Institutional Bias by Andrew Montford

Author:Andrew Montford [Montford, Andrew]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

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…it is clearly wrong for you to threaten to freeze all expenditure of the group because I may find it inconvenient to attend the meeting that you are pressing for. Some may regard your approach as bullying and it may have worked on others in the past. I however regard it as a massive over-reaction. Indeed I and others may wonder whether it has more to do with an entirely different agenda.

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After a week of trawling through the figures and liasing with the institute's accountants, Gill was able to report some more details of the Energy Group's financial situation. The conference profits had amounted to some £1350, but the IoP's finance department had not passed the proceeds on to the Energy Group because a small amount was still owed from two attendees. However, because of the threat to freeze the group's spending, Gill persuaded the accountants to pass on part of the profits immediately. This left the 'substantial' overspend at a total of £63 and, with another £700 due imminently, it looked as though the group was actually 20% underspent on its annual budget. As Gill made clear to Beeby, a meeting was therefore entirely unnecessary.

Surprisingly, Beeby was still unhappy and he reiterated his demand that Gill meet with Main and Verth. On the positive side, he did seem to be backing away from his threat to freeze the group's funds, suggesting instead that he would report non-compliance to the IoP's council. Perplexed, Gill reported what had happened to the other committee members. As he noted, while the group was owed sufficient money to keep it in the black, the Jaworowski meeting – the last of the year – would certainly eat up the rest of the budget. They had discussed this possibility at their meeting back in May and at the time had decided to cut back on the refreshments so as to make ends meet. Now, however, it looked as though they would need to err even more on the side of caution and Gill pointed out that there was a way they could do this: other committee members had offered free space outside the IoP to hold the Jaworowski meeting, allowing them to avoid the normal internal room-hire charges. This should be enough to prevent any possibility of an overspend.

The meeting with Peter Main was eventually fixed for 31 July 2008, but it seemed clear from the moment that Gill walked through the door that Main and Verth had stage-managed the whole affair. Besides Gill, the Energy Group was represented by John Roberts (no relation to Simon Roberts, the committee member we have already met) and Love – Axon had also been slated to attend, but in the event failed to make an appearance. However, unbeknown to Gill, Main had also decided to invite two other members of the committee who had only recently been co-opted: John Twidell and Michael Laughton. The presence of Twidell was particularly worrying. As a green energy consultant

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