Diary

13 June 2009

Roger Mosey opens his diary

More widely, the Olympics offer a great insight into the way Britain works. There are the hoped-for successes — many people in LOCOG and the Olympic Delivery Authority are impressive — and there are the quangos. In quite a lot of support areas it’s not clear who’s running what, and many of the initiatives around the Games have a baffling number of fingers in the pies. There’s also a rush for the funding that’s believed to lurk beneath the Olympic umbrella. Part of this may just be because there are three years to go and many deadlines are some time away, but the ceremonies goal is again the best: work out what has to be achieved, appoint the right people, be clear about what they’re responsible for and let them get on with it.

Observations from the recession: in the past week I waited fruitlessly for a chap to clear up the garden who never arrived (‘mix-up with the bookings, mate’) and an electrician to sort out some lighting (‘four people went sick today so we can’t send anyone’). Meanwhile a company advertising in a local magazine failed to respond to an email inviting them to give a quote for some other jobs around the house. Service-led recovery, anyone?