. Yet despite the visible evidence of a long line of people waiting patiently, two old dears bypassed the long line, strolled straight up to the counter and proceeded to reach into their purses to buy two tickets. So much for rules in nation that supposedly loves to queue. I was thankful that the woman behind the counter was made of sterner stuff than the timorous security guard who had been so confident in instructing people to take two steps forward whenever a gap emerged in the queue. The ticket vendeuse, spying my flabbergasted look at these two rude and selfish old women, challenged their presumption and sent them to the back. From appearances, the ill-mannered duo looked like retired teachers, which might explain the need for endless ASBOs for Britain’s youth.

You cannot entirely blame British government for the purgatory of rules taken to inhuman extremes. In the final reckoning, politicians tend to obey their voters and generally follow the fashions of the era. As far as the average Brit is concerned, football is far more important than politics, and football is far from immune to the chronic disease of the creeping rules. Even little children can throw down their jumpers for goalposts and enjoy a perfectly fun kickabout, but for multimillionaire professional footballers, rules are a constant source of frustration, thanks to their application, non-application or misapplication, depending on which side you play for. It is not hard for kids to referee their own games, because football has so few rules. Do not use your hands. Get the ball in the net. Do not try to defeat an opponent by swinging a machete threateningly in his direction. But listen to the endless drivel of overpaid pundits and cry-baby managers, and you would think that football is the unfairest game in the world, in desperate need of a rules overhaul. TV replays, extra assistants, fitter referees, and even the manager’s right to challenge decisions have all been proposed as solutions to the seeming plague of ‘bad’ decisions. Meanwhile, the rules themselves are tweaked for the good of the game. Level is onside, keepers can move sideways at a penalty, kicking the ball away merits yellow and a foul by the last man deserves red… did these rules really improve the game so much?

The eccentricity of sporting rules is that they apply to the other side, not your own. You still hear people still repeating the delusion that British players cheat less than their European counterparts. Presumably anyone who still believes this must always shut their eyes whenever players with extraordinary strength and balance, people like Heskey, Owen, and Gerrard, make a purposeful run in the penalty box. You are more likely to see Gerrard launch into a stream of upper cuts in a bar than see him trip up whilst walking down the street. But put him in that mysterious zone that surrounds the opponents’ goal, a rectangular version of the Bermuda triangle, and strange forces compel him to collapse to ground faster than a tower of cards built atop a jenga tower on a rickety stool. With the stool on the top flight of Blackpool Tower on the windiest day of the year. In the most debated example of rules confusion in recent weeks, the Irish team expected all rules to be rewritten because one decision went against them. To hear the protestations on behalf of the Irish national team, after being unfortunately defeated in the their World Cup qualification play-off with France, you would think they were odds-on favourites to win the tournament, instead of a hapless marginal team that failed to well enough to go through based on the results from their qualifying league alone. But it is difficult to be too harsh on the Irish, as half of their squad is British after all, reliant on mysterious grandparents and great uncles to be eligible to play for a land which they only tend to visit when playing ‘home’ games for Ireland. And tells you all you need to know about the purpose of rules in international football.

Not everywhere in the world is hamstrung by rules. Being abroad, it is a revelation to discover there are places where you can swim in the sea without disclaimers warning that you might be drowned, and fizzy drinks cans that assume you can pull a ring without severing your forefinger. At the aforementioned queue for football tickets in Doha, they kept the store open an extra hour beyond closing time, because serving customers is considered a higher priority than subservience to the employment contracts of the people paid to sell those tickets. Britain has the mother of Parliaments, and she is the happy matriarch of every Brit. Mother’s been parenting her children for a long time. She does not much enjoy letting them off the leash, never mind trusting them to make their own decisions.

Even when leaving rules Britannia, they give you a parting gift of extended rules impositions to tide you over until you return. A bag that was light enough to be allowed in the cabin on the way in is subjected to a precise weighing to confirm compliance whilst on the way out. See-through bags of toiletries had nestled unmolested in hand baggage prior to arrival, but demand thorough inspection on departure. These transgressions, though, are mere peccadilloes compared to the great bête noire of international travel – believing you should be free to move around this world without a piece of paper that gives you permission. I do understand why there is a rule that says I am supposed to have a valid passport. What I do not understand is the remarkable effort is put into enforcing this rule, which at every turn presupposes that previous checks had been performed by bumbling nincompoops. The airline checks my passport when I check-in. At the border control, my passport is checked in addition to the boarding card I got when checking in. At the departure gate, they check my passport and tear my boarding card in two. In the hour or so from start to finish, my passport has not changed once, but it has been checked three times. Then, when sitting in the departure lounge, two border agency goons are wandering around. What are they employed to do? You guessed it. They check my passport. Clearly not overworked, they would have checked my passport twice if the dozy woman, following the same path trod by her burly male colleague a mere two minutes before, had not been challenged about the need for a passport to be checked twice. Which tells you everything you need to know about the quality of the check – what if I had been lying? She did not check that, but just took my word for it.

Rules are imposed by big people on little people, which is why parents set rules for children, and not vice versa. You and I may not be allowed to drive in the bus lane at any time (unless you are driving a bus) but when Tony Blair comes to town, he should stop the traffic, or so the theory goes. All of which explains why certain rules, like those for claiming expenses or paying tax, are so liable to be bent, twisted, exploited, broken and cheated by the ultimate rule-makers, our Members of Parliament.

Rules turn us into children. Not happy children playing in the park and making things up as we go along. Miserable children, bound and gagged and unable to act or think for ourselves. For adults to depend on rules is troubling, because there are no adults who can be relied upon to be more adult than any other adult. Which means we might as well recite rules in the mirror and enforce them by bending over and spanking ourselves. If kids playing football can get by with few rules, maybe they have more sense than the infantilized grown-ups around them. They get by with a sense of right and wrong, of luck and misfortune, of getting up and getting on with it, no matter what the game, or life, sends their way. Adults, in contrast, substitute lengthier rules for shorter rules and consider this to be a sign of great progress. They are wrong, and with rules, we have long passed the point where less would be more. We need fewer rules and to follow them, not more and to ignore them. The problem is, there is no way to turn the tide and have fewer rules in future – unless we wrote a new rule that makes that happen…