Addressing the Council of ECIF, the components trade association, and then meeting the top brass of OFTEL and persuading them of our BMMG case for their intervention to advise against Norman Tebbit approving the IBM/BT license application
Up early, and a toast breakfast before catching the 8.02am train to Kings Cross. I contribute to another passenger’s annoyance as I first park my Jaguar too close to close her in and then notice that she is too late for a cheap day return and has to move it. A quiet run in to London, catching up en-route with my journal for these last two days. I am pledged to try to find the entrepreneur’s magazine, Your Business, today to see the photographs and coverage that Tom Fitzpatrick reported to me yesterday. On arrival, I take a cup of tea at the station café and jot a few notes for a speech later today. Then on by tube to Olympia for the Personal Computer World microcomputer show. I spent an hour or two there meeting journalists, exhibitors and other visitors. In particular I spent time with Guy Kewney of Computing and also the Acorn Executives talking about MSX. Off by taxi at lunchtime to Saville Row and there to address the council members of the ECIF – a components trade association. I was made welcome, they enjoyed my remarks and entertained me to lunch at the Piccadilly Hotel. After by taxi again to Holborn Viaduct and the offices of OFTEL – The Office of Telecommunications. There to meet the Deputy Director General, Bill Wigglesworth, and the Head of Department for BT, Alistair Catto, with Nigel Smith, the BMMG Chairman.
We made our case eloquently for the opposition of the IBM/BT licence and met with an understanding and sympathetic response. It remains to be seen whether or not they have the nerve to make a negative recommendation – there is no doubt that our arguments are valid. Home by train and pleasant conversation with Nigel Smith about City lawyers and his business problems. He thinks that I managed to get out in good time, and he may well be right. An evening resting after an energetic day and darkness falls to a night of more rain.