Sunday, October 09, 2011

Out of His Depth

An official in the Fire Brigade, from his high rise office down in the Big Smoke, arbitrarily decrees that ("for safety reasons" of course) all fire alarm units in licenced premises must be "upgraded" to a certain type within 6 months.

The only manufacturer of this "certain type" of fire alarm is in Perth, and when contacted reveals that it will take them at least 3 years at full production capacity to manufacture enough to meet this sudden need.

The Fire Brigade official, at the 6 month deadline, suspects that not all licenced premises have complied. He obtusely commences site inspections, and fines venues for non-compliance.

He is stunned when his fines are challenged in court, stunned at the reason for the challenge (inability to procure commerical supply) and even then, does not comprehend why the challenges are upheld. That is, that that judges actually ruled against him, when it was a regulation that licenced venues comply).

How did he ever get above the level of "boy who washes the fire engine"?

2 comments:

kae said...

Peter principle.

JeffS said...

What Kae said. But I suspect that "Peter" can be defined in at least two ways under these circumstances.