Just seen a news report on ITN about Whitehall civil servants creaming off a total of £26 million from the tax payer in performance related bonuses.
It seems the same story is in today's Daily Mail, click here, which estimates the pay outs range from £6500 to £8500.
But that's small beer when you learn about what Lothian and Borders top cops are trousering. See my Police Box blog on how L and B are trying to hide behind Freedom of Information/Data Protection legislation to keep the exact payouts secret.
But as a rough guesstimate, if Chief Constable David Strang is on a salary of around £130k and he has been awarded the top level 15% bonus, then he is pocketing just shy of an extra £20 grand a year.
And his sidekick, Deputy Chief Freeloader Tom Halpin, on a salary of around £110,000 and based on the top bonus payable at 12.5%, will be helping himself to a nice little earner of about £13k. Nice work if you can get it fellas.
No wonder L and B cops rushed round mob-handed to Fred the Shred's hoose when his windows were tanned in - no doubt seeking advice on how to invest the windfall and how to face down a potential public outcry.
p.s by the way Tom, have you found that missing laptop yet?
Tuesday, 16 June 2009
Friday, 5 June 2009
Tuesday, 12 May 2009
Cops Forced In To Apology
Lothian and Borders Police ordered to apologise after taking 1 hour 38 minutes to respond to death call and then ignoring complaints of dead man's family.
Sound like a story to me and its been on two police websites with no-one catching on. Does this mean the press are so short staffed and under resourced that they don't have time to check out these websites or are the sites so dull they are ignored?
I don't know the answer but full details are over on my Police Box blog for any hack who wants to follow it up.
Sound like a story to me and its been on two police websites with no-one catching on. Does this mean the press are so short staffed and under resourced that they don't have time to check out these websites or are the sites so dull they are ignored?
I don't know the answer but full details are over on my Police Box blog for any hack who wants to follow it up.
Sunday, 26 April 2009
Press Trip
So there I am, just off Union Street in Aberdeen with five high flying lawyers and Press and Journal snapper Kenny Elrick.
Legal eagles taking part in a charity run to raise funds for art organisations and I'd arranged for the briefs to be kitted out in their running gear for the P and J pic. I'd joked in the office I was only along to revel in their embarrassment.
So Kenny is setting up the shot and I'm trying to keep out of the way and thinking I'm being helpful I move his camera bag nearer to where he is working. Also a bit of a habit after working for years with photographers in areas where the locals wouldn't think twice of half-inching the gear given half a chance.
But I'm still in the way - and then it happened. As I moved, my foot got caught in the handle Kenny's camera bag. But this wasn't just a little tumble - the sort where you hope no-one notices and you just carry on as normal.
This was a full-blown Olympic medal winning heid-first dive in to the turf. No hands to save me - cos I'm carrying his damn bag. Sprawled full length, the tin flute is covered in mud and there is no way of recovering gracefully. As I pick myself up the lawyers are bent over double in hysterical laughter, as I would be if it was someone else who had gone for a burton.
And to add insult to injury, across the street there are a couple of geezers having a fag outside a social club and they are also poorless, gesturing that they have caught the episode on a camera phone.
It turns out the social club smokers were joking about getting my belly flop on camera so it won't be appearing on YouTube, thank God. As for the end result - the P and J used the words but not the pic. Welcome to the world of PR.
Legal eagles taking part in a charity run to raise funds for art organisations and I'd arranged for the briefs to be kitted out in their running gear for the P and J pic. I'd joked in the office I was only along to revel in their embarrassment.
So Kenny is setting up the shot and I'm trying to keep out of the way and thinking I'm being helpful I move his camera bag nearer to where he is working. Also a bit of a habit after working for years with photographers in areas where the locals wouldn't think twice of half-inching the gear given half a chance.
But I'm still in the way - and then it happened. As I moved, my foot got caught in the handle Kenny's camera bag. But this wasn't just a little tumble - the sort where you hope no-one notices and you just carry on as normal.
This was a full-blown Olympic medal winning heid-first dive in to the turf. No hands to save me - cos I'm carrying his damn bag. Sprawled full length, the tin flute is covered in mud and there is no way of recovering gracefully. As I pick myself up the lawyers are bent over double in hysterical laughter, as I would be if it was someone else who had gone for a burton.
And to add insult to injury, across the street there are a couple of geezers having a fag outside a social club and they are also poorless, gesturing that they have caught the episode on a camera phone.
It turns out the social club smokers were joking about getting my belly flop on camera so it won't be appearing on YouTube, thank God. As for the end result - the P and J used the words but not the pic. Welcome to the world of PR.
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