I thought it was 1st April when I read today’s Telegraph but after checking the date a shiver ran down my spine. The “government” , whatever and whoever that is in reality, has decided that the terms “husband” and “wife” can be applied to either gender. If they can overturn this what hope is there for debit and credit as we beancounters know them?

Will debits now be by the door and credits by the window? Or could the individual be left to decide which side they fancy them on?

Yesterday a long standing and value member of staff met HRH Prince of Wales as one of his guests at an event attended by around a thousand people. Much to her surprise the heir to the throne came up to her and asked where she worked and what the firm did. She proudly told them she works for Formations Direct and they register limited companies. The host enquired further as to where we were based etc. etc. and then she told him that her boss is “very good” – well, that’s what she reported to me 🙂

I am not sure if an OBE is practical as it means reprinting all my buisness cards but perhaps a Royal Warrant ….even Harrods haven’t got that any more.

I am a very fortunate commuter. It takes me 3 minutes and 35 seconds to get from breakfast to my desk at work. No. I don’t work form home in a large mansion, I am fortunate enough to work around a few corners from home . It’s so close actually that I often walk the long way round to get in my daily exercise quota. Previously I worked 1.5 miles from home and walked or cycled most days.

Now, I am fortunate in as much as I chose where to locate my office and the main criteria was that it was within a 30 minute walk. I pass hundreds vehicles each day , often the same people stuck in the same jam. At one spot I pass the Manchester bound X43 from deepest Lancashire and over a stretch that is 1/5 mile long I pass them , open the office, boil the kettle and start drinking  my tea as it trundles past 7 – 8 minutes later. I can’t help but feel sorry for those passengers.

Which got me thinking. Do people really think about changing jobs to avoid a commute or do they get into their car or catch the bus as a matter of routine without any consideration ?  Or are they sucked in because there are no jobs locally ?

What are your commuting thoughts and experiences ?

No doubt you have paperless banking, at least for your private affairs, as do I. I have been scratching my head for some time as to why I receive a plethora of paper correspondence from my bank. Why can they not deliver notification of charges or changes to terms and conditions on their website when I log in? The bumf that thuds onto my doormat is given a cursory glance and it invariably ends up in the recycling box without leaving the threshhold to my residence.

Royal Mail must me minting it on such junk mail. One can only assume that there are burdensome banking regulations mandating the sending of such correspondence by snail mail. Is it a sinister move by the those in power to flatter the profits of Royal Mail in the run up to privatisation? I bank with Lloyds, which as you know is a state enterpise, so the conspiracy theorists must surely find something here.

So our old friend the RBS is back in the news for the wrong reasons . Everybody is working up a lather over the circumstances over Mr Hester’s departure and that has triggered a debate as to whether it signals that privatisation is firmly on the radar.

The elephant in the room remains the level of rotten property debt on its books but we don’t seem to hear much about it these days. I know several people who have massive defaults on RBS loans but their companies trundle along as zombies with the bank paying them management fees to manage the portfolios. It feels that they are taking far too long to get their balance sheet tidied up . If they were my client I would tell them toget a move on and bite the bullet, American style.

The question is how these are being valued for the purpose of privatisation both by the government and by prospective investors.

Given the gulf between what you and I paid to rescue the bank and it’s current share price I am scratching my head over why the “P” word is even on the radar.

HMRC have gone after firms that take on interns without pay and claiming a breach of minimum wage. The only reason HMRC are managing to get away with it is because these young people have fixed hours, so it seems that the issue is not one of principle but one of technicality . This is a typical situation that pushes creative minds to find loopholes.

Working unpaid for a several months is a fantastic way of giving a young person the vital experience needed to progress. I have witnessed it myself through my employment charity. One of the employers we worked with was a local authority , so here we have joined up government in action.

What we need is to sweep away all the tax rules and have an independent committee that will decide on a case by case basis whether something should or should not have been taxable. In the meantime the tax is paid until such time it is ruled to be refundable .Surely it is much easier than the hotch potch we have now and certainly no less fairer than the current lottery.