[Varley]

The above bodes ill for the recent nationalisation of the IoM steam packet. One of the loud noises that those in the industry made was that should this happen the management would remain independent (not necessarily without re-tendering). The government gave that assurance but I wonder how easy they will find it to keep to it.

Even in successful managements I would follow E-S - certainly targeting the team leaders as well as the troops. On successive new builds any attempt I made to included detail at the outline stage was removed by my manager - 'Only comment in outline to an outline spec.'. When it came to the contract spec., of course, nothing could be detailed differently from the yard without an extra being demanded (I did manage to get the domestic voltage of two bulk carriers increased to 220 from 115 at zero difference, must have saved the yard enough in copper and protection for them to forgive it).

Some of that is a management Vs owning organisation feature. All the review will be, at best, discounted. For a new client as we would be looking to attract the owner as an ongoing management client, to an existing client we would be doing our best to cement the relationship.

Detailed commentary increases the costs to managers while reaping reward only to the owner and any extras subsequently incurred were the owner's alone.