Tuesday Diary: Bollocks to Bonuses and the Brilliant Baroness Trumpington
Jerry Hayes gets angry over excessive bonuses, and recalls a few anecdotes of Baroness Trumpington and Christian Sweeting.
7 Feb 2012, 09:00
The Wondeful Jean Trumpington
* Oh, how the filthy rich squeal like little porkers when they face the possibility of the trough being taken away from their greedy little snouts. They still don’t get it. Yes, if you put in your own capital, you risk your home, you incur massive financial exposure for your dream that you work your bollocks off for, you should be richly rewarded. But if you are no more than the hired help, doing no more than you are paid for, why should you earn one hundred and twenty times more than your employees? So Cameron is being anti business? Bollocks. He is just in touch with the mood of the struggling masses of those earning less that one hundred grand without a gold plated pension pot, a golden handshake or a platinum parachute. Was the Hester bonus pressure unfair? Probably. Was Justine Greening’s nil points for the grandees of the railway companies and their massive bonuses when commuters are treated like cattle with ever rising fares a bit below the belt? Of course. But in this climate, anything less by our elected politicians would be perceived as treasonous, Mussolinious and hung by the lampostius. What would Thatcher have done? She would have been aghast. She would have found the concept of earning excesses for a paid job incomprehensible. I once asked her about her view of MEPs. I thought she was going to be violently sick. She just growled, “gravy train.” I was once with her just after my dear old chum Mathew Parris had caused a by election so he could join LWT to replace Brian Walden as presenter of Weekend World. She was mystified. “People DO NOT LIKE those who leave public office to BETTER themselves,” she fuminated. However, the old girl had a good way of dealing with those whom she thought had overstepped the mark. One Governor of the Bank of England complained that he didn’t object too much to a serious bollocking from the great lady, what he considered to be the real humiliation was being forced to eat a cream bun in front by mother. So Cameron and Clegg do a Marie Antoinette Thatcher: let them eat cream buns.
* Now, talking about great women, I was reminiscing over a refreshing lunch with an old friend recently about the delightful Jean Trumpington; the Baroness; she of the V sign; Trumpers. I recalled a tale she used to tell me years ago when visiting a stud farm in Newmarket when in local government. After a dull tea party, the owner took her to see where the horses were stabled. “This is where the mares are brought in and the stallions are attracted by their scent and have sex with them,” he smiled. “Good God,” she grimaced, “I am a Mayor and wearing scent. Exciting isn’t it.” But this story was topped by my friend who once accompanied her to one of these dreadful Tory shindigs which serve shepherd’s pie and sherry. “Can’t stand bloody sherry,” she whispered, producing a quarter bottle of whiskey from her voluminous handbag. “And none of the buggers smoke.” At that, she lit an untipped whilst flourishing a foldable ashtray to the horror of the blue rinse brigade. What a legend.
* Christian Sweeting is a dear old friend. He is a very successful businessman and, as I have once written on this page, he once took me in his vintage Bentley to a drunken lunch at the Savile whilst wearing his full Papal Knight regalia. Ok, he may have looked like an Italian postman; but what the hell. You may recall that years ago he came a bit of a hero when, as a Tory candidate, he rather bravely confronted some burglars with an air rifle and rather unfairly, was placed in the cells for a night by plod. Well, young Sweeting has gone up market. During the Libyan war he bravely travelled to Tripoli to successfully negotiate a massive oil deal. And there is a wonderful photo of him in full battle gear manning a rebel howitzer. What a star.
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Jerry Hayes
Jerry Hayes is a former Conservative MP and leading barrister defending and prosecuting high profile cases
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"But if you are no more than the hired help, doing no more than you are paid for, why should you earn one hundred and twenty times more than your employees?"
This is a very bizarre question. You are doing what you are paid 120 times more than the other employees to do. So in that sense "doing no more than you are paid for" makes no sense as part of the comment.
Remember, the person who chooses what to pay any employee (such as the "hired help" here) is the boss - that person who puts in their own capital etc? If they think an employee is worth paying 120 times more than another why should anybody else intervene? One may wish to criticise the boss, but how on Earth is it wrong for someone to do the best they can for themselves?
I do not earn one hundred thousand pounds (not by a long shot), nor do I have a gold plated pension pot or a platinum parachute (probably, I have no idea what one is, and imagine it would probably not be very effective if a plane fell out the sky). However, I find the idea that the baying of the mob is a reason to interfere in private arrangements absolutely terrifying. It's not that this is anti-business, it's anti-freedom. Apparently one cannot enter into legal arrangements if a sufficiently large number of people find them offensive and if one does enter into such arrangements one should be prepared to be pilliored and pressured until the arrangement is no more.
08/02/2012 08:46"But if you are no more than the hired help, doing no more than you are paid for, why should you earn one hundred and twenty times more than your employees?"
This is a very bizarre question. You are doing what you are paid 120 times more than the other employees to do. So in that sense "doing no more than you are paid for" makes no sense as part of the comment.
Remember, the person who chooses what to pay any employee (such as the "hired help" here) is the boss - that person who puts in their own capital etc? If they think an employee is worth paying 120 times more than another why should anybody else intervene? One may wish to criticise the boss, but how on Earth is it wrong for someone to do the best they can for themselves?
I do not earn one hundred thousand pounds (not by a long shot), nor do I have a gold plated pension pot or a platinum parachute (probably, I have no idea what one is, and imagine it would probably not be very effective if a plane fell out the sky). However, I find the idea that the baying of the mob is a reason to interfere in private arrangements absolutely terrifying. It's not that this is anti-business, it's anti-freedom. Apparently one cannot enter into legal arrangements if a sufficiently large number of people find them offensive and if one does enter into such arrangements one should be prepared to be pilliored and pressured until the arrangement is no more.
08/02/2012 08:46