[the eu] and its interface with the great british workman

Sometimes the more mundane issues are the more interesting.

Last Thursday, I heard a knock on the door and there was The Great British Workman, named Chris, to be known for simplicity’s sake as The Great British Workman, wearing a sickly yellow green jacket.

‘We’re ah, going to do the lekky, like.’

All right, there were a number of assumptions here. Firstly, what the hell was he talking about? Secondly, what ‘lekky’ needed to be done? I was happy, I had my pay meter, the shop was not far away to do the top ups, the sun was shining.

‘We’re moving your meter, like.’

‘Ah, and where, Chris, are you moving it to, pray?’

‘Downstairs.’

‘Why would you move my personal paymeter, which currently houses my electronic key, which I had to negotiate with the electririty company over a period of twenty five ‘press one if you need to be confused’ days, to some remote part of this mansion, accessible only by three flights of stairs and five intervening doors, when the whole point of a personal paymeter is to know instantly and at hand, how much electricity you have, to take the aforementioned key, go to the shop with it and say, ‘Ten quid on the lekky, please?’’

‘Health and Safety.’

‘Yes and I fervently believe it’s a great idea, health and safety but how does this come into the discussion about my paymeter?’

‘Well, it’s unsafe like.’

‘Who says?’

‘Health and Safety.’

‘Right, let me get this straight. Last week, you’d concede, my personal paymeter was perfectly safe, no sparks or conflagration of any kind? Good. Today though, it’s become unsafe, a liability lurking in a box, ready to spring out and incinerate my children and hopefully my missus?’

‘The EU like. New regulations come through.’

‘Now I understand. Right Chris, when do you want to do this?’

‘Tomorrow – wil you be in all day?’ he innocently asked, expecting everyone to phone up work at a moment’s notice and say, ‘Think I won’t drop in today; I’m having my paymeter removed.’’

‘I’ll be in.’

.o0o.

TGBW arrived only thirty minutes after the designated time [and I appreciated that I’d been given an actual time in the first place], with stepladders, tools, a sheet and a mate, wearing a sickly yellow green jacket.

Soon they were up in the loft, there was a lot of yelling at someone called Tel, elsewhere in the loft and then a great thick black cable was passed through, maybe an inch thick, snaking its way into my bathroom.

‘This is moving the meter, is it?’

‘We have to change the cable.’

‘What, for the whole building?’

‘Yeah, the old cable doesn’t meet specifications.’

‘This is a new flat, that was new cable you put through a month back’

‘Well yeah but it doesn’t meet specifications now. The EU like.’

‘At this point, I ran into the owner of the complex, an exceedingly nice chap named Frazzled to a Cinder, hereafter to be known as FTAC, not wearing a sickly yellow green jacket. You can always tell the owner of a venture in this land - where things are actually built, rather than a few figures being creatively moved about on a page as he applies to be bailed out – he’s the one with the worry lines on his brow and the glazed eyes at age thirty-two and he doesn’t wear a sickly yellow green jacket unless he has to.

‘FTAC, what’s all this about? I don’t want my fucking meter moved downstairs, excuse my French. I was perfectly happy in this nice little complex with its gardens, fountains, triple glazed gas filled, acoustic glass, CCTV, bicycle sheds, carpark, domaphone and piped music.’

‘James,’ he said, in that exasperated voice, ‘tell me about it. This is costing me a thousand fucking pounds to change the fucking cable over. The thing’s cost twenty three thou so far. Scottish Power. We’ll try to get them to keep the disruption to a minimum.’

‘And I thought I had problems. Thanks, FTAC.’

.o0o.

Three and a half hours later, with me still stuck in the flat, TGBW reappeared. ‘Ah, look mate, they say they’ll be in to do it Monday morning now. Problem with the new meters like.’

‘Oh thanks a whole lot for that, GBW, I appreciate being cooped up here all day. What time Monday?’

‘Well, we can’t tell, can we? I’ll be here eight o’clock though. Will you be in Monday like?’

‘For you, Chris, anything.’

.o0o.

The trip to my mate was also stymied due to certain internal issues at that end so a pleasant weekend was had writing and editing the book.

.o0o.

Monday morning duly arrived and no one appeared, as I’d suspected.

About ten, TGBW appeared and said, ‘Right, we’re shutting off the power in an hour. Will you be in, like?’’

‘How long for?’

‘An hour.’

‘No, how long will the power be off for?’

‘An hour. We’ll finish the cable now.’

Thirty minutes later, there was a knock at the door. There was TGBW, Tel, a stepladder and the ubiquitous sickly yellow green jackets. I knew he was my mate because he said, ‘Awright, mate?’

They now went into a four hour session of cursing, swearing to themselves and whatever in the loft, every so often resulting in cable coming through to the flat, dust and debris going over the carpet and walls.

‘You got a vacuum?’

‘Not yet.’

‘Right, brush and pan ’ll do.’

The other one was at my box, incising cable, drilling, screwing, unscrewing and generally enjoying himself. I felt ravaged.

Then the drilling in the walls and roof began.

A couple of hours later, I caught TGBW and asked when the ‘lekky’ was going off.

‘Tomorrah now. They didn’t get the right meters.’

I wondered if he’d meant to say Gomorrah rather than tomorrah. ‘Tell me, Chris, are you expecting me to be in tomorrow?’

‘Yeah, if ya can like. We need ta get in the flats.’

‘That’s very kind of you. For how many more days will this happen?’

‘Only tomorrah.’

At this point, some very official people with clipboards appeared – I knew they were official because they had clipboards and weren’t wearing wearing sickly yellow green jackets - and I made the mistake of asking, ‘Is it absolutely necessary that the personal paymeter go downstairs?’

‘No, not at all.’

‘You’re electricity, right?’

‘British Gas and Electric.’

‘Not Southern Electric?’

‘No. Ah, you’re not one of ours then. What, are you, Npower?’

I went and found a Scottish Power man downstairs – he was the one looking on approvingly and not much else but his jacket was orange, which provided pleasant relief, like – and I asked him the same question.

‘No, not at all.’

Good, my severed cables and debris notwithstanding, my interruptions and inconvenience were soon to be ended. Now, quite a number of hours after the threatened shut down of electricity, I sought out TGBW.

‘Well, we’re not shutting it off until tomorrow morning now.’

.o0o.

Tuesday morning.

About ten, TGBW appeared and went through the ‘we’re shutting the lekky off in an hour’ spiel.

An hour later, it was shut off but everything had been done – washing, ironing etc.

Two hours later, I went for a wander in the strangely silent building and found an interesting sight downstairs. Leaning on his van, with a bemused smile on his face, was FTAC.

‘Morning, James.’

He wandered over and we found an alcove. To my questioning glance, he explained, ‘These people standing about are the first gang, for the cable. There’s another lot meant to be here but they were sent to another site instead and we’re waiting for a third gang to arrive. This lot are costing me by the hour.’

‘They’ve cut off the power.’

‘Maybe you’ll have better luck than me. We’ve got flats to build.’

‘I wondered why it was so quiet.’

‘Look, that’s him over there. Go and have a chat.’

I did. It was a rotund, red-faced little man with Scottish Power tattooed on his forehead and wearing an orange jacket. ‘Excuse my presumption but is it necessary to have the power off while no one’s doing anything?’

‘Don’t blame me mate – it’s them wot didn’t turn up.’

‘Yes but while everyone’s hanging about chatting and having cuppas, could be have a smidgeon of lekky perhaps?’

‘Nah. Regulations. Health and Safety. Sorry.’

FTAC was grinning, fit to burst. I went upstairs, crestfallen.

One hour.

Two hours.

Three hours.

I went downstairs to find out and TGBW explained to me, ‘Yeah, the meters came but they were the wrong ones. We’re waiting for the new meters.’

‘Chris, forgive me for being stupid but I thought you were actually getting my meter out and putting downstairs behind an old washbasin?’

‘Oh no, we can’t touch them. They belong to the company.’

‘You mean I have to phone my electricity supplier, with whom it took weeks just to get an identity code, to come out and shift my personal paymeter downstairs here, coordinating with Scottish Power?’

‘Yeah, it might be worth calling ’em like.’

I went upstairs, intending to do no such thing.

Half and hour later, there was a knock on the door. It was TGBW. ‘I’ve come to take out your meter.’

I ushered him in and watched the start of the complex process of about a dozen little sub-boxes needing removing, new cable attached and so on. There was still a little bit of battery power on the Mac so I went back to that.

Late afternoon now, I went looking for them all and found TGBW, a success in itself. He explained, ‘They need these lugs,’ he drew a diagram on the wall with his finger, ‘and they didn’t bring ’em. You’d think seein’ as we’d put new cable in, we’d need lugs too.’

‘Hold on – do you need the lugs or do they?’

‘Them. We put ’em in but they have to supervise it, like.’

‘Why?’

‘Regulations.’

‘Health and Safety?’

‘Yeah.’

Just before my regular meeting with my mate of a Tuesday evening, TGBW appeared at the door and knocked. ‘Your juice is back on.’ He then moved to the next flat.

In the car, my mate chuckled, ‘There might be a blog post in that, you know.’

This morning I told FTAC I was running a post on this and he grinned. He’s heard of blogs, of course but being involved in building things, he doesn’t have a lot of time.

If you want to meet him, he’s the one with the polished accent, his sentences punctuated by he word ‘fucking’, looking like a navvy and driving the van.