Richard Parry recalls his early days in the Civil Service in latest September blog. Expect to be in stitches along the way as the charming Head of Experience Economy at DIT takes you back to the 1970s….
During something of a summer hiatus, I have been reflecting on what is laughingly called my “career”, and, as this week marks the (approximately) one hundredth anniversary of my induction into the Civil Service, I thought I might recall some formative incidents from my early days working for Queen and Country.
I spent most of that August anxiously awaiting the postman, hoping for good news. And it duly came – my travel expenses for my last term at college had been approved. By the same post came a letter from the Civil Service Commission (I think) telling me that I had landed a job as an Executive Officer in the Export Credits Guarantee Department (now UK Export Finance). My first choice had been High Commissioner to Barbados, so I was a touch underwhelmed. Nonetheless, Dick Whittington-like, I set off to London to claim the glittering prizes.
I dimly recall my first day as spent being spoken to by a series of gurning people, imparting all sorts of vital information, almost none of which sunk in. I think I signed the Official Secrets Act and I remember a chap from HR saying, repeatedly, “never abuse your Whitleys”. To this day I don’t really know what this was about – I think it concerned uncertificated sick leave. But, dear reader, I can assure you that, to this day, my Whitleys are utterly unabused.
Day two in the Civil Service
Day two started with something of a shock. I was taken to a large, smoke-filled office and introduced to my fellow workers, the first two of whom were Mr Strange and Mr Fear. I was in an episode of The Addams Family. Later that week, I was granted an audience with the Assistant Secretary, or God. I was sent along to meet this deity with a chap called Peter Crabb, who was being inducted at the same time. Pete and I favoured the casual look – jeans and jumper – and blithely knocked at the door of the Great Man’s office. “Enter” came a shout. We entered. If you asked Central Casting for a British senior Civil Servant (male) 1970’s, Bob Milstead is who you would get. Balding, avuncular, pipe in hand and tweed jacket with leather elbow patches. I’m pretty sure his shirt had leather elbow patches, and I wouldn’t bet against his actual elbows having leather elbow patches. And a very nice man, to boot. His office was the size of a tennis court. Bob was on the phone and held up his hand in apology. After a minute or two, he put his hand over the mouthpiece and said “hello, chaps. Begin at the end, please”. This floored us. We just stood there. Bob looked up. “Start at the end, if you don’t mind”. I assumed this was some esoteric civil service code. Pete just stared at the ground. Eventually, Bob came off the call.
“Sorry chaps, I was just asking if you could start painting the far end of the office first” He thought we were the decorators. My meteoric rise to the top was underway.
Pete and I became firm friends (we still are) and got involved in any number of childish japes, such as inventing a board game based on our work and involving several “Risk” cards that were (shamefully) deeply politically incorrect – for example, “David says hello – miss six turns”. David had a stammer. And, having formed a darts team, we produced a programme for each game, giving the reader an astonishing amount of detailed, personal information – almost all of it invented, and defamatory – about our opponents.
Recalling the pranks
One of our more memorable, and disastrous, escapades involved Valentine’s Day and a young Irish girl called Bridget, who worked with us (God help her). Bridget was the nicest person in the world – if a tad naïve – and was excellent material for some harmless fun. I should say, at this point, that we both thought the world of her, and felt that we should reveal our feelings in a suitable way on February 14th. The plan was that we would record a fond message to her, hide a tape recorder (ask your parents, kids) under her desk, press “play” and leave the premises. We recorded 30 seconds of silence to enable us to make a getaway before my dulcet tones kicked in with “Bridget, I love you. Your silken hair is the colour of the rich chestnuts of autumn, your eyes are limpid pools of loveliness..” and so on. In fact, there was quite a lot more, but we assumed she would find, and stop, the tape before it got to the racier bits. The volume was set to 1, so that only she would hear it.
On the morning of the jape, we began to wonder if 30 seconds was enough time to absent ourselves, and so we enlisted the help of a bloke called Peter Carter. His job was simple. On a signal from us, he would watch us leave the room and then press “play”. Pretty simple, no? The only slight snag was that, in our Beavis and Butthead delight at our brilliance, we forgot to tell him about the thirty second silence, so when Peter pressed “play” he heard nothing. And turned the volume up to 10.
Apparently, the effect was shattering, not just to Bridget, but the entire office. I think she seriously considered killing us at one point. It took two boxes of chocolates and bunch of flowers to make things better.
Craving more from Richard? Check out Experience Economy’s Summer Blog here.
