A letter to my MP

Hello Mark,
You must have been pleased with the masterly performance from George Osborne on Wednesday, putting a great spin on what is a rather depressing message. After thirty five years in business, and having now weathered five recessions since starting out in self employment (as a carpenter/joiner in Mallorca) just as the economies of Europe took a dive in 1974, I have become rather more sanguine than some. After all these years of New Labour 'growth' we are seeing some chickens come home to roost.

I returned to England in 1978 just in time to experience Labour's Winter of Discontent, and another nosedive in the economy. As I turned up one morning to install a porch for my very first UK customer, I met her setting off to the ATV studios to take part in a hand-wringing discussion about the dire economic future and the death of UK business. "What do YOU think?" she asked. I told her that I thought the increasing productivity promised by modern computerised manufacturing would bring on a Golden Age freeing us from wage-slavery, with a flowering of small businesses in trade crafts and art and food production. I rather think I was proved right in the fullness of time, although the look on her face told me she thought I was mad.

The one thing that was missing from George's performance, though, was anything to encourage these small businesses to take on staff. After struggling with ever-growing laws biased in favour of the employees, five years ago I grabbed an opportunity to get out before the roof fell in, and shut the business with the loss of twenty two jobs. I swore then, for the second time, as it happens, to never employ anyone again. Although I am now drawing the state pension, and (as Gordon stole my company pensions) I have to work for a living, this time round, with business booming following a phase of innovation permitted by not having to battle the staff on daily basis, I intend to outsource and licence my way to a pension.

Two questions:
1: Are you aware that private individuals have to pay VAT on the costs of developing their Intellectual Property?
My patent agent charges VAT that I can't reclaim as an individual. This amounts to a substantial imposition on a pensioner, even if (with a fair wind) I hope to live long enough to see the fruits of my innovations some years hence. What value-added does the government see in taxing my innovations? Is this designed to encourage us as entrepreneurs? Or is it just one of those silly things that HMRC slipped past everyone thinking that BIG BUSINESS is the source of invention? Ask George to give us a break, please.

2: I recall pointing out to your father (ed - then local MP) some fifteen years ago or more, that small businesses had the capacity to soak up most of the unemployment of Margaret Thatcher's time. The problem was, much of the time employing more staff wasn't worth the hassle, or the risk, and wasn't sufficiently rewarding. Regrettably, the suggestion fell on deaf ears, and I guess Euro Employment Law took precedence over sanity.
So,the question is - what plans does the Coalition have to make employers WANT to employ more staff? Surely, as I put it to Frank Field MP in 1992, during another economic nose dive, tax-breaks for employers MUST cost less than welfare payments.
It's frankly too late for me, but as George says, it's time for some radical thinking.

Yours ever
Keith

What an exciting day!

The BFRC window rating scheme is getting it in the neck big style. Here's the link to read the full stories: http://renegadeconservatoryguy.co.uk/category/energy-rated-windows/

On top of that, the issue of external misting of these efficient windows has prompted a flood of complaints from the public now that autumn has arrived. Those of my readers who have been paying attention will know that this issue was highlighted on TerryTheWindowman's website (RIP) around ten years ago when I first encountered the problem in my own office window. I did ask what the public would say when they found they couldn't see out of their nice new windows. I seemed to be in the minority then, but now we know. Here's the link: http://renegadeconservatoryguy.co.uk/a-rated-windows-problem/

Where have you all been since then?

Recession? What recession?

Phew! Grabbing a few minutes to catch up! Recent weeks have been hectic, with business piling in, the creative juices flowing with answers to long- standing problems appearing out of the blue, and dealing with all the issues that both business and leisure have been throwing at me. In particular, the unfolding (and predictable) shambles over the new Window Rating Scheme (particularly in view of the dodgy science involved): Predictable in the knowledge that it could never be more than a marketing ploy - in the same vein as the 'Secure By Design' label owned by the Metropolitan Police - and that those, like me, who view the whole thing as a well-intentioned job-creation scheme, would continue to stick with the entirely justifiable U-value calculators from truly independent sources such as the highly reputable BRE at Watford.

I never completed my treatise on DGU fabrication, started here in August to explain why these new- f angled slim sealed units for Georgian-glazing-bar windows are distinctly dodgy. That's 'cos it seemed superfluous while a full discussion was in full flow on Philip Rougier's ExpertExpert site. Here's the link to the relevant page for those interested: http://forum.expertexpert.com/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=42

So much for retirement, too much to do. must fly. More later.

Back to work

Back from a great week gliding in Yorkshire. Sharing Janus A Delta 31 with a great team, Brian and I managed to stay in the top half of the entrants in the 25th Two-Seater competition at Pocklington. Just three great flying days saw us complete more than 700km from Newark in the south to Thirsk in the north, via Driffield and Knaresborough in the east and west. The English countryside at its best, with air like crystal clear champagne.

Back to find lots of great business prospects on all fronts, and a really nice e-mail from a past client expressing delight in the ease of maintenance and wanting more windows.

I must catch up with the dissertation on slimline sealed units soon.

A diversion

I'm currently talking to other businesses about outsourcing a great deal of business to them, and have been surprised at several who have turned away the prospect of very simple profitable repeat business without even considering what's required. It's led me to reflect on my earlier experiences in manufacturing, and the constant struggle to get the staff to follow the laid-down procedures to the letter, without gradually omitting the bits they have difficulty with. Even the managers were complicit, and it was a constant battle to prevent them doing their own thing. I'm sure McDonalds don't have this problem (or do they?)

It strikes me that part of the problem was (and still is) the fact that employees generally are no longer terrified of losing their job, these days. Not that they should be expected to lie awake at night with their eyes sticking out like chapel hat-pegs (as many small business-owners do, as they wonder how they are going to pay the wages at the end of the month), but they ought surely to be concerned that if they don't do their job properly they might be shown the door. It's so time-consuming getting rid of unsatisfactory staff these days - difficult and fraught with danger - that quality and output may suffer to the detriment of the whole business. Call me old-fashioned, but hungry staff are going to be very much more diligent than those with a couldn't-care-less attitude. It's why I avoid employing anyone at all these days.

In my first week as a trainee metallurgist with the Heat Treatment Service of the then nationalised West Midlands Gas Board in 1961 I was told " Don't worry, lad. They can't sack you whatever you do." It shocked me even then, that such attitudes could prevail.
It got better under Maggie for a while, but we lost a lot of ground under New Labour. I suspect that our dire economic position with the lean and hungry Indians biting at our heels might require a change of heart, again.

Back to the double-glazing.

Gas filling is the last step (to date) in achieving a small but significant improvement in U-value, (according to the published U-value calculators) but is perhaps the most difficult to explain. Air is a wonderful insulator - generally accepted to be the best of all - but three of the inert gases are reported to have better insulating qualities still, despite being heavier (and therefore denser). Logic might suggest that they might conceivably be better sound insulators but worse thermal insulators. Clearly there's more to this than meets the eye, as I have seen it claimed that these heavier gases - which also convect, of course - are at their best at successively smaller glass spacings. On that basis, it appears that an argon-filled DGU with a 12mm spacer ought to perform better than one with a 16mm spacer. Not according to my BRE U-value calculator it doesn't. I rather think that the benefits are questionable. However, for my preferred 20mm DGU (12mm spacer) argon confers a demonstrable and affordable reduction of 0.2 in the U-value of an average-size domestic window installation. Whether it's cost effective is arguable. Whether the use of expensive krypton or eye-wateringly expensive xenon is ever justified is highly, highly questionable. The claim that either (or, most puzzling of all, a mixture - in just what proportions?) of these two gases miraculously tranforms a 4mm gap into an efficient insulating unit is emphatically NOT borne out by the published U-value calculators from our most reputable authorities.

On a cheering note: Yesterday, a passing trio of canvassers for a national pvc window company told my wife (working in the front garden) that they wouldn't bother to pester her, as our wood windows were clearly excellent, and she wasn't going to be interested in what they were pushing. Knowing that pvc salesmen never have an option up their sleeve for those they encounter who really do want wood, I suggested they point such leads in my direction. They jumped at the opportunity. Other canvassers, form a queue here, please.

More digression

I have spent the last few days completely re-writing the website, which along with an ongoing discussion on rising damp on Philip Rougiers forum (http://forum.expertexpert.com/index.php) hasn't left much time to continue the thoughts on slimlite DGUs. I'm now busy with preparing a new pitch to a potential big client, so it'll have to wait a bit longer.