NationStates Jolt Archive

I wanted to think up a clever title for this, but I just can't. My brain can't think of anything better.

From the Telegraph (is that better than the DailyMail?):

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/3375869/Tea-task-force-to-spy-on-water-use-at-work.html

A 'tea task force' could be employed to spy on employees filling the kettle at work, a Government body has said.


By Charlotte Bailey
Last Updated: 9:19AM GMT 04 Nov 2008

Envirowise is calling on businesses to appoint tea monitors to make sure people do not waste water.

It is advising companies to use teapots instead of making individual cups of tea, and hopes to re-introduce tea urns to the workplace.

They say that the moves will cut greenhouse gas emissions and, in turn, help businesses to save money.

Envirowise, which is funded by the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs, estimates that more than 30 billion cups of water are unnecessarily boiled each year.

In a statement it tells businesses: "Appoint a tea task force or tea monitor to make sure all your office hot drink-making facilities are as efficient as they could be. Only boil the water you use - this will avoid water and energy being wasted."

They go on to say that employees should use a teapot when making a round of hot drinks as this "allows you to measure the correct amount of water you will need, and often tastes nicer than making tea in the cup.

Mary Leonard, director at Envirowise said that the advice would serve as a "resource-saving initiative" for small and big companies.

However, critics and politicians have branded the advice "useless".

Susie Squires of the Taxpayers' Alliance said: "This is yet another example of a taxpayer-funded quango doling out useless advice. People are sick of these quangocrats wasting our time and money."

The Conservative environment spokesman Peter Ainsworth said: "You might have thought that in the current economic environment the Government would have higher priorities than appointing tea monitors."

I knew the Brits were serious about their tea, but I had no idea!

Oh for Christ's sake....

Next up: monitors for how many sheets of toilet paper each worker uses to wipe?

:D

Does the British government seriously have nothing better to do than monitor tea consumption.

tea in the teapot is way better.

but this is just sad. then again, it is from the Torygraph... once its on the BBC i'll believe its true ;)

:D

Does the British government seriously have nothing better to do than monitor tea consumption.

Yes. But their real fuck ups are so embarrassing, they'd rather people concentrated on what these loony QUANGOS get up to.

No-one controls how much tea I drink! :eek:

Teh lulz, teh lulz!!! :D

but this is just sad. then again, it is from the Torygraph... once its on the BBC i'll believe its true ;)

Look, have some sympathy for the torygraph. They are in an emotionally vulnerable place right now. The british government just handed over billions of pounds so bankers in the city wouldn't have to forgo Xmas bonuses. Normally they'd be all for this sort of thing, but it was Gordon Brown that did it, so they are a bit off their feed.

It's just a governmental quango producing an idiotic report, which is often all they do. It won't get made into policy. The best thing the UK could do is to get rid of at least half of the Quangos. They're a complete waste.

tea in the teapot is way better.
So this measure is meant to ban teabagging?Naughty Kat...

Oh for Christ's sake....

Next up: monitors for how many sheets of toilet paper each worker uses to wipe?

There are alot of pervs out there that'd be passionate about that line of work. :eek:

So this measure is meant to ban teabagging?

Teabagging has no place in a civilized workplace outside Germany or Netherlands. It's a threat to the national security, and should be dealt with as such.

I'm suddenly glad that I'm a Colonist

Brits the government just declared Brits are only allowed two cups of tea a day unless they are a member of parliament.

Could your government explain how making one cup of tea (which will be totally consumed) is more wasteful of water than making a pot of tea (the dregs of which will be discarded).

Could your government explain how making one cup of tea (which will be totally consumed) is more wasteful of water than making a pot of tea (the dregs of which will be discarded).

simple you pour to on sleeping homeless during the winter to encourage them to stop sleeping on door steps.

Could your government explain how making one cup of tea (which will be totally consumed) is more wasteful of water than making a pot of tea (the dregs of which will be discarded).

I'd imagine it's to do with people boiling more than a cup of water. But this isn't really the government. For some godforsaken reason (probably involving a lot of jobs for the boys) we have a lot of semi government agencies that produce crap like this that rarely if ever even register on the radar, let alone get made policy.

I'd imagine it's to do with people boiling more than a cup of water. But this isn't really the government. For some godforsaken reason (probably involving a lot of jobs for the boys) we have a lot of semi government agencies that produce crap like this that rarely if ever even register on the radar, let alone get made policy.

The natural rate of unemployment in the UK is absolutely massive. The government can't just let the number fall where is should. It would be 1930s bad.

That said, these people could be given less visible things to do. Flower pressing or someshit.

30 billion cups= 15 billion pints=7.5 billion quarts=1.875 billion gallons

So that works out to about 30.85 gallons per person each year. I wonder how much water will be consumed as a result of adding additional bureaucracy, and for that matter how much water could be saved through instead using that money to invest in incremental conservation improvements rather than another layer of bureaucratic oppression?

Although the Tea Issue is one of great importance to this country (far more than any vote they're having across the pond, clearly), I feel such quangos should look at whether their own practices are environmentally- and economically-sound, particularly paying attention to one thing: their continued existence.

It would be nice to have a few posters or adverts telling people to not waste water, particularly when boiling it for tea, but employing monitors for this is just ridiculous.