The Evil Diaries: “A Jolly Good Citizen”

Master Investor was packed on Saturday. I do not know whether this is down to the endeavours of the Burnbrae Media management or a reviving interest amongst private investors or whether it is a bit of both. At a guess it is the last identified.

At the end of my own contribution I was asked not once but twice for a political forecast. And, on each occasion, I manfully declined to rise to the bait. Had I done so I would only have made a rod for my back. In any event, I do not think anybody knows. Not even Soapy Joe who has pointed out to me that a bet of £10,000 to win £1,200 that it will be a hung parliament is a gimme.

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The Debonair One (a.k.a. Jim Mellon) has been in touch commenting that Avation (AVAP) is one to get stuck into. It’s now around 137p. I see it is a full listing which means stamp duty of 0.5%. If memory serves me right it was Jeff Chatfield that got this company going. I do not know what its cost of money is. But that is presumably fairly attractive.

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Harry Wallop of Channel 4, the Labour party’s broadcast propaganda unit, is engaging. He spews out fun. He can’t help it. So I settled down on Monday night to see what he had to say about Sports Direct (SPD) where viewers were promised shock horror revelations. There was not a single such revelation.

It was alleged that government guidelines (not statutory requirements, be it noted) entail that it is contrary to whatever to put closing down sale notices in your windows and then move the shop one hundred yards. That is not closing down apparently. Well, I do not know what else such a sale is.

Channel 4 kept on banging on about zero hour contracts being widely applied at Sports Direct. I am not surprised that they are the rule given that at least 80% of the potential workforce prefer them. However, since the Labour party think that they are beelzebub on wheels, Sports Direct is to be criticsed. I suppose Channel 4 got a directive from Labour to say something stupid dressed up as consequential.

The drivel ranged far and wide. For instance, a Newcastle United supporter  resented the fact that the owner of NU The Mashley, as I call him, sees that Sports Direct does not pay NU for the copious advertising boards promoting SPD set out all over NU’s ground. What on earth this supporter identifies as improper God alone knows. But if I were a shareholder in SPD I would remark that The Mashley is a jolly good citizen and if I were a SPD worker I would think my job is that bit more secure.