Business As Usual …Part 2

Spoiler Alert.

When you watch Jamie’s Ministry of Food in October- today’s Magna event will be one of the showpiece scenes.

Hundreds of people finding joy through being taught the art of cooking by St Jamie. A mass awakening. Praise be; we be saved Massa.

There were plenty of happy smiling faces and this footage will be cut to portray a positive affair.

Imagine this. Instead of going to work today- you get to go on a bus trip. You and your mates get paid for messing about with woks. Laugh? You wouldn’t stop till knocking off time.

In the aftermath, speaking on his personal publicity outlet (BBC) Jamie was bullish.

-This event was going to kickstart the whole movement. The UK has the most unhealthy people in Europe. [There was no source to back up this dumb statement naturally, but don’t interrupt Jamie was on a roll].
Today was only the start. He wanted everyone to go back to their firms and pass it on.

As we established earlier: If you let the single issue simpleton speak his mind- he becomes the leader of his own opposition.

- Starting today, for six months; he wants people to spend either half an hour a week or half an hour each day at work teaching each other to cook.

- Starting today, for six months; he wants people to spend either half an hour a week or half an hour each day at work teaching each other to cook.

I thought that gem deserved repeating.

26 weeks of cookery lessons; 130 lessons if you’re on the preferred daily plan. Even if you are on the Jamie war wagon- you have to agree that is insane.

Think about everywhere you’ve ever worked. Sink, a kettle and a microwave if you’re lucky. As there are not adequate facilities at most work places- I assume we are talking about letting people off early  to cook at home in groups.

As there is no way their boss could check up on them: What do you think the chances are that people would carry on sharing their culinary knowledge for six months?

As there is no way their boss could check up on them: What do you think the chances are that people would carry on sharing their culinary knowledge for two weeks?

 As there is no way their boss could check up on them: What do you think the chances are that people would just go their separate ways and not bother ever cooking together?

Luckily- the numbers work out, so that the pass it on classes can be done in threes. Jamie informed us that 40% can cook and 60% can’t. Two out of three people can’t cook at all. That’s the premise the series is built on. Does that sound like your social circle? I want to emphasize here “can’t cook”. Not don’t cook or eat ready meals- “can’t cook”. Are two out of three people you know incapable of baking a potato or cutting up a salad? It is even beyond their ken to look in a book and try themselves. If this is your life, and the only thing which will inspire you to change is some bloke off the telly coming to town- you are not the kind of person I socialize with regularly.

Even if everyone did stick faithfully to the regime- what benefits would the employer gain?

In October- the national minimum wage will go up from £5.52 to £5.73. That equates to £74.49  per worker (£372.45 for the daily mob) for leaving early 26 times. You may say that’s not much- but it’s quite a lot for doing sod all productive.

Look at a big firm. Ventura’s call centre business employs around 6,000 people in the former mining areas heading out to the Dearne Valley. That’d be a hit of £446,940 (£2,234,700 in the unlikely event of the daily plan being adopted). The real figure would be far more as, even in the call centre biz- not everyone is on minimum wage. Would effiency improve enough to justify this outlay? Am I missing something? Is there some amphetamine in the meatballs?

None of this matters to the Glorious Leader. Unless everyone accepts the idea that all problems in the country could be solved by cooking at home- the entire project falls. Any dissenters are crushed. Ventura employees won’t be getting  paid for leaving early. They chose not to take part in Jamie’s event today.

Heretics. Jamie slated them. Not much of a call centre, he said, they never returned his call.

How dare those bastards not agree with Jamie? What kind of commercial concern doesn’t want to pay out cash for no return? How can they not agree that we can cook ourselves out of all our troubles?

If Jamie stopped thinking about his own book sales for a minute, he may grasp the fact that there is a world outside his own arse. Ventura shut down their Cardiff operation recently. The outsourcing biz is on it’s arse- in a large part due to the growth of the sector in India. Today- Ventura announced 300 jobs were going in Yorkshire. In the circumstances, perhaps they thought it would not be appropriate to be seen larking around at a frivolous event.

I wouldn’t like to work at Ventura. The money’s not great and they are strict with staff. On the other hand- they did step in and invest in the Dearne Valley at a time when no one else wanted to know. There are benefits to working there too. The staff get a hefty discount at Next and they enjoy a heavily subsidized canteen that offers plenty of healthy food at affordable prices. Wasn’t that the kind of thing Jamie used to support when he was on his School Dinners tip? Who cares- there’s a new book to sell now.

Slagging off a local employer on the day they have announced job losses. Saying what a crap job they do- just because they wouldn’t do exactly what you told them. How do you think that made Ventura employees feel? Way to go on boosting confidence in the town Jamie.

Remember this when you see the laughing Magna stir fry session on your TV.  Not everyone was smiling.

 

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