Get Cycling! (But not when its drizzly)

Well, so much for the Get Active! Get Cycling campaign. I turned up at the right time this morning, but the “instructor” said it was drizzling and he couldn’t go out due to “Health And Safety” – those three little words that help people being paid to do stuff excuse themselves from doing anything at all.

So I left. It stopped drizzling, so I returned. He’d gone, along with his expensive van full of unused expensive bikes, all depreciating in a capital depreciation kind of way.

I rang his HQ in Peterlee, managed fairly loosely, it would seem by the County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust. (Staff at the HQ in Peterlee couldn’t remember the name of The University Hospital of North Durham, naming it as “Dryburn?” (the question mark is important here)… or “That hospital in Darlington?”

He said the ride had started at 10:00 and I’d missed it. I said the van had gone. He said then in that case, it must be that nobody had turned up. I said that somebody had turned up, but instructorman wouldn’t go out because of Health and Safety on account of the fact that it was drizzling.

The Peterlee chap said that rain wouldn’t normally stop the ride going out.

I told him it wasn’t raining now and, in fact, it was sunny.  He didn’t seem to know that the “instructor” wasn’t there any more. Where had he gone, I wonder? Was he having a jolly on a cycle path somewhere? Was he drinking tea somewhere else?  Had he gone to visit a friend now that he’d got the day off? Maybe he’s taken annual leave….

There were apologies.

There’s a lot of staff salary and equipment and office costs going into this. Get Active by the Physical Activity Health Improvement But Not When The Instructor Can’t Be Arsed Scheme. 

They’re about to close the Leisure centre/Gym/Swimming pool in Crook in order to save money by the way.

Joined-up thinking.