Keith Hinde.com

Title: Plundering the Public Sector Author: David Craig Publisher: Constable and Robinson ISBN: 1845293746 For more information click here

Having literally just finished David Craig’s latest book “Plundering The Public Sector“, I had to chuckle at seeing this post on The Register, entitled “DfT unaware of IT payout“. Basically, it appears that the Department for Transport were clueless about paying almost £25 MILLION to Atos Origin for work on their IT systems. This single story served as an excellent illustration of many points raised by Mr.Craig in his book, which highlights the wholesale fleecing of the public purse by New Labour and their cronies in the managment/IT consulting industries. The story was all the more apt as Aptos Origin are one of the suppliers heavily criticised by Mr. Craig for their involvement in the controversial (and seemingly unnecessary) “Choose and Book” system for the NHS.

Mr. Craig examines many of New Labour’s public sector “reform” initiatives, their aims, implementation and acheivements. Unsurprisingly (at least to me) most, if not all, fail to hit their key targets, even given the amazingly lax government “success” criteria for projects. Mr. Craig comprehensively criticises, amongst other things, government procurement practise, parliamentary oversight, the ineffectiveness of the public accounts committee and the national audit office, outshoring, offshoring, PFI, PPP, questionable practice by the consultancy industry and cronyism at the highest levels of government. At the end of the book you are left with the feeling that public services would probably run more effectively if New Labour just left well alone in the first place! Mr. Craig constrasts this situation with that of U.S. public services, which have effective legislation to try and safeguard such projects whilst emphasising the need to get value for (public) money.

Luckily, despite the culture of secrecy (check out Australia’s opinion here) built up by New Labour around these project disasters, it appears the opposition are starting to take a deeper look at the government’s track record in this area. Only last month Conservative Party Leader David Cameron announced the creation of a working group to look into some of the governments IT fiascos (More details here). Now, I’m no Tory (by a country mile!) but it is about time Blair, Brown et al were taken to task over their incompetence. For some reason (most likely Iraq, Terrorism etc.) this story has been pretty much ignored in recent years, but with any luck even cursory examination of the situation will raise enough alarm to stoke the mainstream press into covering this story. In an eery confirmation of Mr. Craig’s closing chapter, it is probably too late to recoup all of the money wasted by New Labour on these projects, but proper examination of the issues might help other countries in the future (such as in this story).

1845293746

book reviews

conservatives

consultancy

david cameron

dft

new labour

nhs

politics

public sector

tony blair

uk politics

Title: The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-first Century Author: James Howard Kunstler Publisher: Atlantic Books ISBN: 1843544539 For more information click here

OK OK, I’ll admit it, possibly not the best choice of reading material for the Christmas period, but thought-provoking nonetheless. Although squarely aimed at a US audience, James Howard Kuntsler’s “The Long Emergency” paints a possible picture of the future, should the plethora of 21st century challenges converge, which is equally relevant to modern Britain. Described as a middle-of-the-road scenario, that is, neither utopian nor apocalyptic, it makes truly disturbing reading.

Focussing primarily on the issues of fossil fuel depletion, the lack of suitable alternative energy sources and the growing impacts of climate change, the author makes a compelling case for the unsustainable nature of modern suburban life and presents a clear call for urgent change. The changes viewed as inevitable include a return to local food and goods production as well as the revitalisation of local communities, with the current situation variously described as “hallucinated” and “running on fumes”.

Now, depending upon your point of view and your agenda, be you “on the make“, “on the take” or just plain stupid, you may not agree with everything that the author predicts, but this book certainly draws all the relevant subjects into one place for consideration. We’ve had the hollywood drama and limitations of “The Day After Tomorrow” and the misrepresentation of Michael Crichton’s “State of Fear“, maybe it is time some brave film studio took up the plot described in this book? After all, drama’s such as “Threads” and “The War Game” did a good job of blowing apart government lies about the impacts of nuclear war in the 70’s and 80’s, why couldn’t the same be done to higlight potential outcomes of today’s challenges?

book reviews

climate change

environment

fossil fuels

gas

hubberts peak

james howard kunstler

oil