We note with joy that the John Lewis Partnership has had a good Xmas. JLP are an organisation held close to our collective heart. Firstly, inasmuch as the Beaker People are great fans. Located handily as we are for JLP in Milton Keynes, and two Waitroses - one in CMK, one in Leighton Buzzard. On occasion we even get all reckless and organise coach trips to Waitrose Extra in Rushden. Like a heaven on earth. You can pick up olives and sun-dried tomatoes from the olive bar - what an olive bar - and then grab a flat screen TV or one of seventeen hundred unusual knick-knacks and some nice tea towels while you're there. And all with good parking. Or you can go to the traditional JLP stores, and pick up almost anything.
And then consider the organisation itself. The tens of thousands of Partners are well-cared for. They have decent food at reasonable prices in their Partners' Dining Rooms (no canteens for Partners). And most of all they have their constitution. Endless levels of representation, through branch committees and the Partnership Council. Divisional Councils. Branch forums (or fora? I must ask Hnaef). And all carefully balanced to give Partners a voice, a kind of brush on the steering-wheel of power... but the Management makes sure it keeps the balance of power. I like it. It's like a secular form of Methodism. And I see it as a kind of guiding light for how the Beaker Community should be run. So you all think you can sway the way we're going - while I keep things on an even keel. Democracy's great as long as you don't go mad and share any real power.
If John Lewis is like a Secular Form of Methodism, can I argue that Methodism is like a religious John Lewis? We'd be packing them in, and they would never knowingly be unsaved....
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