Picking Losers

Continuing a trend of "the least likely people getting it right", today I think I can trump them all. Labour laughing stock and soon to be ex-secretary of state for Health, Patricia Hewitt has finally said something that is neither spin nor complete nonsense.

Government

Government  

The new Bagehot at The Economist, recently returned from a posting to a "harsh, cold country", thinks that those of us who claim Britain is going to the dogs are hypochondriacs. I have sent the following letter in reply:

Sir,

(Picture - Hat tip: Guido Fawkes)

Government

First Bush. Now Blair. What is happening to the world?

Actually, the feigned surprise could be considered disingenuous. This author does not generally perceive politicians as knaves or fools. Mostly, they are decent and intelligent people trying to do what they think is best. Of course there is sometimes corruption and incompetence, but most of the many failings of government can be attributed not to individual failings but to the intellectual climate, both in shaping politicians' false conceptions of appropriate ends and means, and (perhaps more importantly) in shaping the public perceptions that they have to satisfy. What is surprising is not that these people have shown their intelligence, but that they have used that intelligence to reach unpopular and unconventional conclusions, and moreover that they have felt able to go public with them. What a pity that politicians with the freedom of not seeking re-election are not reported more often.

(It is this, by the way, and not whether you agree with what he did, that makes Blair's valedictory excuse - "I did what I thought was right" - so feeble and irrelevant. It is outcomes and not intentions that count.)

Anyway, what Mr Blair is right about is a decent chunk of his analysis of the role and behaviour of the modern media. Not in the regulatory solution at which (as so often) he hints. But in his assessment that there is a problem.

The media have said sayonara to subtlety, dispensed with detail, kissed goodbye to considered analysis. Everything must be immediate and black-and-white. In echoes of Hollywood, there must be "good guys" and "bad guys", a very simple plot, and two-dimensional characterization.

There is a marvellous booklet, published by the Social Affairs Unit in 2000, called the Dictionary of Dangerous Words. It contains modern definitions, provided by many great thinkers and Oliver Letwin, of words "which once meant something good and now mean something bad, which once meant something and now mean nothing or vice versa, or which have in some interesting sense changed". If the SAU were thinking of bringing out a new edition, I would recommend that little word "key" for inclusion.

I was looking at the speaker-list for an energy conference, and it was pretty much the same list as for every other conference on the subject, of which there are dozens a year. This particular conference was organized on behalf of the Institute of Economic Affairs, which, of all organizations, ought to have been trying to encourage alternative perspectives. I wondered how the organizers came up with such an uninspired and conformist list, and happily they provide an explanation on their website. Their "target list" is put together "following extensive research and consultation with key industry executives". And guess what: their list of speakers is chock-full with those same "key industry executives".

So I add the phrase "key industry executives" to those other abuses of English: "key workers" and "key stakeholders". "Key" is used in this sense to mean "the people (or things) that we think matter". No standard is provided by which this assessment is made. The implication is that it is self-evident that these people (or things) are clearly the most important. "Key workers" are to be contrasted with those unessential workers in the economy, "key stakeholders" with those whose voices need not be listened to, "key executives" with the other executives who don't know as much about or aren't as important to their industry.

And there is worse. The phrase "key civil liberties" is starting to be used more commonly. That would be to distinguish from the unimportant civil liberties, would it? The ones that we need not guard so jealously?

Government  

So incredibly one person in our poll thought that the new Olympic logo was worth every penny of the £400k it cost.  Maybe Lord Coe reads Picking Losers..?

An overwhelming 76% of you thought £400k was a complete waste of money regardless of the what it had ended up looking like.  I have to say, I agree.

So yesterday, as promised, Ruth Kelly outlined the plans for the implementation of HIPs. All houses with four or more bedrooms will be required to have them from August 1st, then it will be a phased implementation with three bedroom houses next and then the rest of the market to follow. That is that all cleared up then. Thank goodness for that.

Government

Government

Education. Education. Education. The opening lines of ten years of spin, let downs and failed policy from New Labour. A report published by Civitas today confirms that whilst this government has talked about education and pumped a load of extra money in to it, it doesn't follow that government interference is the best solution for getting the best out of our children.

The HIPs saga rumbles on. The latest is the news that the government may well be getting sued over the whole matter. That is to say, we are going to have pay for their incompetence if legal action goes ahead - because there is no chance they would win! Since the scheme was "delayed" last month to start on 1st August and is now to only include houses with four or more bedrooms, companies have been laying off trained inspectors as they are no longer needed - many firms have even gone out of business.

Government  

Government 

• The Department of Trade and Industry has rejected a minister's suggestion that paid paternity leave should be doubled.  Beverley Hughes advanced the suggestion in what her department said was her capacity as an MP and not a minister. The children's minister had been due to call for fathers to be able to spend at least a month with their newborn babies. But the DTI said there were no plans to extend the current two week maximum.

Conservatives