Private message to Bill Weasley

[alt_rachel]

First, do you know when Corax is going to be done with those files? (You don't have to ask him! I'm just wondering if you have any thoughts on what he wants them for. Whether it would help if I asked him nicely if I could have them, or if I'll get them faster if I leave him alone.)

Second, this is sort of a random question but I really know absolutely nothing about animal husbandry and I know your family keeps goats. Do you know offhand whether goats are more or less expensive than other animals, in terms of the food they eat, the supplies they need, and the veterinary healing they typically require? I mean, if you compared a herd of goats to a herd of cows, which would you expect to be more costly in the long term?

Comments

[alt_bill]

No, this was done, I swear, for the good of the Protectorate. For the good of the animals.

Here's a hint: go back and look at when that line item started showing up in camp budgets. I believe it was about five years back.

Then go back to the previous year before that and check the Muggle maternal death rate. Due to complications related to, er, dropping calves.

Compare it to the maternal death rate this year.

See the difference? It's entirely due thanks to the excellence and reliability of those 'animal husbandry services.' But those services wouldn't have made it into the budget at all if they had been called what they really were.

I daresay that for that very reason, Corax Mulciber will cut them immediately if you say something about it.

I sincerely hope that you don't.

[alt_bill]

It's clear, by the way, that you never met my father. If you had, you'd realise what an in the utter absurdity of suggesting that he ever did anything at the Ministry merely to enrich himself.

[alt_rachel]

Don't be absurd, Bill. I learned a long time ago not to assume that someone couldn't possibly be embezzling simply because they seemed honest and forthright and sincere. Liars and cheats wouldn't get far if they couldn't convince the people around them they were honest.

So. Healers for muggle mothers. Fascinating. I guess the thing I'm really curious about is how this got slipped past the Camp Administrators? I'm sure that bloke who was selling muggle girls to be hunted and marking their deaths down as 'in camp' wouldn't have hired healers for muggles.

[alt_bill]

I don't remember all the details, but I think much of it went to midwife training, and simple kits to give to the mothers. So the information and materials were dispensed among the women themselves, you see. Even if they didn't have a healer--or a veterinarian--available at the birth, they would have the know how to keep the area sterile, and to cut the cord with something that wouldn't spread disease. Better outcomes, you see.

The program has saved lives, more workers for the Protectorate, you see. Very convenient, for very little extra cost.

Are you going to raise a stink about it? If you do, I'm sure Corax Mulciber would probably be happy to hex the line item off the spread sheets.

[alt_rachel]

I don't report to Corax, and this isn't the sort of thing I'm trying to stamp out.

But someone must have bought the kits, arranged the training, and distributed them in the camps. Was it your father?

[alt_bill]

He knew about it. After the fact. But he kept it quiet.

As to who did the implementation, I don't have any idea. Someone in Muggle Domestication, I suppose. Dad was only the Liaison to that Department, so HE didn't have any oversight into their budgets.

[alt_rachel]

I wonder if it's someone who's still there.

They've had a bit of turnover, these last few years.