Coffee Aroma has been ordered by Lincolnshire County Council to remove by four o’clock in the afternoon the tables and chairs outside their coffee shop.
Walk from Coffee Aroma to Lincolnshire County Council around lunchtime and you will find en route vehicles illegally parked on the footpath, obstructing the footpath and forcing pedestrians out into the road into the path of lorries on a busy highway. Many jobsworth are walking to and fro, it is after all lunchtime. Report to local traffic wardens, the police or Lincolnshire County Council and what action is taken? Er, nothing.
This is the council headed by the Philistine Martin Hill, a man who shows arrogant contempt for the public. Who thought it ok to close two-thirds of the public libraries in the county, the remainder on limited hours. His latest crude power grab is to hold a referendum, at taxpayers expense, to have only one council for the whole of Lincolnshire. No guessing, it would be his council.
An edict issued by a worthless jobsworth with nothing better to do.
This is classic jobsworth, trying to justify their existence.
These are what David Graeber calls bullshit jobs, jobs that exist to employ people who perform no useful function.
Classic bullshit jobs, half a dozen migrants with dirty rags and a bucket of water replacing an automatic car wash.
But why is there a need to remove the tables and chairs by four o’clock?
The tables and chairs are behind bollards defining what was once the footpath in a pedestrianised street. Even if there was traffic flowing down the street, they would not be obstructing the highway.
This is a pedestrianised street, as is the High Street, as is Sincil Street.
But before ten o’clock in the morning, large lorries drive up the High Street, often until at least sometime after 10-30. Then a repeat after four o’clock.
These are pedestrianised streets, there should be no motorised traffic.
In all these streets, the heavy lorries apart from danger to pedestrians, are destroying the road surface, more cost to local tax payers, more jobs bullshit jobs created.
These vehicles should be barred, a pedestrianised area, should be that, a pedestrianised area 24 hours a day, seven days a week. An area for people, an area where they are safe.
This is the norm in pedestrianised town centres across Europe.
Lorry deliveries to an offloading area on edge of the town centre, then delivered by barrow or hand cart.
This is the norm in Istanbul, Puerto de la Cruz, La Laguna, Santigo de Compostela, Athens, and many other towns and cities.
It is also the norm to see people sat outside, as for example outside El Café del Aguere in La Laguna, the only place in Tenerife that serves a decent cup of coffee.
Not only sat outside, but not hemmed in by a barrier.
Coffee Aroma is a very popular coffee shop, and even in winter, it is always busy, not only inside, but also people sat outside.
What we are seeing, apart from creation of bullshit jobs, is ethnic cleansing of small businesses.
Sincil Street, up until a couple of years ago, was busy, many indie business, more people on the street from ten o’clock to four o’clock than in the High Street. Now Sincil Street is dead, boarded up shops, rents unaffordable, thanks the the Coop acting in cahoots with the City Council.
The same is true of the Central Market. Dead.
A good market brings people into a town centre.
In the Central Market there is a fruit and vegetable stall. Once a month on a Saturday, they are denied their pitch. On that day, third Saturday of the month, a flea market. On what would be their busiest day the only day the Central Market is busy they are denied a pitch.
North Laine in Brighton, three streets and associated side streets, indie shops, not a single chain store, is always busy.
Small independent businesses circulate money within the local economy. Chains such as Costa and tax-dodging Starbucks suck that money straight out of the local economy.
Postcapitalism can go one of two ways.
Precarious, part-time, zero-hours, temporary, soul-destroying McShit jobs; bullshit jobs serving no useful purpose; serfs working for apps at often less than the minimum wage, Uber, Deliveroo, Wheelys.
Or we can have small businesses, open coops, sharing, collaborative commons, a basic income for all.
Which begs the question, is a barista a bullshit job? Or meaningful work?
The answer depends upon where you work. If Costa or tax-dodging Starbucks, yes, a soul destroying McShit job. If somewhere like Coffee Aroma, no, a creative job where enjoy what you are doing taking pride in the work.
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