General Well-Being is back

Pot Head

Things can only get bitter !

Dave B

After watching Dispatches 'trillion pound horror story', I looked up Hong Kong Sir John Cowperthwaite, he had some simple advice for a government seeking economic growth, that seems on point:

"Asked what the key thing poor countries should do, Cowperthwaite once remarked, "They should abolish the office of national statistics." He refused to collect all but the most superficial statistics, believing they led the state to fiddle about remedying perceived ills, thus hindering the working of the market. "

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2006/feb/08/guardianobituaries.mainsection

Tiberius

Tin hats at the ready.

Verity

Pete Hoskin, please don't repeat Cameron's moronic, self-elevating, pr phrase, "detoxify the party's image". This is typical smart-arse Shameron, pretending to some special professional body of knowledge.

Please don't repeat this idiocy as a fact. It was merely self-serving Cameron trying to look effective. (Failed.)

JR

Well I think it's a good idea to explore. The French backed Stiglitz, Sen, Fitoussi report (http://www.stiglitz-sen-fitoussi.fr/documents/rapport_anglais.pdf) is a well thought through piece of work. People will inevitably disagree about some elements but it is at it's best when dismantling the fetish for GDP measures alone. The traffic jam example (raises GDP lowers wellbeing and is a symbol of externalities and inefficiencies) may sound ridiculous but is actually incredibly important. I'd suggest Coffee Housers read the executive summary before jumping to dismiss it.

Verity

Cameron created an aillment so he could be perceived to "cure" it. God, that individual gives me the creeps!

DaveL

Don't YouGov already have a survey that is a Happiness Tracker? Don't bother with a quango, pay for the result more cheaply!

Frank P

"General Well-Being is back."

Is he related to the Hampshire Well-Beings, from Down-in-the-Dumps near Nether Wallop.

Rhoda Klapp

Among the many things that are not the government's job, making people happy is paramount. The sheer unmitigated gall of even believing it's any of their damn business how happy I am, the brazen arrogance of taking on this when they can't properly do the few things that they ought, makes me far from happy. Do your damn job, creeps. If you can't do it well, at least do it with honesty. If you can crack that start worrying about extra duties. Bastards. Socialist bastards. Arrogant stupid socialist bastards.

Vulture

More money wasted on more sub-Blairian bollox.

Dave is an asinine, short-termist, non-Conservative creep. The sooner he's put out to spend more time with his Wisteria the better.

Verity

Endorse every word that Rhoda K and Vulture wrote.

Dave's too shallow to even paddle in, although the scope and depth of his ego is oceanic.

God, he's a disgusting, cheap little creep!

TGF UKIP

Well I welcome this wholeheartedly.

It is obviously another of the Labour Mole's little stratagems that play to the image of his best mate as a shallow, callow rather silly PR man and this one will certainly succeed, though not as well I fear as his real genius "detoxifying the Tory brand" one did, which continues to fool the teenagers even now.

I think I'm fast becoming a fan of the Labour Mole as both of us appear to have the same aim and ambition - the ridicule and downfall of his dear chum, Dave.

Verity

Dave should sack his vanity photographer. His face looks like melting plasticine.

Is the pose supposed to suggest "Looking into the future", by any chance? How clever!

Mirtha Tidville

Yawn Yawn........please wake me up when Dave`s been got rid of....ta

ssleddon

Spot on Verity, Rhoda; personally I’ve noticed a strong inverse relationship between happiness and government involvement in my life.

se1man

Rhoda: *applause*

If my GWB happens to be high, exactly how much credit do you think that I will give the government of the day?

lescam

@Rhoda Klapp; "Do your damn job, creeps. If you can't do it well, at least do it with honesty. If you can crack that start worrying about extra duties. Bastards. Socialist bastards. Arrogant stupid socialist bastards".

Rhoda, couldn't agree more. None of their damn business how happy I am. If I want to be miserable I bloody well will be. To echo S.J. Perelman, when told to "have a nice day", he replied "I'll have whatever kind of day I like", or something to that effect.

This sounds like another Steve Hilton special. God these people are arrogant beyond belief. Jumped-up, stupid, cocky, idiotic bastards.

What's more, I don't like them!

Liz Brown

What a load of crap - my happiness might well equate to someone else's misery. This asinine idea should be put straight back into its box

Frank P

Pop over top Melanie's blog. She has just cattle trucked his drive for 'appiness.

Perhaps he should hire Ken Dodd to sing it at all future PMQs?

EC

Commander Vapid has come up with a real beauty this time!

Verity

Frank P - Thanks for the tip-off about Melanie's column.

David Cameron is in so far over his head and his abilities it's not even funny. So we can't have a merry laugh over it ...

David Duff

"smile wryly"?

More like, throw up violently!

Edward McLaughlin

For those who need to rely on signals: when the government needs to devise methods for tracking the nation's sense of its well-being, said nation isn't feeling too well.

Holly ......

Lots of happy bods out tonight.
Tee hee.
I've been at my lowest and I'm still happier
than some of the misery guts on here.
But then I'm not on the losing team.
Tee hee.

Colin

Davy Blah Blah...

Holly ......

Just read Melanie's post.
Must have taken her yonks to look up'jolly' & 'jape'.
I'm sure I read their books at infants school.
Quite underwhelming all in all.
The usual negative stuff we are so used to from the 'brilliant'post writers we endure.
When recent policies of Cameron's have had such negativity thrown at them the public usually agree with them,so I'm not too worried about Melanie,or what she has to offer on anything.
She was the future once.
What a jape that must have been for her.
Jolly days.

Mike Spilligan

I'm surprised that no one has mentioned that this was one of Blair's "eye catching initiatives" of about 8 years ago; so it's not even new.
Rhoda K's summary is so good that nothing else needs to be said; though I don't want to discourage Verity's carpet bombing.

Anon

@JR - unfortunately you haven't even managed to question the far more significant question of whether governments should be attempting to pursue any such objective be it GDP growth or any other measure. That is not the proper role and function of government - particularly when all measures are inherently subjective as the report you highlight demonstrates nicely.

JR

Anon - could you clarify? There are many ways to read your comment - even at the extreme the Government needs a way of measuring its impact and for people to be informed about that to enable participatory democracy. So if you stripped back internal Government to just protecting property rights and preventing citizans harming other citizans through the rule of law you would still want to understand how well you were doing that?

I happen to believe that in the UK people do care how Government impacts their economic wellbeing but at a household level - therefore I'd strongly support the report's recomendation of looking at income/wealth/consumption/debt at a household as opposed to macro level. That seems to me a sensible public policy measure but on top of that it is a sensible political measure for any Government to have a better chance of winning elections.