Random reminder

Press, 25 June 1979, Page 30

Random reminder

» BIG BROTHER

The Post Office Supply Branch is a fairly earnest organisation, as befits a government department which has won pretty high marks for efficiency over the years.

Now and then, some extrovert tries to breach protocol. And, apparently, he is put down, smartly.

An officer of the supply branch in Christchurch had occasion recently to forward a telex message to the headquarters of the department in Wellington. The subject was more than e little mundane. It was about manhole covers. Our hero — and he had to be a hero, to try to buck the system — is a cheerful character, and he thought he might do something to brighten the dull lives of those in the headquarters office. So he added, in his light-

hearted way, a paragraph suggesting that the Sexual Discrimination Committee had decided that the term “manhole cover’’ should be replaced by “personhole cover.”

This must have caused chaos up in Wellington. It was quite clear that there, one could find people all too willing to frown on any sign of iceb eaking, and friendly liaison between headquarters and a district office. That, at least, is how our informant saw it.

The manager, or personager, “of his branch had a telephone call from Wellington, a verbal slapping of the wrist for frivolous conduct.

Little wonder the people in the local branch now talk in whispers, taking great care what they say. They must have all been to see “Glide Time.”