News in Brief #59

Gunboat diplomacy? BEERMAT diplomacy is 21st Century

Spoons Boss Enters Brexit Negotiations

Representatives from the European Union were suprised this week when, sitting down to the table for discussions on the UK's imminent departure, they were confronted not by David Davis and Theresa May, but by Wetherspoons CEO and mullet-projector Timbo Martin. "As a major employer, who is better qualified than me to conduct these talks?"

"They wanted to open preliminaries on the Northern Irish border," yelled Timbo  "but I showed them I meant business by simply putting a big pile of my beer mats in front of them. Read these,  I told him, and said I wasn't budging on any of my positions."

"I told them I wanted the flow of cheap food and cheap workers to continue, but I want no interference on anything else.  I could tell by the shocked looks on their faces that they knew I was right. That's how to do it, I told the politicians. I learned how do that dealing with local councils."

Chief EU negotiator Michael Barnier said "We listened to Mr. Martin and will consider his suggestions with all the seriousness they deserve."

The talks continue.

Money well spent

CAMRA Circles Reveal All

After the recent financial embarrassments at The Campaign for Real Ale, we have asked the ultimate insiders for their views on these matters - the CAMRA branding circles.

"We've heard a few things, yeah." said Large Circle "But we have been rather busy what with having to appear on the Good Beer Guide, the local mags and 190,000 membership cards."

Small Circle chimed in "We're quite well remunerated as we appear everywhere with CAMRA these days. Some within the organisation have questioned why we were needed for a major rebranding when they're struggling for money. But, hey, we keep being paid."

"The most important thing about CAMRA now is the logos and the constant reorganisation," continued Big Circle "Real Ale can look after itself, we're sure."

CAMRA head Colin Valentine was unavailable for comment as he was busy packing up his desk toys.

Acceptable methods, dudes

Bud Gear Hunting Reveal Journalistic  Methods

Much-maligned beer website and certainly-not-paid-for-by-big-beer thing Bud Gear Hunting has told a rapt audience how it goes about it's business.  "Lots of people think we just wibble on about how awesome beer is and all that," retorted BGH UK editor Curt Mattis to a packed conference hall "but there's far more to it than that."

"For example, one of my duties as UK editor is to scour the news sites and see if any journo is, like, going 'off-message' about all the stuff we're promoting."

"Say someone at the Morning Advertiser implies he brought up the problem of Sexism in the Beer industry first," explained Curty "when it was, like, us, obviously.  Then we make sure we get all our Twitter fans to dogpile him, force him into an apology and hound him off social media. These things are IMPORTANT, dude."

Asked if this could be construed as bullying by the people concerned,  Mattis replied "No. Bullying isn't a problem in the beer world."

"Beer people are, as I always say, GOOD PEOPLE."