Hi Everyone
This week I am bursting with pride and as they say nowadays "Over the Moon" when I realise that my blog last week, together with a little help from that national TV series, has galvanised the Post Office, the media, the police, lawyers, the government, and the members of Parliament into rapid action to sort out the Post Office scandal. Before you get too excited, however, just remember that this has been going on for over twenty years and that none of these organisations have 'galvanised' or 'rapid action' in their mindset otherwise this tragic saga would have been sorted out years ago. Now the government is promising to resolve this matter "By the end of the year" which by my reckoning is at least another 50 weeks of 'experts' earning millions while the people who should have been compensated years ago patiently wait for their reputation to be restored and to be properly financially compensated. As a result of my blog and that TV series of course, a number of the real people involved in this saga have appeared on our TV scenes and in the media, and if you thought that the TV series was almost unbelievable, it gets far worse when you hear and read their stories. A few days ago I read that an Englishman visiting America had sued a company for something he felt they had done, won his case, and was awarded $9 million dollars in compensation. In comparison to that sum of money, whatever our government pays in compensation will be an insult.
As a young boy at the Fruit, Vegetable, Flower. Lolly, and Game Shop, the Post Office was about 50 yards down the road on the opposite side. It was quite a large shop with three counters. On the right was the cooked meat and provisions counter, on the left the fresh bread and cake counter, and across the back of the shop. the Post Office counter. Now of course at that time the word computer had not to our knowledge been invented and the main function was selling stamps, issuing postal orders (remember those) if you wanted to send someone money, dealing with the occasional parcel, and sending urgent messages by telegram. I can never remember the Senior Partner ever using the shop so it was either the Junior Partner or me who experienced the smell of freshly baked bread and cakes. My visits were usually restricted to purchasing 4 ounces of boiled ham, (I told you that she was tight with money), and a warm crusty loaf. At the postal counter, the postage stamps were in sheets of about 100 stamps with a plain white sticky paper border. It was my job to ask the Postmaster if I could have some of the sticky borders. On returning to the shop I would be told off for picking at the warm crusty edge of the bread. The Senior Partner then took the sticky borders, cut them into small lengths, and stuck them to the shelf edges in the shop to write the prices of the tins and packets on the shelves. Why we didn't become a Tesco or Marks and Spencer I will never know.
Back in the early 1960s just when the Partners were considering retirement, the Post Office decided to relocate the Post Office partly I suspect because they would have no use for the sticky stamp edgings. As the shop was large enough and was likely to need new occupants I decided the apply to be the next postmaster even though I had what I thought was a promising career. Quite rightly and predictably the Post Office was eventually relocated further towards the centre of the shopping area. If I had become a postmaster for the Post Office for the rest of my working life I would have encountered their dodgy Horizon computer system. Can you imagine the pleasure the Senior Partner would have had visiting me in prison?.
Just a Thought:
To err is normal. To blame it on a computer is even more so.
What do you get when you cross a lawyer with a monster from the deep? Another lawyer.
I don't know why my friend's dog gets excited every time he sees the Postman. The Postman never has a letter for him.
Brian
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