I feel I have to share this. In the latest pack of reps’ information I received from my union there is a topical section on various seasonal employment and health & safety issues like putting up decorations with a stepladder instead of standing on swivel chairs, sexual harrassment at the office party, and accepting gifts from suppliers.

This is my favourite bit:

Q. Our office parties can get a bit out of hand when people start playing pranks. Will our photocopier support anyone’s weight?

A. If the office Christmas Party goes really traditional and you end up making ‘cheeky’ photocopies, you won’t be exposed to toner or harmful light for long enough to hurt you, but you may well find yourself spending the rest of the evening face down in casualty, having shards of glass removed from wherever! This is a surprisingly common occurrence, as photocopiers simply aren’t designed to be robust enough to take any kind of weight, even if yours has managed to withstand a lot of rough treatment and kicks all year.

The same goes with most other office or workplace equipment from staple gun shoot outs, paper-opener sword fights to re-enacting the French Revolution with the office guillotine. It goes without saying that items of work equipment are not toys, but in drunken hands, even fairly innocuous devices can turn seriously dangerous.

It goes on to warn about not leaving computers on in case everyone sends abusive e-mails and logs into pornographic websites.

I am getting the impression that most members of the union must work in much more lively places than I do. We never have letter-opener sword fights. Not even on International Talk Like A Pirate Day. And the idea of a staple gun shoot out has never even occurred to us before – but thanks to the TSSA for the suggestion. As a telecoms company I’m sure our stores have some really good industrial-strength guns for attaching 104-pair cables