Scrap The Standards Board!

Flying in the face of everything that is proper and decent, I'd like to say that Dizzy is absolutely right in saying that The Standards Board wastes its time and our money. (OK, it's an old post, I missed it the first time, but still...).

Between 2004 and 2008, the Standards Board for England investigated a total of 2937 complaints. Of those 2344 either had "no evidence of breach" or "no further action".

That means that 80% of the complaints that were made were, for want of a better word, spurious and/or baseless. The total cost of investigating these complaints was £21,024,225 of which £16,274,604 was spent on the spurious or baseless complaints.

Is there, or can there be, a justification for the existence of quango that spends 80% of its time investigating things with no outcome at a cost of £16.2 million? I'd say there isn't.

Me neither. And all of this really does throw complaints by right-wingers about how democracy is all a waste of money, and that politicians are doing politics (and lavish lifestyles to boot!) on the rates.

If you were to argue that £21 million should be spent on state-funding for political parties over a four year period, I expect that you'd get the usual barrage of abuse from the anti-politics hardcore that we all (and most readers of this blog - yes - I do mean you) give an easy ride to most of the time.

But £21million to fund a group of bureaucrats with a brief to create an effective rival for politicians? No bother. Not a squeak. Or not until Dizzy squeaked, anyway....

Unfamilliar ground

Er.... Simon Jenkins has written a quite-good piece on local democracy. I missed it a few weeks ago, but in the interests of balance, I should add it here.

I suppose the only major criticism (there are a number of minor gripes) I can have of it is that it can't have been written by the author of this. However, back to the current piece. Jenkins says:

British people still regard their local council as their first port of call for public services: by two to one, compared with central government (according to Mori). Yet these councils are, to the centre, mere agencies. Their elected representatives are superfluous as conduits of accountability, and their voters not to be trusted with policy, taxes or priorities.

Empowerment is empty without accountability, and accountability is empty without fiscal bite. There is no communal governance in Britain at present and no intention, on the part of either big party, to introduce it.

To the government, Britons are considered incompetent to shoulder the democratic responsibilities considered normal elsewhere. Ask why, and ministers all give the same reply: "But have you actually met any councillors? They are useless." Were it true, which it is not, they do not ask what has made them so.

When Jenkins says "..were it true, which it is not..." he is at least half-wrong in my experience (and I believe that if any commentator were to do any field-work on this, they'd agree with me rather than Jenkins on this). By way of credentials, I'd say that I've met a great many councillors in recent years - probably a good many more than Jenkins, or indeed, most journalists.

He either knows he is half-wrong or he hasn't done much field-work. Interestingly, we see no mention from Jenkins about the quality of local public sector management - another elephant in this particular room.

A better question would be to ask what can be done to change this? Because, being half-wrong on that point, Jenkins would like to see power handed to a group of people who simply would not exercise it very well. That would further damage the case for strong local representative democracy. Is Jenkins arguing, for instance, that .....

• Councillors should be given resources and assistance with research in order to frame policy more effectively
• Councillors should be given assistance in publicising themselves, their work, and in meeting the public in a way that they can benefit from the undoubted wisdom that the general public can impart to elected officials
• Councils should go out of their way to make standing for the council an attractive and fulfilling civic duty
• Council officials should be trained to understand that councillors are the most important people in the local government decision-making chain - and that the democratic services team within a council should generally have a pro-councillor (rather than a pro-Chief Executive) orientation

Certainly, there are very few local authorities that have any record of doing any of these things - even though none of them are problematic under current legislation. Would Jenkins, for instance, ask that the odious Standards Board should be scrapped so that councillors are not subjected to petty humilliations every time they have the nerve to remind an unelected local government officer about who should really be in charge in the Town Hall?

Reading him is a bit like playing Mornington Crescent. You always end up back in the same place. Jenkins has something of a track-record of using dishonest arguments in support of direct democracy and in opposition to representative government, so ... he's still the most objectively reactionary columnist writing in any British newspaper.

Phew.

Guidance for a constipated culture

Tom Watson is asking for feedback on his draft code of conduct for blogging civil servants. And – fair play to him – he knows what blogs can and can’t do for a politician. He says:

“A clunky old blog is not the place for ministerial edicts. It is place to start discussions and seek views.”

For me, the whole question of whether or not MPs, Councillors or Civil Servants blog is a bit of an odd one. In most cases, given the constraints that are on them, I can’t see what it is going to achieve. One of the meanings of the word ‘politician’ runs fairly close to the definition of ‘diplomat’. Politicians have to use diplomacy to square circles, broker deals and occasionally to shaft someone who really doesn’t deserve shafting – all in the wider public interest. It doesn’t make for a full and frank baring of the soul.

Similarly, there is the whole concept of the ‘official secret’ – and the broader role of the policy-making bureaucrat. It isn’t really their job to be thoughtful in public. The opposite is often true, however, for public employees on the ground. Copperbloggers, for instance.

It is, however, the job of politicians to encourage the public to be thoughtful and candid about their experiences and their observations.

So, for most politicians and bureaucrats, I’ve argued (in Shane’s comments box) that there isn’t that strong a case for it. Generally, it can get you into a shitload of bickering with a load of people that you don’t personally represent, or that don’t have anything valuable to give you back in return for a finely crafted (or even a dashed-off) post. There are exceptions, of course. Some of the time, Tom Watson is genuinely interactive without being too cautious about it. Bob Piper is great at this kind of thing – mainly because he doesn’t take any prisoners. I doubt if a ministerial limo will ever be picking Bob up every morning though.*

What ministers and civil servants could do, however, is invite Mick – someone who has loads of experience managing a potentially explosive situation (a Northern Ireland political blog) over to their offices for a quick primer on how to conduct and moderate a valuable conversation. How to encourage people who have something worthwhile to say, to say it – and keep them talking. How to weed out trolls, and how to reward people for bringing content to the table. How to discourage ‘me-too’ comments and gratuitous opinion. How to encourage people to play the ball, and not the man.

These are the conversational skills that are actively suppressed in our up-tight, constipated political culture.

For what it’s worth, it means keeping a close eye on the blogosphere. Dipping in – under a consistent (but deniable?) pseudonym if needs be, and engaging with people that have something to divulge. It means spending time drilling down into other people’s arguments and rewarding them in some way for playing nicely.

There is an experiment about to take place (and it ain’t me doing it either) in which this approach is going to be tried by a few civil servants and politicians. I won’t say more about it yet because it’s still being finalised (it’s not a big secret, so don’t get excited) but stay tuned: It has some bearing on the questions that Tom is raising.

*In the unlikely event of Bob ever being given his own ministry, he'd have to hope that he doesn't get a Birmingham City fan as his driver. The headline: Ministerial limo reverses into a wall - nine times)

Anticipation

I've been planning to write a post about politicisation of the civil service for a while now, but I've been waiting for someone to write a coherent post that is opposed so I can give it some context.

There is a really strong argument in favour of a depoliticised civil service. There must be.

It's just that I've never heard it.

I'm waiting.

Rebuilding trust. A fools errand.

Shuggy on Gordon Brown's pledge to 'rebuild people's trust in democracy'

"Now call me an old cynic if you must but could one of the reasons that people 'feel powerless' is because they are really rather powerless - with regards to basic democratic stuff like who governs them, for example?"

He then turns to Hillary Benn pledging to join the army of 'listening' politicians:

"Let the debate begin. Let us discuss ideas. Let us talk straightforwardly about the future we want."

Ooh, ooh - can I go? I'd like a future where you lot talk less shite, please.

Thing is, I think that Shuggy IS being an old cynic here, bless him.

Of course politicians will always promise to listen, and always pretend to be doing it already. But if they actually *do* start listening, they will find themselves on a fools errand, because there isn't really much by way of a decent conversation going on anywhere (outside of the usual rarefied little circles - and even then, it's mostly poisoned by The Ideology of Applied Adolescence(tm)).

And if they are tempted to get involved, they are massively disincentivised from doing so by….

• A spectacularly dishonest journalistic profession that usually strikes a fine balance between misrepresentation and simplification
• Single issue pressure groups that target anyone who displeases them
• Political parties who worry about reflected ignominy
• Our old friends, the constipators and the other poky little fingers of permanent government
  

And the circles in which these conversation happen are very rarefied anyway.

To illustrate this, last night I met a bloke from Messagespace. This is a marketing widget that the high-volume political bloggers use to make a bit of money from ‘advocacy advertising’. He gave me a number (that I now completely forget - prompt??). It is the number of visitors that political blogs get each month.

The only thing I do remember about it is that it wasn’t very high. And even allowing for the logic of ‘The Long Tail’ and the fact that most page impressions on political blogs aren't on high volume sites, ours is not a large inclusive conversational culture. Listen, and you will mostly hear people talking bollocks.

Now I understand that the world doesn't end with blogging. But this surely illustrates something that most people who work in politics have suspected for a long time. That the vast majority of the population are usually shy of any contact with the smallish political class, and that the twain never really meet.

So, politicians only really have the option of listening to the usual suspects (again!), or dabbling in the dark arts of opinion polling (boo!) or focus groups (boo!). Or, of course, they can try and start a conversation of some kind – in a way that won’t completely blow up in their faces (trans: spin).

Constipator of the Year: New nomination

Remember this blog’s regular beef about our permanent masters and their obsession with stifling all valuable political discussion? The constipators?

Last night, Derek Wyatt MP (speaking at a New Statesman New Media Awards event, doubtless shortly to be blogged here) reported that the Sergeant at Arms had written to MPs telling them that the £10k they have to spend on web-communication can’t go an websites that have any political content.

So the Sergeant at Arms – another nomination for ‘Constipator of the Year’

In the meantime, my limited grasp of the legal issues behind this leaves me convinced that it would be open to challenge. I've not seen anything convincing that wouldn't be beaten by a reasonable defence that claimed that there is no marginal cost to adding political content to an existing website that is paid for out of taxation on the condition that it is non-political.

And I've not heard anyone argue - convincingly - that allowing politicians the ability to communicate directely with the public is the same as giving them an advantage. In many cases, the very idea scares the shit out of them. Thus 'constipators'.

Politics at it’s pettiest

Anyone who is looking forward to the imminent demise of democracy, collapsing into a fetid pond of negativism, solipsism and technocracy, will be pleased to hear that - following Rubbishgate - we now have another example of the sheer arrogance of politicians: It appears that they now have the audacity to attempt to show a film during an election!

Like you, I'm disgusted by this. Thankfully, their swagger has been cut short by the Lib-Dems of my very own native Broxtowe.

Thankfully, not only is it is now legally problematic to express a political opinion once you’ve been elected, it is also legally difficult to initiate a debate or make a political point during an election. The law is a fine thing.

The irony of this, of course, is that the public have a fairly low tolerance level for politicians anyway. Political outspokenness is a risk that these petty prohibitionists are removing from their opponents. It should be one of our inalienable rights: The right to hear the people we have elected talking a load of bollocks, (or doing so in order to get elected in the first place). Thus the advised use of the word ‘constipators’ here for those who stop them.

Perhaps it’s worth running a competition: ‘Constiptator of the year’ ?

Nominations (mostly from this blog’s archives)

1. The aforementioned Dartford Labour group
2. Whoever told David Milliband that he couldn’t use his blog for political purposes
3. Pretty well anyone who stops Councillors from expressing an opinion on a Council website (and many councils have some of these – they’re called things like ‘monitoring officers’ or some other Orwellian job-title with the word ‘compliance’ in it somewhere).
4. The aforementioned Broxtowe Lib-Dems
5. The obvious candidate – the odious Standards Board
6. Police authorities who want to silence copperbloggers:
7. People who organise constipator conferences
8. Mike Tuffrey - London Lib Dem constipator plus

Any more for any more?

Vote now!

(Update: There's more news from Broxtowe)

Local Councillors and their own websites

I saw Michael Cross's article about e-democracy projects. He has kindly referred to a project that I've been working on for a few years to give Councillors their own websites.

http://society.guardian.co.uk/e-public/story/0,,1463323,00.html

While I’m usually very happy with Michael Cross’s coverage of the work we’re all doing on Councillor sites, I think I his sub-editor may have slightly re-interpreted what I said about the need for legal change. (I’m guessing it was the sub-editor in this case).

Just for clarification purposes, Professor Coleman may not be keen on legal changes, but personally I’m broadly in favour of something being done. When I spoke to Michael, I said that I thought something should be done on this issue, but I did add that some people thought that the political rules had a unintended benefit of discouraging political grand-standing and that – in my view – political leadership is as important on this subject as any legal change.

Otherwise it's an excellent article - and if Michael sees this post, I hope he doesn't feel unfairly criticised here ;-)

I think that the rules on 'political communication' that infect large sections of the public sector are a convienient mask for a profoundly anti-democratic outlook in some sections of the civil service. This is a theme I will be returning to, so keep your eyes peeled....