back to article UK Space Agency will pay a new CEO £125,000 to run non-existent space programme

Fancy a career change? Be quick, and the chief exec's desk at the UK Space Agency could be yours. The permanent full-time position with a salary of £125,000 is likely to be challenging as the UK seeks to maintain its position as a space-based international leader in the wake of ructions such as the country's departure from the …

  1. Fruit and Nutcase Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    Lester

    Would have had the necessary experience for this role.

    1. BristolBachelor Gold badge

      Re: Lester

      To be honest, he would've been over qualified, and probably much more qualified than whoever they do choose.

  2. sanmigueelbeer
    Coat

    C'mon, people! This isn't rocket science.

    If Dido Harding can screw-up to the top, so can you!

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: C'mon, people! This isn't rocket science.

      Perhaps this is the ideal post for her. Then somebody capable can be put into T&T.

      1. sanmigueelbeer

        Re: C'mon, people! This isn't rocket science.

        Perhaps this is the ideal post for her

        This will put a rocket into her career.

        She'll be over the moon with this new position.

      2. macjules

        Re: C'mon, people! This isn't rocket science.

        Not enough in it for Dido: add several zeros to the end and a guaranteed 50% bonus.

    2. Dr. G. Freeman

      Re: C'mon, people! This isn't rocket science.

      Give Dildo Hardly the job !

      If she naturally screws up the job, then who knows instead of a non-existent space program, we might get a superb manned FTL starship program (HMS Enterprise ?)

    3. This post has been deleted by its author

  3. Howard Sway Silver badge

    successful applicant "will have a proven ability to handle an intellectually challenging agenda"

    Looks like I could be a shoe-in for this. My colleagues have frequently commented on how intellectually challenged I am.

    1. Chris G

      Re: successful applicant "will have a proven ability to handle an intellectually challenging agenda"

      I suspect most of the intellectual challenge will be making sense of any response from a politician who is holding the purse strings when asked to payfor something.

      Any leadership shown in space related industry and science from the UK is largely in spite of the government, not because of it.

      1. iron Silver badge

        Re: successful applicant "will have a proven ability to handle an intellectually challenging agenda"

        Any leadership shown in industry and science from the UK is largely in spite of the government, not because of it.

        FTFY

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Per Arse Ad Astra

    See Title.

    1. Spherical Cow Silver badge

      Re: Per Arse Ad Astra

      Have a look at this impressive ARSE: https://spaceaustralia.com.au/

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    pay a new CEO £125,000 to run non-existent space programme

    oh, come on, what's 125K between friends! Think BIG, think BILLIONS. We ain't seen nothin' yet! (literally, and metaphorically).

    1. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge

      Re: pay a new CEO £125,000 to run non-existent space programme

      Well obviously you aren't going to get somebody full time for that, it will be something to do on Wednesday mornings between more lucrative directorships

  6. 0laf

    Give it to...oh

    I feel very late to the party with my "Give it to Dido" comment.

    I doff my hat to my fellow commentards.

    1. Andre Carneiro

      Re: Give it to...oh

      Yeah, I was also too late saying we should give it to her to see it all go up in flames...

  7. Tron Silver badge

    There can be only one...

    I'm not the first and I won't be the last: This has to be Dido, El Reg's answer to Boxxy.

    She pulled £37bn out of taxpayer's pockets for £20k worth of track and trace app that regards proximity+time to be a world-beating diagnostic for viral spread, delivering as many false positives and negatives as an astrologer on meth. Think how many squillions she can tug from taxpayers to build the USS Boris, a world-beating intergalactic starship. Only Dido can do this.

    1. Fruit and Nutcase Silver badge
      Alert

      Re: There can be only one...

      USS Boris, a world-beating intergalactic starship

      With WarpBoris Drive developed by ARIA (or whatever it is called), Blighty's me-too DARPA.

    2. werdsmith Silver badge

      Re: There can be only one...

      She pulled £37bn out of taxpayer's pockets for £20k worth of track and trace app

      If pubs were open that would be another example of pub-bore bullshit. So I guess it can be Faecebook bullshit instead. The big money is for test and trace. That’s including all those millions and millions of free tests that are distributed and processed in labs and new industrial scale labs. Dunno how much the app cost to develop but I guess some was wasted on v1 which was binned and the back end stuff.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: There can be only one...

        The Public Accounts Committee disagrees with you.

        https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/127/public-accounts-committee/news/150988/unimaginable-cost-of-test-trace-failed-to-deliver-central-promise-of-averting-another-lockdown/

        Comments by the Chair of the Committee:

        "The £22 billion for test and trace is about the annual budget of the Department for Transport. Test and Trace still continues to pay for consultants at £1000 a day.

        Yet despite the unimaginable resources thrown at this project Test and Trace cannot point to a measurable difference to the progress of the pandemic, and the promise on which this huge expense was justified - avoiding another lockdown – has been broken, twice.

        DHSC and NHST&T must rapidly turn around these fortunes and begin to demonstrate the worth and value of this staggering investment of taxpayers' money."

        And that's just from the webpage's summary.

        (Note: £22bn was last year's budget. As the webpage above notes, it has since been allocated another £15bn for this year, hence the original poster's total of £37bn.)

        1. Alan Brown Silver badge

          Re: There can be only one...

          T&T works out to something north of £12k per NHS nurse

          The UK government budgetted and set aside 2.1% for their pay increase whilst only offering 1% (this is about £200 per nurse per year)

          Where's the extra money gone?

  8. Roger Kynaston
    Mushroom

    Kwasi Kwarteng will be your boss

    As others have said, it must be a shoo in for Typhoid Typhoon Dido. But I should have thought that they could get some sort of warp drive out of De Piffles hair.

    Obvious icon

  9. Alan Brown Silver badge

    £125k

    won't buy much considering what's actually required for this role

    This is definitely in the peanuts and monkeys department

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