Roger Mexico

Now, now, John. These OAP coach trips keep the court system going in fines. Don't bite the hand that feeds you. (Obviously you shouldn't put people from Oakham up in the Rutland as they'll just behave as if they were at home). Actually these trips at the start/end of a season can be reasonable useful financially, because, although hoteliers, the Steam Packet etc don't make much profit on them, they do mean that overheads are covered for a bit longer. It's not like other business is being turned away. That said higher energy costs may have an effect on the viability.

Well the accounts show a government grant of £ 592,572 in the last two years, so it's less than you think (Total running costs for 2021 were over £6 million. They also got government salary support scheme to the value of £820k, mostly in 2020. However they also say: As has been the case for many years, the Hospice received a grant from the IOM DHSC of £592k. With effect from 1 April 2021, our contractual arrangements were transferred to Manx Care. Following extensive negotiation a new service level agreement is in the process of being finalised. The good news is that the need for an uplift in funding has been recognised so that for 2022 onwards we can expect annual stepped uplifts to get us to an agreed benchmark funding mechanism of 50% of core clinical staffing costs within three years. This has already been reflected in 2022/23 with an agreed uplift to £896,000. This increased level of certainty will add a greater deal of substance to our financial planning in future years.

If there's a reporter on the plane, it's a news story.

In reality no Minister is going to make any sort of intervention in a legal case without getting legal advice. How else would they know that they have the vires? And in any case the AG actually sits in on CoMin meetings, so they'll get his legal advice anyway. It's long been observed that the role of AG is conflicted in all sorts of ways (even before the most recent bouts of empire-building). But it suits a lot of people to keep it that way.

The programme just knows you've got an unfriendly aura. (It's not Needham and Roberts, she seems to directed these to a large portion of the Island's population)

And who gives the legal steer to CoMin? All roads lead back to the AG.

Gef have now done a gushing piece on the win, but then the whole thing is the most Gef-like thing you could imagine anyway. Including some of the same people being involved but it's a small scene in a small place.

They're being represented by CallinWild in this particular case, but where else do they go for more generalised advice on eg "What do I do to stop this shitshow?"? Not that I imagine Callister would have the initiative to ask.

Basic Tynwald Member pay is "calculated under a formula set out in the Members of Tynwald (Annual Sums) (Amendment) Order 2014 as amended in 2021 by the Members of Tynwald (Annual Sums)(Amendment) Order 2021 (SD 2021/0140). The formula is based on civil service pay". They're actually at spine point 39. So if the civil service get 6% (or 60%) so do Tynwald Members. All additional upgrades (eg for Ministers) are percentages of the basic, so they would be increased similarly.

Except that I don't think the deposits (or any financial transactions) benefit the government. They all go into a private company, IOM Gift Card Limited. So what we have here is a government agency reminding people that they can pay less tax to the government so as to benefit a private organisation. I'll just repeat something I said earlier in this topic: There's actually another topic on this subject with more information in it, but I don't know if anyone expected the whole thing to be quite this unsuccessful. They've actually spent £192,953.69 so as to have only £66,782 spent in the economy. Not even the finest Skellynomics can make that look good. The only good thing is that they haven't spent the whole £500,000 that was originally proposed. Though I'm sure Allinson will have plenty assuring him that the only thing to do is throw good money after bad. Edited to add: By "£66,782 spent in the economy", I mean spent by the public not including the bonus added on by the DfE. Though even here the word 'public' is stretching it as many of the cards seem to have been bought by companies as part of their Christmas bonuses for employees and so it is money that would have been spent anyway - just with a government top-up. As usual the DfE's idea of stimulating the economy doesn't seem to go beyond "giving money to your mates". At the Conference Allinson was claiming that card had been a great success. Though he didn't say for whom.

You don't pay income tax on rental money from Homestay (at least if it's less than £2350) and I doubt anyone taking money for letting people view from their garden declares it. So there will be less money to the government than there would have been in the past, where VAT and tax would have been paid by hotel and guest house owners.

Now we know you're joking.

It won't be the DoI, given that MNH are involved as well this looks like a DfE (ie Visit IOM) job. No doubt they had some money hanging around. Whether they will actually spend any money on advertising or just on consultants to tell them what a good idea it is, is another matter.

We did know about this one. It's a bit weird because it's not really DHSC v Ranson, but AG's Office v the Tribunal, as the former claiming that client privilege applies while the Tribunal says it's nothing to do with it (it isn't). It's just more can-kicking which seems to be the only way the government knows how to operate. But Callister isn't going to intervene without legal advice and as the only place he can get that is the AG's Office ....

Quite a few Steam Railway/MER/SMR jobs are seasonal - though you will need to apply by 20 November to get one of them. It's conductors and guards and firemen, so drivers, station staff, maintenance, engineers etc are probably all year round. So it won't be 'most of' but quite a few. But the extension in November is only two trains a day each way, Saturday and Sunday only, so I would imagine they will only be using year-round staff. MNH doesn't seem to use any 'seasonal' staff, though I think a lot of their site staff are effectively zero-hours, so they'll only normally be working March to November. But many of these seem to be older people, treating it as a part-time retirement job, so that probably suits them. They also move people between sites (again the November hours are quite restricted), so they may also be operating using permanent staff mostly. The guides who take the cruise ship tours are self-employed, contracted by the company that runs them and I think the meeters and greeters are volunteers. It's not really relevant to the November extension anyway.