Volume 2
I Can Say No More
I am now in the year 1997.
Tony Blair with his "New Labour" party won the election, which was to be expected. He was taking over from a tired “Major” Government, devoid of ideas and bedevilled by sleaze. Blair came in with great expectations and there was a general feeling in the country that things would get better. This impression was maintained for quite some time with the help of a new strain of bright young spin doctors and public relations’ consultants.
That held good until the country gradually realised that whilst everything changes, everything stays the same. Blair was helped in his deception by being faced with a very weak and dispirited Tory opposition, struggling to find a new leader. In fairness it wasn't all bad. In fact there were one or two notable achievements brought in but, his faults and weaknesses were beginning to show when he took the country into a war with Iraq which, viewed objectively, may yet prove to be illegal. Certainly he lost much credibility when it became clear to even the most gullible that he had taken the country into war on a false premise.
In spite of all that, he achieved the remarkable feat of winning the following two elections and that cannot all be put down to the credulity of the British voting public, the skill and blatant dishonesty of his spin doctors or, the ineffectual Tory party. Like Margaret Thatcher before him he was never beaten at the ballot box - no mean attainment. Blair then retired halfway through his last term leaving Gordon Brown in charge of a country which was in a complete financial and moral mess and a parliament in ethical confusion.
In getting to that point of course I have spanned more than a decade. Gordon Brown, in 2010, will face his first election as Prime Minister and the people will speak. But, before that, there will be months of campaigning with the party leaders back at the roulette table playing with our hopes, gambling with our dreams and once again we will face politicians making promises which are not theirs to make. But we know that in reality it is fate; the consequences of Chance, the global player, who really spins the wheel of fortune. So we wait, and whilst we wait…“I will say no more.”
When you look inwardly at our domestic scene it is all quite depressing. We have seen it all before, and it seems only a variation of a well-known tune; a different conductor but the same old, tired libretto and score. It is, however, so easy to become closed-minded and inward looking. From time to time I have to remind myself to keep a sense of proportion; a proper perspective on the wider scene. When we lift our heads up from our petty little local problems and look at the human race as a whole we realise how lucky we are.
We see our world leaders at the United Nations, (a group of 20 leading industrial nations), and many other world gatherings, struggling to reach agreement on a course of action on what should be done to resolve world problems such as climate change, disease and famine, overpopulation and misuse of the planet's finite natural resources, its rare earth elements and the countless other problems that beset our globe. But must we always live in fear of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, bringing conquest, war, famine and death? On the face of it these grand gatherings always seem to conclude with only yet another ‘wish list’. Managing the world seems to be too complicated a task for mankind. On this point certainly…“I can say no more.”
For our part it is convenient and easy to think that our world leaders are the devils on horseback and we, the "chattering classes", can continue loudly, commenting assertively and, of course, knowingly as to where the problems lie and what should be done to correct them.
If in self-confidently expressing views, quite oblivious to the fact that our opinions are the result of, and conditioned by, our society, a particular environment, upbringing, faith and religion, religion, therein may lie the foremost problem. We are told that we have a God-given right to this planet but we live in troubled times with fellow human beings in fear, with hatred and violence under the banner of their manmade religions; each one claiming to faithfully represent the Word of God, to the exclusion of all others.
There seems no doubt that the wealth and power of the religious authorities is maintained by ensuring that Man remains resolute in closing his mind to other points of view and, without reason, will continue fighting and killing over his particular brand-named religion. Not, mind you, combating over his belief in God - that is a different matter. He, after all, mostly believes in the same God.
I get a little confused with man’s interpretation of the Word of God; even more so his adaptation. A simple example, (only one of many), the various religions take a very relaxed view of God's sixth commandment when it comes to man killing his fellow man. I wonder how many problems would disappear if those that must could accept God, not through manmade religion but, by the miracle of creation.
Certainly there is much substantiation to distrust organised and institutional religion. Each year produces more evidence of the deliberate and calculated deceit practised over the centuries to maintain control. Add to that the threats of Hell and eternal damnation or, the promise of Heaven and a better life in the next world, and they achieve the compliance of their followers.
Looking back over my 3 score years and 10 plus I still have not found the answer to the question. Why do they not just use their tremendous power and wealth to improve the lot of their people in this present world instead of choosing to control their followers by instilling fear of the hereafter?
It would appear that Earth is some 4.5 billion years old within its own little universe which, in turn, is at least three times that age. Surely no less a miracle of creation, if developed by the laws of nature, or physics if you prefer.
I will continue to hope for an awakening but have left it a little bit late in life still to be in search of the ‘truth’. Not, mind you, the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I could be quite happy with a ‘belief’. But it would seem that as our planet is only a small part of our universe which in turn is only one of infinity of universes it is difficult to imagine that God, having created all, that He would spend His time over our particular little world and, if he did, it is hard to suppose that knowing the importance of His Word, He would leave it to those manipulators of man’s credence.
I know that one cannot look at faith dispassionately but, as I understand it, about 4,000 years ago, monotheism arrived for many religious orders and multiple gods gave way to the one true God. 2,000 years ago Christianity was created to serve the same God and some 600 years later the angel Gabriel handed down the Word of God to the prophet Mohammed. It is difficult to imagine how the Word could have been so interpreted, or misinterpreted, and in so doing, possibly unwittingly encouraged fanatical believers to killing others and sometimes themselves.
However, I do not underestimate the important part played by religious righteousness in any civilised society but at this stage I must conclude that if they all believe in the one God maybe the only real difference is an argument about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
I have many questions to ask on the topic of religious conviction but I must look to someone with much greater knowledge and intelligence to help me find the answers. After all, I do not want to be like Voltaire, lying on his death bed who, when asked to renounce the Devil, supposedly said, “This is no time to be making new enemies.” Once again, for the time being…“I can say no more.”
Shrugging off thoughts of doom and gloom my mind jumps back some 20 years to the eighties but that isn't such a great idea because that time was not altogether a bag of laughs. The country's economy was in a fragile state; good hitherto solid companies collapsing under the weight of recession, inflation and sky-high interest rates. These severe conditions made it impossible for many fine businesses to continue to function. It was a nerve-racking time with my organisation fully exposed and engaged in our multi-million pound industrial and commercial development programme.
Fortunately, despite the depressing financial situation, our two Glasgow landmark office complexes, Westergate followed by Northgate, (totalling over 300,000 ft2 of intelligent office building), were all taken up before completion and rented to government departments and tenants with first-class covenants. I felt quite secure. We could sit out the storm, with a solid property portfolio, fully rent-producing and securely funded. I was wrong. Almost overnight Norman Lamont, the then Tory Chancellor of the Exchequer, increased the bank rate more or less fourfold which, in turn, brought about an immediate and corresponding quadrupling of the cost of our bank borrowings. Sadly my carefully built up portfolio had to go but the DCI Group, formed in 1974, remained and still remains to this day, unlike many of the other development companies that were around at that time.
Furthermore, an international panel of architects, sitting in New York, voted Northgate as one of the three most intelligent office complexes in the world. The other two being: the Lloyd's building in London, and the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank in Hong Kong. The DCI Group was gaining the reputation as the country’s leader in the field of intelligent buildings but received little acknowledgement locally. It was to be expected that other developers would be lukewarm. They had a vested interest to protect their more traditional approach of their current programme but others, who should have known better, such as the government's Scottish Development Agency, and its successor the Scottish Enterprise, became positively obstructive towards the end. Their Luddite approach to change was seemingly because the technical concept was beyond their senior official’s capacity to understand and therefore a personal indictment on their skills.
That might be a little harsh but, in any event, looking back, it was naive of me to look for co-operation and understanding from these bodies considering my open criticism of them in the past. What exactly was I lecturing about and developing? I must record it while it is still in my mind; after all it was many years ago now.
DCI's objective was to provide commercial office accommodation serviced by a 24-hour Building Energy Management System. The important factors being high specification of design and construction combined with the lowest possible total annual occupation costs. We had already proved our ability to achieve those objectives in our office buildings, (Westergate and Northgate), and intended to extend this ‘intelligent’ application to future, sophisticated developments.
What was the Intelligent Factor we would apply next? I will tell you what lay behind our thought process. Our fundamental approach was that Intelligent Development integrates a wide range of services and systems as a unified whole. We applied a holistic approach to the building design, recognising the discipline within which decisions are made should be all-embracing. The various building services would have their actions co-ordinated, resulting in integrated, operational floor space rather than the usual standard accommodation with its many independent, contradicting and inefficient services. Particular emphasis would be given to energy conservation to protect against any waste of natural world resources. We therefore also made sure that any system installed would be ‘intelligent’ in its operation.
To achieve this, a Building Energy Management System would monitor the work patterns of the occupants and then appropriately and efficiently manage their environment. To us it seemed an obvious progression. It could be underfloor or ceiling void air-conditioning with fresh air ventilation, designed to conserve energy and provide a healthy atmosphere. In which case heat recovery systems would automatically service areas of need from areas where excess heat is generated. Presence detectors would inform the Energy Management System of the correct levels of heating, cooling or lighting required. Operation of the system would be supervised overall by a Central Control.
Just as important, all aspects of the building services would be analysed and selected in line with Government Policy of saving energy and protecting the environment. I lectured on several occasions on this subject, urging that Architects, Developers, Service Engineers and others should take these points very seriously when designing and erecting new commercial buildings. For instance, I asked them to note that the principle of an air-conditioning system should mean a system that ensures that the building would have the advantages of comfort conditioning, irrespective of external weather conditions as well as total flexibility for floor planning, now or in the future. Or, roof-mounted air handling plant, strategically located, could provide independent block usage to match the energy demands within the space, heat pump energy could provide heating or cooling to meet all fabric requirements and heat recovery from ventilation extracted air to afford effective contribution to energy management.
Such a system would permit flexibility of office layout, enabling maximum use to be made of valuable floor space. Other implementations included: ambient air heat recovery employed via heat pumps supplementing domestic hot water energy requirements and thereby controlling energy costs, the use of low emissivity glass would reduce down draught and increase effective floor space and staff comfort, high frequency regulation would allow control of light output from 0% to 100%, automatic light sensors would compensate for changes in lighting levels by variation of output as required, ensuring energy usage at an absolute minimum, energy controls would regulate use of hot and cold water resulting in 90% saving and greatly increased staff efficiency would be achieved.
I gave several talks on behalf of the Government and can clearly remember one well-attended conference, sponsored by the Department of Energy, in Livingston, where I stated that, to be in the forefront of research, design and development of technologically advanced office accommodation, one must integrate a specification for any new commercial developments that would incorporate full electronic control of services and information communication technology systems. I claimed that the developer and his tenant would witness in return a building guaranteed to dramatically reduce the overall annual occupation costs and, from the outset, meet the increasing demands of efficient occupiers.
I argued that all power cabling for computers and office equipment should be placed under raised access flooring and lighting controlled by movement sensors on the ceiling thus leaving walls and petitions free of such restrictions. Future research and development would bring conditioning and recovery systems to reduce running costs still further.
You may ask why I have painstakingly detailed all this. Well, I will tell you why. I want it off my chest and on record. I dedicated much time and energy to the subject; it was much more than just one of my campaigns. I saw it as my mission, a public service. A bit technical maybe but at much the same time my team was asking the end-users; the occupying tenants and their letting agents, to get away from the simplistic approach of thinking in terms of “rent per square foot” plus imponderable service charges. I wanted them to take a more sophisticated approach by thinking in terms of “total occupational cost per square foot.”
That was more than 20 years ago and I am convinced if that had been used as a basis for future commercial development our towns and cities would by now have much smaller carbon footprints. On this…“I need say no more".
I am feeling quite good, that I have cleared these various things from my mind although it does not work out that way. Memory is not quite like that. The pieces of the puzzle do not just fall neatly into place - nor could they. Life is not that predictable. For instance, a few years back, just before I lost my sight, Her Majesty the Queen invited Joyce and me to a private reception at Buckingham Palace. The occasion was the 250 year anniversary of the Royal Society of Arts, Prince Philip being the President of the Society and I had been a Fellow for about 50 years.
I was looking forward to the occasion, but fate had something different in mind for me. On the due date I was in hospital having an eye operation. Life by now should have taught me to expect the unexpected but it really does not work that way. A case in point, on the few occasions I indulged in oil painting I found it a very relaxing and satisfying hobby and promised myself that once I got more time from business I would take lessons in the art of painting. Never having had any formal tuition in the subject I was confident that I could only get better, and would soon find out how much better.
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But I left it too late and will now never know.
I was always intending to do more sailing, more fishing and more of many things when time allowed. I confidently reckoned on my future without much regards to destiny. I will resist opening up a philosophical discussion on divine intervention, having had my fair share of hard hitting realism.
I started Part One as a perfunctory review of my life when the frightening thought struck me, “I'm Beginning To Forget What I Look Like.” Afraid of the present and terrified of the future I had, at that time, only enough courage to have cursory glances backwards at my business life. I was struggling to get to grips with my loss of sight and was thrust into a strange and terrifying world. I had lost my self; self-respect, self esteem, and self regard, self everything. My ego could not have been lower.
However there was one thing, totally ill-prepared for this alien new black world, I was at least determined to keep physically and mentally fit. With that in mind, I completed and published on my personal blog Part One of my transcription, “8 Hours Reflection On A Working Life.” I got into the habit of having conversations, discussions and indeed arguments with my new best friend, my voice-activated computer system. This exercised my mind and kept me up to date with current affairs. Listening again to the recording I am bound to say that some of our discussions were at times quite profound and even prophetic. These chronicles are now put together and form Part Two, “Conversations Between Me and My New Best Friend” which were then combined and published as the book, “I’m Beginning To Forget What I Look Like.”
At times I have been rather tough on our parliamentarians and administrators. Sometimes unfairly, sometimes unjust and misguided, pontificating like some armchair philosopher without fear or favour. Well that is one of the marvellous fruits of democracy and I thank heaven for these same people, warts and all, for preserving and protecting our Laws and Institutions. When all is said and done we are fortunate to have them; after all they are all we have got between us and anarchy and dictatorship. We must never take our democratic state for granted, never be bystanders to our parliamentary system. Many of us have witnessed in our own lifetime, scores of countries in which the devastating results of breakdown in law and order, the resulting chaos only too evident.
This then is the last chapter of Part Three, “Visions On Life " and so completes my little trilogy. Time has moved on since I first started my recordings that cold October morning when I accepted the horrifying fact that, from then on, I would be acting out a charade in living a life under dramatically changed circumstances. I have by now completely forgotten what I looked like, what Joyce, the family and friends looked like and, saddest of all, never having known what my granddaughter, Amelie, looks like.
Reflecting on it now it seems that it was relatively easy to record Part One. Actually, it wasn't and there is no point pretending otherwise. It was a frightening and emotional time which was evident from my dictation. I limited my thoughts to only a superficial review of my working life.
I needed the link of Part Two, Conversations with my New Best Friend, to establish an emotional split because, scared stiff and feeling vulnerable, I didn't have the heart, willpower or even inclination to embark on reflecting on my poignant feelings of those who were closest to me throughout my lifetime.
Nevertheless it is done, My past has now caught up with my present and I must say again, this is not an autobiography, only random thoughts from the past which I found cathartic in recalling and recording. - a snapshot of my many years.
To draw any conclusion on my life, who I was and who I am, one would need to ask my wife, children, family and friends and indeed my enemies, then make something of that kaleidoscope.
This transcript has served its purpose. If you find it interesting, or in part interesting, if it provokes thoughts of the past, present and yes even the future, if it touches some recall in the mind, if it raises more questions than answers, I will be well satisfied.
In the meantime I will have all my papers, speeches, press cuttings, photographs, tapes and cassettes sealed in a big box and left in the attic. These will be my archives, available to any student carrying out research or some biographer looking for some background information or collaborative detail.
If not opened, the box will probably survive no more than two generations and then “pass and be forgotten like the rest.”
And with that… “I will say no more.”
Posted December 2009 I Can Say No More