CurrentAccount:Current Account is struck by what reads like uncanny accuracy in the financial horoscopes published this week in You & Your Money, a new magazine gracing retailers' shelves nationwide.

With only 11 pictures of the great man between its glossy covers, the casual reader may not pick up on the fact that the glossy mag is actually the pet project of televangelist-cum-financial salesman Eddie Hobbs, who according to Company Office records is a Scorpio.

"Now I want you to take a deep breath and sit down," advises astrologer Julian de Burgh of Hobbs and his fellow Scorpians. "Like a squirrel you have hoards of cash piled up all over the place that makes your little heart flutter, but you've simply got to let go of that tight-fisted grip you have on your finances."

Although he was last seen ignominiously cancelling his one-man shows in Dublin and Cork following slow ticket sales, it seems Hobbs is far from ready to give up his vice-like grip on educating the State's masses on their finances just yet.

The Cape Verde Islands enthusiast, who charmingly sports a white coat and euro-adorned stethoscope in his new publication, is back on RTÉ on March 25th with a new series of Show Me the Money.

Enterprise Ireland irks cash-strapped clients

The Irish are not known as the best at paying their bills, as many a failed business has discovered - the problem isn't getting work in the door, it's getting paid for it. But it seems that state development agency Enterprise Ireland has managed to upset some of its clients by introducing new procedures that require companies to pay for services in advance.

Technology industry veteran Joe Drumgoole, who is currently getting his PutPlace.com start-up off the ground, felt irked enough about the change to post about it on his blog under the heading "EI - Lions Led by Donkeys".

When contacted by Current Account, a spokeswoman for Enterprise Ireland said the measure was intended to "increase our efficiency and improve our processes". She said it was also designed to provide "clarity for our clients from the outset", but we remain unconvinced how paying in advance for services will benefit cash-strapped start-ups.

Truth hurt in PR debate

Current Account has always been slightly sceptical about the attachment of the PR industry to the concept of truth in its dealings with the media. Spin merchants, for their part, insist that while they are there to defend the interests of their clients, they would not stoop to lying outright.

Now, at last the PR industry appears to have undermined its own argument.

At a recent debate in the UK organised by magazine PR Week and the University of Westminster on the motion "PR has a duty to tell the truth", Max Clifford and academic Simon Goldsworthy confronted Vodafone communications chief Simon Lewis and George Pitcher, co-founder of communications consultancy Luther Pendragon.

Clifford and Goldsworthy were arguing that truthfulness is not necessarily the best PR policy, while Lewis and Pitcher said the industry could be more ethical and transparent.

And the outcome . . . the 260-plus PR executives in attendance defeated the motion by 138 votes to 124.

Point made, methinks.

Report chides insurers

After five interim reports over five years, the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Enterprise and Small Business has at last delivered its final pronouncement on its investigation into reform of the Irish insurance industry.

One of the more interesting things about the report, given its provenance, is how little it has to say about, well, small business or, indeed, enterprise. Instead, it seems to be consumed largely with lecturing the motor industry on measures it should take to ensure that drivers who will not take responsibility for their own actions are protected from themselves.

It has been apparent to Current Account that the committee has been going to some lengths to drag out an investigation that hits all the right buttons with the electorate. Now, true to form, Donie Cassidy and his team have delivered what amounts to an election manifesto by the committee's members of all political hue.