If The Archers characters were acted by dogs, Rob would be a Shih Tzu. Discuss Ambridge events here.

[PseudoBadger]

Avoided a non-sweary title.

That was awesome, especially on the day of Trump's inauguration.

A chink of light on a dark day

Rob will be lucky to get that job at the Overlook Hotel...

The same fairy that took away Brian's epilepsy and brain tumour then.

I am a little behind at the moment. I must catch up, so I can't comment on the last couple of days.

I really like Johnny. He is very sweet. I miss Nigel, he was always one of my favourite characters. I am loving Lilian's cheerful stoicism.

Just listened to the podcast. Wow... in SOCs day we'd have been lucky to get the suspiciously spotless Lower Loxley interrogation or the Tracy tirade, but both of those as light relief around Justin skewering Rob (after extracting some work from him even) ... I'm not sure BOOP is apt any more, wasn't that invented to signal when there was a bit of relief from our despair at the direness? 🛶

What next though.... Rob had presumably somehow rustled up a large wad of cash which he now hasn't had to give to Stefan, will it fund his absconding with Myson and/or Henry?

I should imagine Justin paid him off

I'm trying to imagine a scenario where Justin could legitimately pay Stefan for the information without it being blackmail. It seems a shame Stefan won't get anything.

Justin could either give Stefan a job or a good reference, which I think Stefan would appreciate.

I hope Rob isn't expecting too much by way of severance pay. He's only been there around four months, hasn't he?

He's going to go round slagging off Damara now and saying he walked out. He won't be able to bear any member of the Archer family knowing that he's been sacked.

Rob won't get severance pay after such a short period of employment will he?

Did Stefan tell Justin then? Surely not, as he was expecting a pay off. Was this all from Lilian over hearing?

PatienceandChocolate there was a discussion some threads back (which I am confident someone on here will be able to link to ) about the magic wrought by the Ambridge Health Fairy. Suffice to say it's a good place to get sick or have a serious accident (unless you are poor Nigel of course).

So if I LA to Weds. will it have the conversation between Stefan and ? in a cafe? Overheard by Lil? I missed it.

Oh great outcome by the way.

Justin isn't exactly an honest chap. I should imagine he paid stefan as a gesture of goodwill for the way he was made to leave Berrow or some such excuse. First priority is to stop him talking.

Yes it would be great if the downfall of Justin's empire followed this!!!

Oh i see, lil overhead enough to pass to Justin who knew who Stefan was (?) so Justin found Stefan and paid him for the info/silence. I suppose that way Justin gets to nobble Rob and also have confidence that Stefan won't spill the beans. Maybe he threatened Stefan as well/instead of paying him

Last week some time, we had Jenny and Lilian at the Lower Loxley jewellery fair - Jenny noticed some like loitering around who looked familiar. Eventually , she twigged it was Stefan, and ended up telling Lilian what Stefan had told her and David in the out-of-the-way cafe about seeing someone blocking the culvert, whom he had thought was Rob, but couldn't be totally sure.

Then this week, Lilian went to Justin and Rob's office to see Justin, arriving at some point during Stefan's visit to Rob to say he wanted more hush money. We don't know exactly how much she overheard, but Rob blustered on about the man just leaving being a pushy, rude salesman, in a way that was totally credible and not blindingly obvious that he was really wound up by it to an extent even the most socially unaware person would notice, not at all.

Clearly Lilian heard enough that combined with her knowledge from Jenny, she could fill in any gaps when she told Justin about it all. Rob wouldn't have known that she would have recognised Stefan from the week before, so he wouldn't have realised all the salesman rubbish would be totally transparent - though even if she hadn't known who Stefan was, it wasn't actually believable.

I'm sure Justin could spin it as compensating Stefan for Rob (who everyone now nows is a villain) coercing him to leave. He might have said it was a pity stefan hadn't come to him in the first place, so justin could have dealt with it, rooted out the bad apple. If at this point stefan did still threaten publicity, I reckon Justin would call his bluff- after all, it really was all Rob's doing, he could make a pre-emptive statement, he's summarily sacked Rob.

Thanks Ebear I heard the one where someone was commenting on a loiterer around Honeysuckle Cottage (sorry if I got that wrong, I can't remember the name of Hell and knob's ex cottage). I'm assuming it was Stefan now.

Small correction to Ebear - Lillian had to visit one of her properties en route to the jewellery fair, tenants with some sort of Eastern European sounding names - thats where JD spotted Stefan, though she took a while to figure out who he was. So Lillian also knew how to find him, otherwise it wouldn't have been feasible for (as we assume) Justin to talk to him before the time of robs rendezvous.

Rob isn't expecting too much by way of severance pay. He's only been there around four months, hasn't he?

Statutory minimim or what is in his contract. "Severance pay" was exactly the sort of pompous legalspeak Rob would have come out with.

Lillian had to visit one of her properties en route to the jewellery fair, tenants with some sort of Eastern European sounding names

Ah, I missed that (I was driving.) I was a bit confused about why Stefan would have been at a jewellery fair, so that makes more sense.

I'd have thought Rob would get a month's pay in lieu of notice at the very most. He's being sacked for being an incompetent, lazy arse, and he's been there hardly any time, so won't have accrued any rights. I wonder if he thinks he deserves a golden handshake of some sort - it's not like he has any record of recognising when he's in the wrong, so he's probably wondering what he needs to put in his grievance.

Although, as he was in charge of hiring and firing at Damara, he should have some knowledge of employment law.

Someone asked about the fiddling of the milk yields being of any interest now that Rob has got his come-uppance - I was wondering whether they might be used to rehabilitate Charlie, who was blamed by Justin for all Rob's sins at the time, wasn't he? (I wasn't listening much, but seem to remember Rob walked out when there was a chance Charlie might find out what he was up to with the yields and then side-tracked him by blackmailing him about Adam, or have I got that round my neck?)
Though I enjoyed last night's episode (and the Continuity Announcer's remarks), I still think Justin is a rather disgusting character. Bit like an upper class Tiger, in business, if you will .

He knows employment law very well and had the wit to demand sick pay from Bridge Farm.
Last night's demand was just bluster. He went from whine and cringe straight to insults and threats. It cut no ice with Justin.
I like the way Huge Canoe has handled this. A sudden yet believable unravelling.
I have high hopes Toby's Brighton escapades will receive the same treatment.

The interim editor(s) did a good job of resetting ambridge back to normal prior to the launching of Huge Canoe to take us into fresh waters. Probably they couldn't make decisions on things like whether to hire a new Lily - and hopefully revive the contracts of some of the other MIA folk, who are at least getting mentioned again eg Kathy and Lewis.

(I wonder if he has any idea that a chance mishearing resulted in this rather wonderful moniker? )

I agree. The interim editor did well to set things back on track -or at least rein it in a bit - and I suppose Huge Canoe took time to do some research, think about the characters and how to eliminate the more preposterous SLs as seamlessly as possible.
He's doing a great job so far, in my opinion. We have come to expect overly-dramatic and tortuous plots but now I think we're in for something lighter and closer to real life.
Which is not to say all characters' lives will run smoothly from now on and I don't think it will necessarily be dull. I do expect it to be more plausible.

At the meeting Justin wanted to discuss Berrow so it is obviously still being closed down and the figures are bad. Which suggests the milk yields will be picked up on at some point but probably only a passing comment

Do you think when huge canoe got to his new desk there was a note saying 'I'm afraid there are no answers to the plot holes'

I bet soc had no idea about Brighton himself so the poor sw trying to come up with something plausible

It's all been so much better since soc left and huge canoe has made a promising start