Borderline Psychosis
In a country with an education ministry that promotes religious delusion, a defence ministry that launches unprovoked attacks on other countries, and an opposition party that agrees with the Government, it was doubtless inevitable that we would develop a border protection scheme which weakens national security. Staff in the immigration system claim that they are "being asked to perform key roles such as passenger profiling with less than three hours' training" and that vehicle checks are "down by 50 per cent because of insufficient preparation".
The claims are being made by a trade union, the PCS; but by one of those amusing sociological paradoxes which make Britishness the rollicking national experience it is, they do not constitute a threat to the very order and fabric of our society, as would undoubtedly be the case if a union were to express similar concern over the closing of post offices, the privatisation of health services, or cutbacks in safety procedures on public transport. Since the very order and fabric of our society are not at stake, the Down With Frogs, Out With Wogs party agrees with the trade union: the PCS general secretary says that "National security requires proper resourcing at appropriate skill levels, not short-cuts", while the Shadow Home Secretary Rampant accuses the Government of an "ill-thought-out, back-of-the-envelope style".
The Home Office has responded that "staff in the new force will be expected to perform their 'non-core' tasks", i.e. swap roles with staff from different departments, "only on limited occasions". Obviously, if someone from the passport agency is expected to do only limited work for Revenue and Customs or the charmingly East German-sounding Immigration and Nationality Directorate, it would be uneconomic to give them as much as three hours' training for the job. Indeed, it seems plausible that only New Labour's usual excessive concern for the headlines has prevented them drafting in a few Chinese cockle-pickers or Rwandan butchers as an economically viable human resource augmentation measure. I'm sure such people would be cheap, and they probably wouldn't complain.
The claims are being made by a trade union, the PCS; but by one of those amusing sociological paradoxes which make Britishness the rollicking national experience it is, they do not constitute a threat to the very order and fabric of our society, as would undoubtedly be the case if a union were to express similar concern over the closing of post offices, the privatisation of health services, or cutbacks in safety procedures on public transport. Since the very order and fabric of our society are not at stake, the Down With Frogs, Out With Wogs party agrees with the trade union: the PCS general secretary says that "National security requires proper resourcing at appropriate skill levels, not short-cuts", while the Shadow Home Secretary Rampant accuses the Government of an "ill-thought-out, back-of-the-envelope style".
The Home Office has responded that "staff in the new force will be expected to perform their 'non-core' tasks", i.e. swap roles with staff from different departments, "only on limited occasions". Obviously, if someone from the passport agency is expected to do only limited work for Revenue and Customs or the charmingly East German-sounding Immigration and Nationality Directorate, it would be uneconomic to give them as much as three hours' training for the job. Indeed, it seems plausible that only New Labour's usual excessive concern for the headlines has prevented them drafting in a few Chinese cockle-pickers or Rwandan butchers as an economically viable human resource augmentation measure. I'm sure such people would be cheap, and they probably wouldn't complain.
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