The UK media have been scratching their pointy heads of late as the opinion poll gap between New Labour and the Tories has closed to indicate at best a hung parliament. Despite looming and actual strikes, a record budget deficit with no prospect of recovery, real and impending tax rises, unemployment levels at a 30 [...]
Category Archives: public sector reform
Why Quality is important and why we need more of it
January 5, 2010 – 3:04 pm
A bunch of people out there believe that doing things better is the answer to our economic woes. I can’t argue with that, so I’ve recently joined the Chartered Quality Institute as its External Affairs spokesman, because I firmly believe that until and unless we get to grips with the wholly unnecessary and avoidable malaise which has [...]
How the Tories wordgrabbed Progessive and sent Mandy Mental
August 12, 2009 – 2:16 pm
Yesterday, unlike ‘Lord’ Mandelson, I saw George Osborne deliver his case for the Tories as the party of ‘Progressive Politics” at centre-left Demos think tank HQ. The hounhymns were confounded. Phil Collins – no, not the former drummer of progressive rock group Genesis but the former speechwriter for failed prog rock singer, Tony (Ugly Rumours) [...]
Kicking National Express was a good call from Labour
July 5, 2009 – 4:18 pm
On the National Express, there’s a jolly hostess, selling crisps and tea. She’ll provide you with drinks and theatrical winks for a sky-high fee. We’re going where the air is free. Tomorrow belongs to me. Lyrics from ‘National Express,’ by The Divine Comedy.
Surely some mistake? Privatised train operators are supposed [...]
Industrialising the service sector is a false economy and fatal in the public sector
June 8, 2009 – 10:21 am
Alistair Darling has demanded further £15bn efficiency savings through more IT-led front-office/back-office public-service designs. In the accompanying Treasury report, these totals are justified by ‘proxies, assumptions and estimates’, not evidence. Indeed, the evidence points firmly the other way; the further industrialisation of public services will inevitably lead to higher costs and worse services. By John Seddon. [...]