The mailman always knows. Whilst out and about on the “Your Rights At Work” campaign in the weekend, a number of Australia Post employees (office and delivery staff) told me that they were told that they are unable to take leave in October. One has had his Long Service Leave (planned for a number of months) rescinded. Now why would that be?

Sam thought he’d show ’em. So bringing Bert Newton back to Nine was “disastrous” and he was a “relic and dinosaur” wrote the Sunday Telegraph yesterday. Though the article did fairly point out it wasn’t Bert’s fault, the only person to carry the can was programming director Michael Healey. Well, what about Sam Chisholm, the genius behind the poaching of Bert from daytime TV on Ten!? He was the CEO and, as he was fond of telling people, he made ALL the decisions. Bert was Sam’s big attempt to make an impact at Nine. He should be called to account by the media for that and the Jessica Rowe flop. Again, a “star” from Ten? It wasn’t Jessica’s fault either if she wasn’t right. It was the person who went against the advice (or at least wishes) of his entire executive. The driving force behind Sam getting Jess was that he thought David Gyngell had failed. In fact, Gyngell had had a conversation, but thought better of it. Same can be said for John Alexander and Jim Rudder. Sam thought he’d show em. Good one Sam. Bert, Jess.. what else?

Poor ordering and operational procedures? So, rather than take responsibility for their own poor decisions at running their business, Angus & Robertson figures their suppliers need to pay for poor ordering and operational procedures? Like when Angus & Robertson prices books above the RRP (Selected books at a minimum of $1.04 add to the RRP, with some of the more expensive books being listed at over $20 above RRP) which I have noticed in combination with sales prices of so called reduced prices (Yes…reduced from the over charged price and on sale at the…RRP.) I for one no longer shop at this rip-off merchant.

Just popped onto the A&R website. They have a section called “Become a Supplier.” This appears just below the “Career Opportunities” link. No mention of you pay us if we can’t flog your book, etc.

Sugar-coating the situation. Angus & Robertson’s reply to Crikey is totally disingenuous. In classic damage control mode, and “to put things in context”, A&R states that only 47 out of its 1,200 suppliers (3.91%) received the offensive letter, thereby implying that A&R’s recent standover tactics would not materially affect the company’s book range. A&R would have you believe it’s all a storm in a tea cup: the official line seems to be that this is nothing but routine annual negotiations, affecting less than 4% of our suppliers. Talk about manipulation of statistics! The 47 suppliers that have been targeted are collectively responsible for approximately 25% (or $15m per annum) of A&R’s book sales. The only BOOK suppliers who do not seem to have been targeted in this way are the major multi-national, foreign owned publishers, such as Hachette, Penguin, Harper Collins and Random House, who would collectively account for about 70% of A&R’s book sales. Despite A&R’s attempts at sugar-coating the situation, the truth is very different than they would have you believe and their duplicity should be exposed.

“Professional” shoplifting teams. JB Hi Fi has the potential to seriously increase its profitability if the board can root out the well-established “professional” shoplifting teams organised by employees particularly in Queensland.

What is APRA doing right now? There is much public distancing of the impact in Aus from the US Sub-prime problem. Is not the term “Sub-Prime” American for “Low-Doc”? Are there not recognised risk similarities inherent in the very sectors our Govt is apologising to for the interest rate rises? What is APRA doing right now about Low-Docs and securitisation practices? Are there dots to join?