Forestry reprieve (27)

Not sure if that was aimed at me, but if so: MY main point was that the govt should be able to change a decision without being derided as weak. Terms like "U-turn" and "backed down" tend to be rather loaded in that direction. It's all a bit childish and doesn't lead to mature debate or open government, and doesn't help democracy. People get very emotional about these things and God help us human beings are stupid enough without that.

As far as "a lot of writing" goes, yourself and Mr Tom widened my point out into other stuff so I was just responding to that.

For clarity, once again: governments should be able to change their policy without necessarily being mocked as weak. Anybody disagree with that? No? Good. Yes? Also good. At least we understand each other.

Yes, it matters. Whether you like it or not, it's the nature of the original proposal that's driving much of the reaction to all this. You believe that the proposal itself and its subsequent reversal are separable issues which which should be considered in isolation from each other; I don't. That's probably as much as can usefully be said.

I don't suppose you intended that to sound quite as condescending as it did. It does have a familiar ring to it: people are confused, they don't understand the benefits, they need to be educated, etc, etc

A company exists to make money. That's a statement on which even the most rabid Marxist and the most extreme free-marketeer can find common ground. The idea that companies exist to serve their customers is marketing fluff; if they happen to satisfy their customers needs, this is merely incidental to their primary purpose.

That simple fact determines every aspect of how that company manages its assets and conducts its business. It says nothing about the people who work within it, but they are there to make money for the company. No other reason. Anyone who was ever confused on this point must surely have been cured of it by the so-called "privatisation" of the rail system.

Which box you put your cross in on polling day is your business. I have no curiosity on the matter; I was just pointing out that you seem to be singing from the same hymn sheet.

I don't think it's a matter of better or worse. Both have the capacity to be incompetent and corrupt, and to some extent they usually are, but the fact that they exist for different reasons makes each incompetent and corrupt in its own particular way.

As Max Bygraves used to say: I wanna tell you a story.

A few years ago I went into my local town centre where a new shopping centre had been built. The paths through it were uncovered, and they were the same ones as I'd walked on when they were public. In walking into it now, however, I crossed an invisible line where different rules applied.

Seeing me wandering around with no evident purpose, a man wearing black with a radio on his belt approached me and asked if he could "help" me. What this meant of course was help me spend money; clearly, I had no business being there otherwise. He turned around to admonish someone for standing on a bench. On another occasion I was told not to take photographs, and then - believe it or not - actually kept under surveillance to make sure I didn't attempt to do so again.

This is happening all over the country. Areas which used to be public have been privatised, and anyone entering them is required to comport themselves in a way which meets the approval of the new owners. Rules are applied which are arbitrary, inconsistent, which cannot be challenged, and which take precedence over the established civil rights of the citizen. The answer is always the same: if you don't like it, leave. And you wonder why people don't trust private enterprise?

And as for the dull old FC forests - I'm sure Ronald McDonald would love bringing joy and laughter into them. Wouldn't that make a lovely day out?

They're doing what is in their nature. Every creature does. In some cases, government divests itself of assets for no other reason than that they're an inconvenience, and they want rid of them. This predisposes them to accept at face value the offers to take them off their hands. One would hope for politicians who were less credulous, but there we are.

Nobody gets far in politics without a brass neck. You don't imagine, I hope, that Spelman is sitting in a darkened room sobbing, or going round with her head in a paper bag. She's pragmatic enough to see the Punch and Judy show for what it is, shrug her shoulders and move on. Given the choice between the Punch and Judy show, and a fatalistic apathetic indifference, I'll take the Punch and Judy show thank you.

This is hugely important, I think. Public laws and public rights no longer apply in these semi public "shopping" spaces. Housing complexes also are built within walled complexes where the developers' laws apply. You buy your apartment, but no washing on balconies, no pets, no ball games, no running with scissors, no rights beyond the key to your door.

Planning permission now frequently depends upon developers obtaining a "Secure by Design" certificate. "Secure by Design" is Police Guidance on building design. Thus, new housing is built within walls and gates with one point of entry and exit, surveillance is mandatory. The security industry profits, public laws no longer apply.

In America gated communities, who after all are paying for their own security, their own cleaning of communal spaces, their own refuse collection are demanding to be exempted from public levy. Everyone is starting to live within private enclaves. For the rich they are "luxury" security from the threat of fellow americans, for the poor they are a form of social control.

The more that our public spaces are privatized, the less we share common objectives, common costs or have social interests in common. This seems to be to be about far bigger issues than whether public or private "management" is "better" whatever that means. I assume Once Upon a Time meant better by some "efficiency" measure, some form of measurable return that fails to count of the cost of social fragmentation.

"Imagination is more important than knowledge" (Albert Einstein)
Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est. http://www.informedconsent.co.uk/posts/226772/

I do too

R4 obsessive

Best

M

Space travels in my blood. And there ain't nothing I can do about it.
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If it's about achieving the same result for less cost then less cost to who? Not less cost to the tax payer surely since that money is taken out of the private purse and into private profit whereas the less efficient use of more staff and so on to achieve the same result puts the same money back out in wages etc.

I'm interested in answers to this as I really don't understand what is meant by better management in this kind of discussions. It sounds to me like an anachronistic turn of phrase from the late 70s when MBA qualified students were compared with the bureaucratic managers of nationalized behomoths. That kind of public/private management distinction is surely completely out of date?

The question now is to follow the tax payer's money. Who benefits from it?

Which reminds me - how come the Olympics are being used as a test template for ultra security -a wall with high security around the entire site, iris recognition, crowd behaviour recognition/prediction software. We the tax payers paid for it, yet can't even enter the site for a look and walk around at our site of national pride (ahem). We the tax payers have paid a high £ price for the cost of the security that excludes us. Who benefits?

Edited 21 Feb 11, 9:21 AM by clare

Commercial companies are absolutely wedded to the view that the totality of their assets and liabilities are entirely contained within their balance sheet. It's all about money; nothing else. The notion that they exist within a social context, and have responsibility to a total constituency composed of shareholders, customers, neighbours, and society at large is much too complex to think about. So they don't.

They are not there to serve the interests of the taxpayer. Only one thing matters - the interests of the shareholders, expressed as profit. The fact that the taxpayer has to meet increased welfare costs as a result of public service workers being laid off does not figure in the calculations of the companies bidding for the work. You are certainly right to say that it should concern government, which in theory ought to be acting in the taxpayers' interest.

You've put your finger on it. When Margaret Thatcher (may Her Holy Name be praised) met a group of British Rail managers, she reportedly announced "None of you can be any good. If you were, you wouldn't be here". (Some of them were later to have the last laugh, but that's another story.)

Similarly, when the BBC interviewed her in Downing Street, she asked why it took so many people to record the interview, and suggested that this was a symptom of waste in state-run enterprises.

While there were, of course, few limits to the woman's abilities, she was not speaking from any expertise on the railways or broadcasting. It was a matter of dogma: they were state-run, ergo they must be inefficient, and they must attract people inferior to those working in the private sector, who were in theory exposed to the ruthless Darwinian selection of the Free Market.

Sadly, no; it's still very much with us.

Now, now: you know the answer to that

Edited 22 Feb 11, 9:04 PM by MrTom