4 Jobs, Parts 3 & 4

y third job, in 1980, was a cleaner in Sydney. I helped Carlos, who came from Colombia, clean an office and a nightclub on alternate days. (I've no idea who worked the opposite pattern.) It was tedious but it helped with the money.

My fourth job was in 1984 and 85, during the fourth year of my five-year university 'sandwich' course: temporary trainee planning officer in Bromsgrove District Council. Bromsgrove is situated in the Green Belt to the south of Birmingham, so a large part of dealing with applications for planning permission involved saying "No".

In the vast majority of cases, this was straightforward, even when people appealed against the decision since the policy was clear. In one or two cases, however, the applicants used their imaginations to try to find a way round the system.

Someone started to build a bungalow without permission, and was told to stop. He repeatedly tried to justify the development by submitting applications for activities on the adjoining land: the building was, at various times, a stable for a stud farm, residential accommodation for a trout farm and, most impressive of all, the manager's house for a nuclear fallout shelter.

The applicant even submitted floorplans for the shelter, showing three columns of rooms underground, each split into twenty floors. One column provided dormitories, one was for dining, and the third for recreation. Presumably everyone had to move from one room to another at the same time. It was almost a shame to refuse such an unusual application, but that was what happened, yet again.