I was chatting at the Cloud Circle event last night to a chap from one of the more affluent London Borough councils about the flagellation of the public sector that we are currently seeing in the UK as if the reason why the international banking system collapsed was because of spending a bit too much money on public libraries.
[Mounts hobby horse]
I recounted how I saw Liam Fox on television on Wednesday night talking about how, and I quote, "'so called 'project overruns' are just not tolerated in the private sector" as he announced a review of procurement practices in the Ministry of Defence.
Dr Fox, they may not be tolerated in the private sector. That doesn't mean that they don't happen. It's just that no one talks about them. For example, no one is talking about the £500M outsourcing project that was unceremoniously cancelled by the supplier at a former employer of mine last Friday, seven years early and having delivered no benefit whatsoever, now are they?
There is either a zealotry or naivety to this current government that I find deeply disturbing. An idea that change can happen by just issuing edicts and pronouncements. That the public sector is inherently incapable of delivering anything yet when almost all big capital projects in the public sector are actually run by private sector outsourcers. And all of this from a group of people in government who seem to have little or no real world work experience, and disproportionately come from inherited wealth so have never had to really worry about working either.
I know that to some that this will sound like some kind of call to class war. It's not. It's a call to ask whether people whose sole "business" experience has been trying to balance the books of a political party should be taken seriously when they believe that business change (to cut costs) can happen without substantial and significant cost being incurred along the way.
[Dismounts hobby horse and puts it back in the cupboard]
mmitII 