Stockport introduces Vietnamese business practices

I have just attended a meeting organised by Stockport Homes, the arms-length from Council but owned by council company responsible for managing residential council property. We were invited because the property we rent out is on a council estate.

What amused me was that all attendees where given £5. It reminded me of Vietnam were it is standard practice to pay staff to attend meetings. We had to do it to get the Vietnamese government officials to attend. It's the first time I've been paid to attend a meeting.

You may suggest that I should have refused it as the other attendees were more cash strapped than I, but it is coming out of our service charge (£1,400 was paid out to attendees last year) and they are asking for more than £500 from us to pay to paint a stairwell we don't have access to.

Stockport Homes seem to have problems with quality control of work done by contractors. Amazingly, they have only one contractor, who is another Council company. Having established that the meeting had little confidence in Stockport Homes' ability to manage small grass-cutting contracts, the Stockport Homes representatives were very slow to understand why residents should then be concerned about their management of a new £40m fund for environmental improvements. (Comments such as, "It is completely different" and "It's a much bigger fund" were not reassuring.

Actually this posting was just supposed to be about my amazement at being paid an attendence allowance. I've wittered on again. Be thankful you don't work with me and have to read my meeting notes.