You've got to admire their gall!

What do you do if you are the countries leading retailer, and are the subject of serial abuse by those unhappy with your success?

How to you respond to their criticism?

Why, stock it and sell it, of course! Preferably at 20% off.

Textbook!

(Hat tip to Brian Micklethwait, who found this last week)

It was ten years ago today

Ten years after being elected, Tony Blair has expressed regrets, apparently. I can imagine that would take a while!

InnerWest sums up Tony Blair's successes and failures thus:

Tony's Tenure's Top Three....

1. An Independent Central Bank. People really have never had it so good.
2. Northern Ireland. The IRA - remember them?
3. Devolution. Not everybody agrees about how much power should be given
away from the centre, but the important thing is that some was and it's gaining
it's own momentum....

and the Bottom Two:

1. Foreign Policy. An ethical intent gave way to the allure of the ends
justifying the means - only for the ends to become an almost unmitigated
fiasco.
2. Public Services. Lavishing money and ducking tough questions does not
equate to reform, just a stay of execution.

Well, 3-2 seems to be a victory for Blair.

Then again, Inner West seem to have discounted a number of (own) goals:

1) Spin - need we say more?
2) Cash for Honours - because Cash for Questions was so last government
3) Human Rights - they started so well, and then it all fell to pieces
4) That economic record, which ignores the fact that unemployment, inflation and taxes all rising

5) "Education, Education, Education" - three times as much priority, and still a quarter of school leavers are illiterate, a quarter innumerate, and a third have no qualifications worth a damn...

One really could go on!

So go on. Why not add your own personal lowlights of the Blair administration. After all, it was ten years ago tomorrow!

Greens hypocrites? That's hardly news!

An excellent post by Joe Otten, explaining (one reason) why the Greens are a menace.

Hat tip to Nich for spotting it before me.

Another bit of favouritism for Tony’s Cronies?

Ministers, civil servants and the public have all been shocked and appalled by the recent fashion for kiss-and-tell accounts of the inner workings of government.

While I well-written memoir is wonderfully enlightening, and the details of the Hutton Enquiry and Butler Review exposed Blair’s sofa government for what it is, the salacious bean-spilling by some civil servants and ministers has been to the detriment of the service.

One can understand why the Government has sought to limit further breaches of the secrecy that must exist within ministerial offices. Personally, I find any effort to limit free speech to be worrying, and I fully support open government. However, there must be a degree of trust between ministers and their colleagues, and between ministers and civil servants, and it is not unreasonable to require people to commit in advance to secrecy. It is a normal practice for lawyers and Catholic priests, after all. One cannot compel a person to be silent, but one may justifiably insist that they choose between their right to speak freely and their desire to take a particular job. Accepting a post as a minister, civil servant or special adviser should carry with it a commitment to discretion.

Meanwhile, one would expect the law to be implemented blindly, without favouritism. So it is extremely disturbing to read that the Government has been accused of dragging its feet over implementation of its own rules so as to enable Alastair Campbell to publish his diaries before the new rules come into effect.

According to Chris Grayling, the Conservative Shadow Transport Secretary,

“The Government now appears to have a completely cavalier attitude to the rules
of Whitehall when it comes to looking after people who have been close to Tony
Blair and Gordon Brown. This is quite obviously a blatant attempt to delay
things so that Alastair Campbell can get on with publishing his diaries without
anyone intervening to stop him.”

Of course, without presenting evidence, Mr. Grayling is potentially making a scurrilous accusation. However, as the collapse in the confidence between ministers and civil servants is a direct result of the manner in which the Labour government has itself used leaks and spin to control the news, it seems hardly beyond them to play so fast-and-loose with the principles of good government.

Awkward memoirs and embarrassing leaks are a problem of their own making. Sadly, it now seems likely that they are further compounding the problem by once again turning them to their advantage.

Don’t hold your breath

Rumours have been flying around for some time that Gordon Brown might call an early general election to take advantage of the Brown Bounce, a surge in the polls as the voters take a big breath of the fresh air that Gordon will represent after replacing Tony Blair.

I’ve been rubbishing this suggestion for some time. Apart from its echoes of another Labour bounce that we were promised, the voters are becoming increasingly aware that the most bouncy thing about the Chancellor of the Exchequer is the rubber cheques he has been writing.

So I hope the boys in Campaigns haven’t blown the whole of the budget just yet, because according to The Times Gordon Brown has explicitly ruled out an early election. On ITV yesterday he pouted

“I didn’t hear the Conservatives calling for a general election the minute
that John Major took over in 1990… Nor did people say that on the other
occasions in British history.”

The analogy is apposite, as the Tories were highly unpopular in 1990. However, Major had the advantage of being relatively unknown when he took over, unstained by the previous ten years. Not so Brown, who is up to his neck in the authoritarianism, spin, sleaze and ultimate failure of ten years of New Labour, while at the same time being personally responsible for unprecedented levels of taxation, high borrowing and vast amount of off-the-balance-sheet public debt.

My bet remains that Gordon Brown will delay the next general election for as long as possible, hoping that he can somehow convince the world that he is actually a good Prime Minister, if only we give him a chance.It looks like it’s not just those expecting an early election who should not be holding their breaths.

“Little black boys will join hands with little white boys as brothers.”

British schools face US-style segregation according to Nick Johnson, Director of policy and public sector at the Commission for Racial Equality.

The problem is at its most acute in areas where racial minorities make up a greater proportion of the population than the national average of 8 per cent. Mr. Johnson’s fear is that this will lead to greater alienation, as children grow up never mixing with peers from other races.

Mr. Johnson’s solution is typically Statist. Schools are to be required to have “a balanced and diverse intake”, and the amount of money they receive may be affected by their success in meeting this target. It is sad that Mr. Johnson has not learnt the lessons of the last decade. Government targets do not lead to better public services overall; they merely lead to public services that better meet the targets. Hospitals must see every patient within 18 weeks, so now every patient has to wait 17 weeks to be seen, and may then be seen for a cursory appointment to ensure that the target is met before being referred to the next waiting list. Schools’ incomes are dependent on the number of children getting higher GCSEs, so they concentrate on children on the borderline of grades C and D to the exclusion of those expected to get very low or very high grades.

Hospital and school managers are only human, and are as likely to game the system as anyone else. The result of this scheme is likely to be schools aiming to achieve exactly the amount of racial integration necessary to gain the financial bonus: no less, no more. Whether this is in the interests of the individual child will be less important than whether the school has more money to spend on children in aggregate. And as Simon Burgess, Professor of Economics at Bristol University, notes, there may be benefits for some children in working with peers from the same background.

In fact, schools are already required to promote community cohesion, itself a disturbing piece of social engineering. I still subscribe to the unfashionable view that schools should exist primarily to educate, but I realise that others see school as performing other roles. For some there is nothing unusual about the compulsory sequestering of a portion of our population for long periods of time; it is necessary to keep them off the streets and keep them safe. All well and good, but should we also be using that time to attempt to shape them to be the model citizens we feel they ought to be: complete with citizenship classes and an enforced multiculturalism.

Interestingly, the problem may very well be of the state’s own making, and the solution greater liberalisation. (I have yet to find a problem that cannot be solved by grater liberalisation!). Giving parents the choice as to where to send their children to school has been found to have a positive impact on racial integration: “choice programs … are increasing the integration of whites and nonwhites” notes one study.

If the CRE and Ministers are genuinely committed to greater social cohesion and racial integration in schools, they would better achieve their goals by freeing parents to send their children to school where they see fit. This would be more effective than bribing and cajoling – the usual tools of government – and would remove any opportunity for gaming the system. Real school choice, however – which requires allowing parents to move their children at will in the same way that they move their bank account – is not on the cards. For the government it would require releasing control and trusting the people; for the CRE it needs a change of mindset from protecting specific groups to freeing everybody.

In the meantime, the CRE will continue to urge Ministers to meddle, and Ministers – as ever – will need little persuasion. It is unlikely to create the socially cohesive Britain they desire, but in the process unintended consequences will manifest themselves. Such is the price of government intervention.

Reasons to be cheerful

It is a refreshing change when Liberal Democrat colleagues support the views of our American friends.

And no Liberal Democrat colleague comes more exalted than this Liberal Democrat colleague.

I hope the Prime Minister is hanging his head in shame.