The problem with Brown's latest Big Idea
Peter Hoskin 12:05pm
There's some very readable stuff in this week's Economist (including a leader which outlines what Brown's government should – but almost certainly won't – do with its "last months in power"). But if you read only one article from it, make sure it's the Bagehot column and its dissection of Brown's latest Big Idea: public service guarantees.
These are the pledges-turned-legal entitlements which popped up throughout the Queen's Speech – such as the "guarantee" that patients will have hospital treatment within 18 weeks of being referred by a GP. As Bagehot points out, it's a problematic approach:
'To be worth the manifesto paper they will be printed on, public-service guarantees need to be readily enforceable. It is fairly easy to see how those that are to be bestowed on groups or communities might work. A school is failing; parents complain; something is eventually done. But the situation for individuals seeking to secure their rights in a hurry is fuzzier.The trouble is that, if the guarantees are not enforceable by law, they will be weak; but if they are, they may lead to an orgy of litigation. The government’s answer is to make many of them theoretically subject to judicial review, but only after multiple layers of complaint to local institutions and ombudsmen. That raises two telling criticisms. One concerns time. If a patient is suffering from a painful condition, or a child is being poorly educated, only an immediate remedy will do. If they have to spend weeks or months negotiating the bureaucracy of enforcement, the result will not be the enjoyment of their rights — it is too late for that — but a paltrier sort of compensation. The advocates of guarantees argue that the threat of redress alone will be enough to ginger up teachers and hospital managers; the guarantees will work merely by existing. That is an unconvincing syllogism.
The other criticism is that, on closer inspection, the new guarantees look very like the old discredited targets they are supposed to supersede: ambitions defined by the government and policed by its servants or appointees, albeit through a different mechanism.'
In effect, this sets up a perfect dividing line for the Tories to operate along. If they can highlight the bureaucratic aspects of this latest wheeze, then it creates more space for those policy areas – such as schools reform and the community right to buy – where they're proposing greater freedoms for communities and individuals.
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Moraymint
November 20th, 2009 12:24pm Report this commentBagehot is being too obtuse and polite.
As any fule kno, no citizen has a hope in hades of taking on the state and winning - unless they have extraordinarily deep pockets, a lot of time and an inside track on the nomenklatura.
Therefore, us serfs know full well that Brown's "public service guarantees" are just so much bo*****s and politicking.
It's bad enough having the politicians taking us all for complete fools, but when organs like the Economist shimmy along with the politicos in this way, one despairs.
We need to trash the Marxist nutters clinging to office, giving them no quarter anywhere, and move on.
Private Schultz
November 20th, 2009 12:29pm Report this commentNever mind that, get weaving with this: http://www.examiner.com/x-28973-Essex-County-Conservative-Examiner~y2009m11d19-Hadley-CRU-hacked-with-release-of-hundreds-of-docs-and-emails
Snowman
November 20th, 2009 12:34pm Report this commentWhat has happened to this once sane, common sense country run by consensus of the governed that it now seriously accepts that the limitations of the human condition could be changed by statutes.
2trueblue
November 20th, 2009 1:00pm Report this commentThis is called recycling. We have heard it all before and it did not happen then, so if the electorate believe that..... well.
There is nothing this government says that I can take seriously, apart form putting up taxes and expanding the public sector, and they are the only things they excell at.
Cuffleyburgers
November 20th, 2009 1:12pm Report this commentIn my view the Economist is going to the dogs, they are simply not coming down hard enough on Brown and his appalling maladministration and as for Europe... well suffice it to say it is obvious they are stable mates with the Pinko
Of course they do occasionally mutter about the lack of democracy but not in the energetic way they are continuously banging on about CO2 emmissions and global warming.
Deeply unsound, and Bagehot is only stating bleedin'obvious.
Publius
November 20th, 2009 1:15pm Report this commentSnowman writes: "...the limitations of the human condition could be changed by statutes."
Wise words. Lost, I fear, even on some of the cub-journalists of The Spectator, who cannot tell the difference between nature and ideology.
Frank Leader
November 20th, 2009 1:44pm Report this commentThe real problem with Brown's latest great idea, is that it is His. This man is an out and out loser. He is King Midas in reverse. Selling gold at its lowest price ; Plundering and ruining private pension schemes. Now he wants to take the Attendance Allowance from the over 65's. Without this extra money many will be housebound as they are unable to use public transport. The extra money allows them to use taxis instead. It just show Labours caring side doesn't it?
The Laughing Cavalier
November 20th, 2009 2:38pm Report this commentI suspect that this has nothing to do with public service but everything to do with an attempt to tie the hands of an incoming Conservative government. Brown is not just scorching the earth but salting it as well.
Naomi Muse
November 20th, 2009 3:30pm Report this commentMoraymint - love it!
Public Service Guarantees are as reliable as a guarantee from a company that has gone bust...
Gordo's good intentions and intent on looking busy whilst working out some other scheme for taxing us or reducing an allowance is his main occupation.
Smoke and mirrors and looking busy - what an epitaph!
alex popplewell
November 20th, 2009 3:34pm Report this commentsympathetic to the view that the economist(prop-pearson also owners of the ft,curiouly a mouthpiece for nu labour and the eu in their op/ed,no doubt as their uk readership dwindles) and regardless of what they say-and they do puncture this one quite well-their use of language and style is second to none.lots of my favourite types of phrases in this piece-gingering up,paltry compensensation,unconvincing syllogism.magic...im still working my way through the speccie and keep the economist for the friday train home.
David Bouvier
November 20th, 2009 3:41pm Report this commentToo harsh. If there is a financial mechanism to access the alternative it can work, and supplier businesses will ensure they can access the revenue stream.
If once I have waited 18 weeks I can go to a private doctor or hospital who can then claim a tariff payment to treat me it will work (some aspects of this are in place already with 'Choose and Book')
If I receive a voucher for my child's education, that will work.
This is easier in education and harder in healthcare (but is actually an already solved problem). The only issue is the extent to which the law actually implements the policy, or just gives worthless procedural "rights to beg".
Holly ......
November 20th, 2009 4:45pm Report this commentHere is a radical idea....
let your yes be yes.
Tankus
November 20th, 2009 5:35pm Report this commentOr, if your Irish.
No be NO
way too radical !
Holly ......
November 20th, 2009 7:06pm Report this commentThe main problem being..
BIG & IDEA.
With Brown and Labour having both, at the same time is worrying.
Tankus
November 20th, 2009 8:40pm Report this commentPlenty of big ideas .....
but never any follow through
like farts in the wind ....
AliC
November 20th, 2009 9:50pm Report this commentWhat a Canute our dear leader is. First, he gets us into debt. Tries to 'legislate'. No need, just don't tax and spend... Next, coming to a beach near you... Nu Lab legislate against the tide.....
Holly ......
November 20th, 2009 11:07pm Report this comment....And just be thankful the Tories were not in charge...the economy would be in a right mess if they had been.......
..at least Labour are putting in place measures to sustain growth....educate the kiddies and looking after granny 20 years from now......enough to make any 65 yr old vote Labour in six months time.
No other political party can promise the country that bag of treats now can they?
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