By Jill Kirby at the Telegraph well worth a read.
A couple of quotes to whet your appetite.
A bit lazy of me but it is a well written article.
“Yet as activism has increased, public confidence has fallen. At opposite ends of the spectrum, the banking crisis and the tragic death of Baby P represent the abject failure of the state to prevent disaster: indeed, the elaborate systems of governance established by Labour appear to have contributed to the problem.”
A couple of quotes to whet your appetite.
A bit lazy of me but it is a well written article.
“Yet as activism has increased, public confidence has fallen. At opposite ends of the spectrum, the banking crisis and the tragic death of Baby P represent the abject failure of the state to prevent disaster: indeed, the elaborate systems of governance established by Labour appear to have contributed to the problem.”
“Reports of success fail to match our experience. Employers choose well-educated immigrants over indigenous school-leavers; parents are unable to secure places at the schools of their choice; hospitals are infection-ridden. The reality gap widens; disillusionment and disbelief set in. So ministers cast around for new ways to try to convince a sceptical electorate that life has got better – like putting targets into law. This is technique number two. Having failed to meet all its (redefined) intermediate targets on child poverty, the Government is legislating for their abolition. Last year's Climate Change Act says that by 2020, carbon dioxide emissions will be down by 34 per cent. No one seriously believes these targets can be met, but opposition politicians are unwilling to challenge them.”
Angus
Angus Dei on all and sundry
Angus Dei-NHS-THE OTHER SIDE
2 comments:
It's a very good piece, Angus - thanks for the link, as otherwise I'd have missed it.
I think things went badly wrong when New Lab, building on the 'free market = good' ethos of Thatcher then went on to extend it by adding the rider 'therefore marketing itself = good'.
It isn't, being morally neutral - depends how it's used. But NL eagerly grabbed every single marketing technique, from Gould's focus groups to Campbell's meedja-spin, and ran wild with 'em! Any half-baked & essentially theftuous notion that emerged from marketing dept of the ghastly Harvard Bus School was regarded as Holy Writ by Labour in the late '80s/early '90s (still is, it seems).
Remember talking to someone then, who is now Cabinet Minister, and being horrified by wholesale buy-in to all forementioned guff.
Result seems to be that govt and all related persons/groups/quangos appear to have the mentality of salesmen: anything to reach the targets, however crazy the method or the target, until eventually they're all competing for the sake of it - if only with each other as nobody else left to compete with.
Same goes for the economy. Sale of gold reserves? PFIs (losses potentially as damaging as UK banks' CDO obligations).
Obviously, there's much more to it than that; but all the mad marketeering does seem to be a strong contributory factor.
What ever happened to making things? Living within means, etc?
Rant, rant, rant - sorry to have gone on at such length.
Bon ouiellequende, Angus!
Thatcher's generation, I am afraid:)
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