'The head of the government department responsible for promoting British business abroad asked officials to think of ways to spend up to £1 million to avoid a budget underspend, it was reported.This is one of the differences between privately owned and publicly owned businesses; privately owned businesses try to underspend to save money, publicly owned businesses try to spend to their allocated limit so as to protect their budgets.
Sir Andrew Cahn, until this week head of UK Trade & Investment, said in an email to senior colleagues that the Foreign Office was "heading for an underspend and wants to get money out of the door", the Daily Mail reported.
He added: "If we can spend money in this financial year on a one-off basis, then we can have at least £1 million. Can you think what we might do with such money?"
One suggestion was to offer "business development visits" to the UK by staff based abroad.'
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1 comment:
I have just had to pay my VAT bill. It only amounted to about £11,000, but putting aside the money to pay it at the end of December meant that I was unable to draw any wages in November or December and with mortgage commitments and other bills, there has been no money for the central heating, or much else. Christmas presents were very modest, but I did mange o buy a frozen turkey and some sprouts. I have four children and a wife, who has been in hospital since the beginning of September. She came home for a few days for Christmas, so I borrowed some oil filled radiators for the occasion. All-in-all, we had a lovely time. It was wonderful to have a few days together as a family.
We are now back to the same routine as before, Me getting up at 6.30, making sandwiches for the children's lunch, taking them to school, going to work, picking them up after school, working from home as long as I can before I make an evening meal which is rushed because I visit my wife each evening, which is a 3 hour round trip.
In addition to VAT, I have to find about £2,500/month for business rates and £3,000 for PAYE/NI.
My total drawings for the Year 2009/10 were £16,000 and I haven't had a holiday since I took four days off in 2007
At least half of the products my company manufactures go abroad, either directly or indirectly.
If the government would like to find ways of spending some of their money, I have a few ideas. Do you have a telephone number?
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