Blessed Visitor Centre Plans Revised

Controversial plans for a Notional Park Visitor Centre at Axlebridge have been dramatically downscaled following intense public opposition and a finance reality check. 

The original proposal - the winner of a free-to-enter competition for local architects - was considerably larger than the land available, and the designers forgot that 100m of plate glass windows on the river bank might be incompatible with sailing boats approaching a bridge. It was also in the flood plain - which would normally result in a planning refusal, but in this instance could be overcome by installing plug sockets 100mm higher than normal, according to Blessed Planning Officers.

In the light of the Authority’s constrained budgets, however, the plans have been scaled down - and moved to a different site, in Thorney.

The new Visitor Centre more accurately reflects the vision and aspirations of the Blessed Authority, almost filling the 1 square metre of space in a disused phone box. “All 72 panes of glass have been lovingly replaced”, enthused Dr Pikeman proudly, “and we’ve fitted a state-of-the-art wind-up audio player together with 8 colour photographs. We think youngsters will be thrilled to experience the Notional Park through this modern and exciting use of technology, and we are confident that it won’t be used as a makeshift urinal.”

Thorney Mouth is a key strategic location which until recently had 150m of free visitor moorings. Sadly, in what has becoming a repeating pattern, the Blessed Negotiation Team fell out with the land owner and the moorings were lost. A replacement floating pontoon was promised but never materialised, and it is hoped that the new visitor attraction will be a suitable substitute. 

“This is the epitome of what the Broads is all about” said Dr Pikeman, without a hint of irony. 

When is a consultation not a consultation?

Blessed Officers have been hard at work this year re-defining the meaning of the word “consultation”, in the wake of the shock decision to hike navigation tolls by an eye-watering 13%. The plan first appeared in the papers for the Blessed Navigation Committee less than a week before their meeting on 12th January, and bore all the hallmarks of a Chinese presidential election – with only a single option to consider and 4 working days to think about it. Having been assured that the discussion could be delayed until January “because of the much improved tolls collection system”, the committee didn’t have much choice but to nod along – allowing Dr Pikeman to claim that the move was “supported” by the Blessed Nav Com. 

Just one week later, their “recommendation” went before the Board for rubber stamping, with the executive stressing the importance of subsidising Notional Park functions with navigation tolls, so as to avoid having to make other difficult decisions instead.

The increase was roundly condemned by everyone, with one industry group bravely pointing out that the consultation was unlawful, because it didn't comply with the fundamental principles of legal consultations - like having time to think about it, having more than one option to consider and being consulted before the decision had been made. 

Of course, the Pocket Monitoring Officer easily got round the problem by stating that the rules of legal consultations only applied when a consultation had to be lawful. Since there was nothing to say that Blessed Consultations had to comply with the law, they couldn't be unlawful if they didn’t.

The group also reminded the ChairPuppet, Dick Bilson, that increasing tolls to subsidise Notional Park activities was illegal because the navigation account is protected by Blessed Act of Parliament - but he dismissed the claim, citing the “Blessed Understanding” with DEFRA which makes them look the other way when asked. Toll payers already contribute to Blessed overheads, he said, so it is perfectly reasonable to make them pay twice as much. “It’s only the price of a round of drinks”, he added.

Bilson went on to explain that there had, in any event, been a full and transparent consultation in the form of a dinner party workshop in October, where an above-inflation tolls increase was quite possibly mentioned. Unfortunately, no record of it exists and everyone who attended mysteriously forgot to mention it to anyone. 

Meanwhile, in completely unrelated news, DEFRA have given The Blessed Authority an additional £440,000 to support Notional Park activities, which is a remarkably similar number to the extra money raided from toll payers to pay for exactly the same thing.

However, anyone thinking that the Blessed Authority would take the opportunity of doing the sensible and ethical thing was quickly disabused of the notion by a gleeful Dr Pikeman. “Notional Park grant income is ring-fenced to pay for Notional Park purposes” he said. “It can’t be siphoned across to subsidise the navigation account’s subsidy to the Notional Park fund, oh deary me no. That would be quite unlawful.”

Public Sector Situations Vacant

Pocket Monitoring Officer

The Blessed Authority has another temporary vacancy for an Office Monitor a Monitoring Officer, starting immediately and ending sooner than you think.

As the eighth holder of this office in as many years, your principal role will be to invent legal-sounding justifications for improper, unreasonable and unlawful actions on a daily basis, including:

• circumventing consultation processes
• siphoning ring-fenced funds to avoid difficult decisions
• refusing freedom of information requests
• redacting documents which don’t say what you said they did 

You will also be responsible for the burying, re-writing or sanitisation of “independent” reports into Blessed behaviour, following the Pikeman Principle of re-assuring members that there is nothing to see here. You will be amazed at how easily members are impressed by the words “legal opinion” and “officers are doing an excellent job under difficult circumstances”. 

Your “monitoring” duties will of course mostly involve monitoring the activities of members (usually the ones appointed by local authorities, though the occasional Secretary of State appointee has been known to go native), and you will be expected to maintain dossiers on their social media profiles and any public comments which could draw unwanted attention to the Authority’s hapless incompetence. 

This work will include a quarterly review of “constitutional documents”, enabling the rapid re-classification of activities as breaches of the code of conduct or conflicts of interest, at the personal whim of the Chairpuppet, Dick Bilson. 

But perhaps your most challenging responsibility will be the defence of the Pikeman Paradox, which allows lawful activities to be re-branded as unlawful, according to who is doing it. A giant and highly visible riverside tent can, for example, be erected for 6 years without planning consent because it is “Blessed” as a temporary structure, whilst small yurts in nature reserves or campsites are classed as permanent buildings. You will probably spend hundreds of hours researching archaic justifications for this complex principle, before realising that “because I say so” works just as well with the members. 

Salary: £20,000 - this is the figure reported to members but will be consumed in the first month. Additional hours will be sub-contracted to a third-party providing “specialist technical advice” at 5 times your hourly rate, before he becomes your successor.

Pre-requisities: broken moral compass, short-term memory of a goldfish, ability to sleep with eyes open.

As a Pocket MO, you will quickly be welcomed to the UK’s fastest growing professional association, the Blessed Authority’s Dispirited Society of Ex-Governance and Monitoring Experts (BADSEXGAME).

Please send your CV and candid photos (to ensure that you can never speak of what you learn) to poorcareermoves@the-broads-is-not-a-national-park.etc