Leaked memo on Transparency

From an impeccable source.

Time for the left to reclaim the 'transparency' debate

Not here - over there.

Nowhere to hide

Ewan has picked another example of augmented reality up:

"Point your mobile phone at the person speaking at the lectern, the cute person in the bar or that potential recruit and see, hovering around their head, all their social networks, tastes in music and books, and dodgy photos from last night."

The potential is quite interesting, but it's also a bit scary, innit? The interesting bit for me is how far this puts pressure on people to be interactive - particularly public figures. There will always be those who either are genuinely open about their life - I know plenty of people who like sharing every detail of their lives.

I think that Westminster may start filling up with people who are ostentatiously open about their lives in a 'look at me I'm a pretty straight guy with nothing to hide' sort of way.

It reminds me of the origins of the word 'Candidate' - from the latin Candidatus - derived in turn from the white robes that Senators wore to signify their purity of mind. It also said 'look at me, I have the wealth and slaves needed to sustain a huge length of clean white linen every day.'

The Man in The White Suit. I would say that 360 degree transparency is something that would be quite expensive to sustain - especially given the huge array of different snobberies that you'd have to be sensitive to.

I wrote a probably-too-long post on things that touch on this question here some time ago if you've got an age to waste.

MPs expenses: Where your host makes an abrupt about-turn and apolgises to former adversaries

OK. I'm trying to write this without it sounding like one of those Private Eye retractions, but it's a bit difficult: But here goes:

A few months ago, I described the MySociety campaign to force MPs to disclose their expenses as stupid and anti-democratic. And while this description could be read as praise if you squint, I don't think that this is how it was taken.

An apology is in order. Reading it back over the events of the last few weeks, it's very hard to maintain the position that I did then. As it happens, there probably isn't a substantial point from that post that I'd withdraw - I do still think that we have one of the least corrupt political cultures that has been found at any point in history, or for that matter, anywhere in the modern world.

When I read the'perceptions of corruption' index and see that the UK is 16th, I still think that even this partly reflects our notoriously hysterical and dishonest newspapers.

I do think that this exercise has played into their agenda and that the end-result will not necessarily be a more effective democracy (I'd still say that there is a real danger that things could get considerably worse as a result of these revelations) - that the result of this 'clean hands' investigation may be a form of corruption that is simply more acceptable to our odious Fourth Estate.

I also still share Shuggy's view that the 'it's our money' argument doesn't always hold water either. People who moan about MPs spending our money often don't really want MPs to run things in the first place. 

But, all of that said, these revelations have foregrounded something that I wasn't factoring in, or that I underestimated: The petty greed, the chiselling little fiddles, in some cases, the manipulative way that standards have been applied to MPs but not to the people that MPs legislate about. When I worked in politics over a decade ago, you heard rumours, and I put them down to political backbiting. It seems that the worst suspicions about the squalid little fiddles that people said MPs were up to were often actually true. 

The scale, and the sordid crafty behaviour of a minority (and so far, you wouldn't believe it, but it is still a minority) of MPs - particularly their 'the rules said it was OK, so I did it' excuses are just stomach-turning.

That the Fees Office connived in this doesn't excuse MPs - it makes it worse. Even the MPs that didn't take the largesse of offer were prepared to accept a culture that was dishing out freebies. This week has confirmed that almost the entire professional political class live on a different planet to the rest of us, and that they really need to be brought to account in a way that they haven't been for a long time.

So there you have it. I was wrong about a lot of this. And I think that there is the potential to turn recent events into something positive.

But I still worry that the end result may not be to increase public faith in democracy, and it worries me that the person who moved the no-confidence motion - Douglas Carswell MP - has an utterly odious anti-Parliamentary Direct Democracy agenda, and that one of the people mooted to replace Gorbals Mick is the arch-libertarian Richard Shepherd MP.

People who hate elected government are loving this. But I'm now prepared to concede that the legitimacy of democracy would continue to have eroded until this particular pill was swallowed.

The big question, then, is what can we do reinvigorate politics? To make sure that MPs aren't these freaks that live in a world where you just decide to buy a fucking big TV system because the rules don't expressly tell you not to.

There really are some utter wankers in Parliament, and I hope that they end up with dramatically curtailed careers as a result of this.

How about a cap on MPs income?

I know I've developed a bit of a reputation as an apologist for MPs alleged abuse of their expenses. I was certainly not very happy with the campaign to force them to publish their expenses for all of the reasons set out in this post here a while ago.

My key argument that I've yet to have countered - is that...

• Demands for transparency are an effective way of hobbling any institution - particularly when the things that are revealed are subject to a high level of public commentary
• MPs have rivals who seek to coerce and compete with them
• Not applying the same standards of transparency to these rivals essentially empowers them against the people elected to represent all of us.

I'd add to that the other old chestnuts that we apologists have been digging up: That the current system arises out of numerous successive 'nod-and-a-wink' deals whereby MPs have been encouraged to take up various byzantine allowances as a means of getting them to accept salary rises that don't keep pace with other sectors.

The idea of springing full disclosure under such circumstances strikes me as an ambush that is bound to damage the reputation of parliament - and, by extension - democracy in the UK.

All of that said, I'd like to offer a counter-argument in mitigation. Chris - here - applies a standard Public Choice Theory explanation of why MPs are neither all bastards or all angels.

But that's not good enough really, is it? All of this seems to come from a very misanthropic and deterministic place - one where collective action is only ever the product of a calibrated set of incentives. One where there no situation is so bad that it's not made worse by rational attempts to solve the problem.

If I were an MP, I'd want to make a point of driving a bog-standard family saloon. I'd not want to spend my holidays in the Galapagos Islands watching Turtles fuck in the sun. I'd be happy with a couple of weeks in Ireland and a week in Marbella at best.

I wouldn't want to eat at anywhere as vulgar as The Ivy any more than I do now. For work, in the past, I've had to go to these places, and I can honestly say that they give me the creeps.

Wealth is positional as much as it is a means to acquire resources. Once you've got food clothes and shelter for you and your family, the rest is largely about chauvinism and one-upmanship.

If MPs are to promote a public service ethos - and Labour MPs really should be looking at this as a response to the changing attitudes towards the excessive lifestyles of the rich - then they need to start shifting this positioning around.

It's a state of mind: If people who were perceived as powerful were living ordinary lives, it would have a significant positive impact on the rest of us. I'd not go as far as the 'Workers Wages for MPs' argument, but I'd be happy to go close to it.

A few weeks ago, Sadie explained why respectable MPs salaries were a key Labour demand - a way of ensuring that the job wasn't just toff's monopoly. I'd turn it around now: Anyone can be an MP, but if they do, subject them to a salary ceiling. Get rid of the fiddles and raise the base, by all means - but cap it as well. That may shake a few Baronet's kids out of the place for a while?

On that basis, perhaps getting MPs to be seen to be managing their finances in a respectable way can be turned around in Parliament's favour?

Waddaya think?

Crowdsourcing

Seeing as there's no shortage of 'transparency campaigners', here's a suggestion:

I'm completely flat out at the moment, but if you've got time, why not go over to the Taxpayers Alliance hagiography Wikipedia page and add a bit of detail.

Here's what's missing:

• Details of who funds them - and we want details - details details details!
• How much tax those who fund them pay
• When their tax freedom day is
• Details of their dishonest campaigning and the comprehensive rebuttals that they have been given
• Who works for them - everyone - details. Who else they work for, what evidence we have of their other personal agendas, etc
• Which lazy stupid journalists re-print their press releases uncritically- details of their other stupid lazy journalism as corroborating evidence
  

A fair bit of this can be moved over from the Other Taxpayers Alliance website, but if you want to dig, feel free.

If there is any information that is not freely available or in the public domain, ensure that the Wikipedia page lists it all.

Every trade union should commit some of it's research, campaigns and press time to this information gathering. Every local authority and governmental body that has it's message disrupted should ask it's press officers to contribute any information that crosses their desks.

Because we deserve to know. It's our right! Transparency is a wonderful thing!

Next off: Media owners, their commercial interests and how it correlates with the editorial line that their organs adopt.

Elected politicians: Always outnumbered. Always outgunned.

The final victory of Sir Humphrey, the permanent government (no matter who you vote for, these bastards always get in) over elected politicians.

The Coup de grâce:

...at the risk (and for “risk” read “certainty”) of being accused of being an anti democratic control freak, there can sometimes be good reasons for holding private meetings where a record isn’t taken. The most successful negotiations, between ministers and his civil servants, between departments or between a department and an outside body, can very often start with an informal discussion that, technically, didn’t actually happen.

No more, apparently. Openness and transparency counts more than successful delivery of policy, I suppose. Hooray for the Freedom of Information Act and the Information Tribunal.

It speaks volumes that the only instance that Tom Harris dares to offer is the ludicrous demands to divulge personal details. In the current climate of public debate, it is no longer possible to argue for ministerial discretion without a deafening chorus of anti-democratic idiocy by way of reply.

From those who you wish to hobble, you first demand transparency.

'Filter-seeking behaviour'

Here's the consistently-clever Steve Bowbrick with a really good post on Andy Burnham's ruminations on internet classification.

And then here's a USAF flowchart on how it responds to the blogosphere.

(both via Podnosh on twitter for which thanks).

Sub judice

Norman Fowler says that politicians shouldn't use the private lives of their opponents against them in the way that they do. Fair enough.

If they wanted to, they could go further. They could recognise that a lot of allegations of impropriety (bribery, favouritism, etc) are wheeled out strategically. They should agree to park and refuse to comment on a story once it's been referred to an investigating authority. They could even see if the press could be coerced into doing the same.

All new allegations against the person concerned should be submitted in private. An informal version of sub judice. It would reduce the number of vexatious and petty allegations and it would help to improve the standing of politicians in the public's eyes.

Hobbling rivals with transparency

The BBC is being fined £400k for the unfair way that it has managed phone-ins. This is, as has been remarked, a fine on licence fee payers, and this just isn't fair.

So should the fine be taken out of the well-stuffed pay-packets of the people who made the mistakes? You can find out whether people object to the principle of public service broadcasting by their answers.

If it is ....

a) It should be a rule that all broadcasters personally fine naughty programme-makers. The BBC should apply this rule in the same way that other broadcasters should be obliged to...

Then you can reasonably say that this is not - objectively - an anti-PSB position.

If it is ....

b) The BBC is a public corporation so we should apply vengeful rules to it's employees but we should leave the BBC's private sector rivals to make their own decisions

... then you are essentially saying that anyone with any sense should stop working for the BBC and go to work for it's rivals because they will find quiet sneaky ways to difuse their fines. This postition is profoundly anti-PSB.

If you call for a level of transparency for one body, but not for it's rivals, you are doing so because you wish to hobble that organisation.

Is this not obvious?