Category: Whitehall

Soviet Planning Meets Parliamentary Boundaries, and it’ll end in tears

The imposition of soviet-style ‘one size fits all’ Parliamentary constituencies on the complex organic realities of England is an extraordinarily clumsy and contentious move.

It smacks of moving towards Amercan-style boundary ‘Gerry mandering’, as well as distancing Parliamentary representation from real local communities. From a government supposedly committed to ‘localism’ this is a strange move, to say the least.

Now the realities of what these changes mean have become obvious, the legal changes needed to implement it look to be in severe danger from disgruntled MPs and Peers. Look out for another screeching U-turn in the near future.

Democracy and Public Administration

The ‘Arab Spring’ has raised, yet again, the issue of how modern publication administrations can be created in emerging and transitional states – especially ones that have long lived with some sort of autocratic regime.

At next years IRSPM Conference in Rome (11-13 April 2012) Beryl Radin (American University) and I are organising a panel on this important issue. The ‘Call for Papers’ is below, for those who might be interested. Continue reading “Democracy and Public Administration” →

Universities and Public Policy

I wrote earlier this year for Huffington Post (UK) about the differences between the UK and USA when it comes to Universities and Public Policy – in exactly the opposite way most would suppose.  Whilst the more government-sceptic USA has lots of activity in Universities, the UK is notably weak – at least when it comes to organising public policy activity. I’ve been doing a bit more research and here are some of the findings. Continue reading “Universities and Public Policy” →

Mission Improbable: ‘Military Style’ Free School for Manchester

The right-wing Centre for Policy Studies (CPS) has come up with one its most potty ideas yet – a “military style” Free School staffed by ex-service people to impose discipline on youths involved in gang culture. Continue reading “Mission Improbable: ‘Military Style’ Free School for Manchester” →

How to calculate the deficit: Can’t Anyone in Congress Count? (by John Weeks)

“In my last comment I demonstrated that the US public debt is not very large, and its annual servicing quite small.  It occurred to me (and to several people who wrote to me in response to my comment), that it might be illuminating to carry out a similar exercise for the annual public deficit.  You are likely to be under the impression that the US budget deficit is more than ten percent of GDP, in excess of US$ 1.6 trillion in 2010.  Or, as a Tea Party Republican might put it, $1.6 trillion!!!”

To read the rest of this excellent analysis go here

The Riots: It may be the Under-Class that did it, but it’s the Uber-Class that lost it

So, the riots have come. They had an almost inevitable quality to them – indeed last December I outlined one scenario for when they would happen (see The Great Train Wreck of 2013). Continue reading “The Riots: It may be the Under-Class that did it, but it’s the Uber-Class that lost it” →

The Only Thing ‘Staggering’ About These Savings is the Audacity of Claiming They Are Staggering.

Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude claims that the government has made ‘staggering’ savings of £3.75bn in the 10 months May 2010 to March 2011.

So just how staggering, and credible, are these claims? Continue reading “The Only Thing ‘Staggering’ About These Savings is the Audacity of Claiming They Are Staggering.” →

Public Service: Mutually Assured Destruction?

When I was a Trostkyist, back before the last Ice Age, one of our favorite slogans was “workers control”. It is therefore somewhat weird to hear Tory and Liberal Democrat ministers extolling the virtues of ‘liberating the workers’ to run public services, and how they will improve as a result. The new White Paper on ‘Open Public Services’ confirms them in this approach. Continue reading “Public Service: Mutually Assured Destruction?” →

On Coalitions and Mandates

I have great respect for the veteran political commentator Peter Riddell, and his new book, “In Defence of Politicians, in spite of themselves” deserves to be widely read. It contains much sage analysis and wise advice and much I agree with. Continue reading “On Coalitions and Mandates” →