| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK 10:53 - Mar 30 with 1516 views | Steve_M |
It is an intensely political question, a decade of ideological 'austerity' has weakened whole swathes of the UK state and the consequences of that show when it is under stress. The failure of politicians - of all parties - to convince the public that paying more tax for better public services is a good thing is also key. Even Corbyn's one real success in changing the terms of the debate was largely predicated on the idea that it would be other people paying more tax.
https://members.tortoisemedia.com/2020/03/30/chris-cook-coronavirus-nhs-at-capac
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| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 10:56 - Mar 30 with 1497 views | factual_blue |
Those on here - and they know who they are - who used to argue Blair and Brown had ruined the public finances were and remain a disgrace, and intellectual pygmies. |  |
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| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:04 - Mar 30 with 1458 views | homer_123 |
And this is the point isn't it.
The NHS (and wider social/ mental care sectors) have been under stress and strain and under resourced for 'years' there is nothing new here, at all.
All the current situation does is highlight how woefully under resourced they are - although worryingly, the outcome maybe that we'll get through this and the NHS will be, rightly, lauded for it's work but shown to have 'survived and worked' through the current situation - which then leads to that wider question of funding not coming to the fore.
It's not just the NHS though - austerity touched everything, from potholes to healthcare, from street lighting to education. [Post edited 30 Mar 2020 11:38]
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| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:18 - Mar 30 with 1419 views | EdwardStone |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:04 - Mar 30 by homer_123 |
And this is the point isn't it.
The NHS (and wider social/ mental care sectors) have been under stress and strain and under resourced for 'years' there is nothing new here, at all.
All the current situation does is highlight how woefully under resourced they are - although worryingly, the outcome maybe that we'll get through this and the NHS will be, rightly, lauded for it's work but shown to have 'survived and worked' through the current situation - which then leads to that wider question of funding not coming to the fore.
It's not just the NHS though - austerity touched everything, from potholes to healthcare, from street lighting to education. [Post edited 30 Mar 2020 11:38]
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I genuinely feel that there is one single thing that could change this country immeasurably
Somehow make the whole populace happy to pay their taxes |  | | |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:24 - Mar 30 with 1412 views | homer_123 |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:18 - Mar 30 by EdwardStone |
I genuinely feel that there is one single thing that could change this country immeasurably
Somehow make the whole populace happy to pay their taxes |
To do that there needs to be a proper debate and discussion about what kind of society we want to live in.
What sort of Health service or Education system we want - once that's established, then paying for it (i.e. through taxation) becomes easier.
The issue we have is that all of these are now political footballs or so politicised that they can no longer be sensibly discussed. | |
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| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:24 - Mar 30 with 1416 views | Radlett_blue |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 10:56 - Mar 30 by factual_blue |
Those on here - and they know who they are - who used to argue Blair and Brown had ruined the public finances were and remain a disgrace, and intellectual pygmies. |
You are totally entitled to an opinion, but those who express their opinions while feeling the need also to denigrate those who hold different opinions are not contributing to a sensible debate about a very important issue. |  |
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| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:32 - Mar 30 with 1384 views | Dubtractor |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:04 - Mar 30 by homer_123 |
And this is the point isn't it.
The NHS (and wider social/ mental care sectors) have been under stress and strain and under resourced for 'years' there is nothing new here, at all.
All the current situation does is highlight how woefully under resourced they are - although worryingly, the outcome maybe that we'll get through this and the NHS will be, rightly, lauded for it's work but shown to have 'survived and worked' through the current situation - which then leads to that wider question of funding not coming to the fore.
It's not just the NHS though - austerity touched everything, from potholes to healthcare, from street lighting to education. [Post edited 30 Mar 2020 11:38]
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That last point is key.
The whole focus of the public sector over last 10 years has been to be as cheap as possible, not as good as possible.
We reap what we sow. [Post edited 30 Mar 2020 12:21]
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| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:49 - Mar 30 with 1351 views | EdwardStone |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:32 - Mar 30 by Dubtractor |
That last point is key.
The whole focus of the public sector over last 10 years has been to be as cheap as possible, not as good as possible.
We reap what we sow. [Post edited 30 Mar 2020 12:21]
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The one anomaly that I have never been able to figure out
The main drivers for the "Everything Cheap" philosophy has been the Tories...yet spend a bit of time with blue blood true Tories and you can see that they tend to wear high quality, expensive clothes, not Primark cheapies. They are usually shod with hand made Loakes or high end proper footwear, not Shoe Zone tutt. They mostly drive a posh car with tyres with real tread, not a 15 year old Skoda with economy rubber.
It is the disconnect between what they deem acceptable for themselves and the cheap old cr*p that they are happy for us to have....that is what baffles me | | | |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 12:28 - Mar 30 with 1300 views | WeWereZombies |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:04 - Mar 30 by homer_123 |
And this is the point isn't it.
The NHS (and wider social/ mental care sectors) have been under stress and strain and under resourced for 'years' there is nothing new here, at all.
All the current situation does is highlight how woefully under resourced they are - although worryingly, the outcome maybe that we'll get through this and the NHS will be, rightly, lauded for it's work but shown to have 'survived and worked' through the current situation - which then leads to that wider question of funding not coming to the fore.
It's not just the NHS though - austerity touched everything, from potholes to healthcare, from street lighting to education. [Post edited 30 Mar 2020 11:38]
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The galling thing is that it is not even good economics, it is penny wise and pound foolish to put it over simplistically. A more nuanced view is to see it as sub-optimal, a confused party voted in by a confused populace has to do something and because of their conflicted position they have to do something that they can demonstrate is 'working'. So they set short term financial targets that can be measured in a way everyone can understand on what can be easily measured regardless of whether it is the most important thing to be done. The most important things, inevitably and just as a result of probability, get left undone or poorly done with a long term effect of reduced services at a higher cost. |  |
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| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 13:13 - Mar 30 with 1251 views | factual_blue |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:04 - Mar 30 by homer_123 |
And this is the point isn't it.
The NHS (and wider social/ mental care sectors) have been under stress and strain and under resourced for 'years' there is nothing new here, at all.
All the current situation does is highlight how woefully under resourced they are - although worryingly, the outcome maybe that we'll get through this and the NHS will be, rightly, lauded for it's work but shown to have 'survived and worked' through the current situation - which then leads to that wider question of funding not coming to the fore.
It's not just the NHS though - austerity touched everything, from potholes to healthcare, from street lighting to education. [Post edited 30 Mar 2020 11:38]
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Austerity - driven forward and supported by intellectual pygmies with a warped, destructive ideology. | |
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| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 13:25 - Mar 30 with 1228 views | Darth_Koont |
Excellent article.
Our taxation (and tax take) has got to a ridiculously low level so I don't disagree in practical terms with an additional health tax. But it's not just the NHS that needs to be ring-fenced. There's also local government that's been savaged with an impact on all manner of housing and social wellbeing projects. Education is also being run in terms of hard-nosed efficiency rather than developing more rounded, happier and more productive adults.
It's all shockingly near-sighted and not at all helped by 5-year government terms and an old-fashioned neoliberal ideology utterly skewing the debate. It's turned into a debate about what we personally want now rather than what we all need now and in the future. |  |
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| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 14:29 - Mar 30 with 1156 views | eireblue |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:49 - Mar 30 by EdwardStone |
The one anomaly that I have never been able to figure out
The main drivers for the "Everything Cheap" philosophy has been the Tories...yet spend a bit of time with blue blood true Tories and you can see that they tend to wear high quality, expensive clothes, not Primark cheapies. They are usually shod with hand made Loakes or high end proper footwear, not Shoe Zone tutt. They mostly drive a posh car with tyres with real tread, not a 15 year old Skoda with economy rubber.
It is the disconnect between what they deem acceptable for themselves and the cheap old cr*p that they are happy for us to have....that is what baffles me |
Part of the Tory....dogma...is that of looking at the private sector to drive efficiency.
Driving efficiency in a private sector company that is part of a competitive market driven economy is good. Efficiency can lead to profits which can be used to re-invest, reward staff, become more competitive etc.
Public services need to have a degree of in-efficiency. It is that in-efficiency that can be used in times of changing demand. There have been posts on here at times that have talked about being in an NHS hospital and observing staff standing around not doing much. Sure if Tesco has 20% staff too many, and Aldi is more efficient and Tesco’ goes out of business to more efficient competition, fair enough.
If you need a shed load of equipment and people to provide a sudden upswing in demand for public services, I like to think of in-efficiency in public sector as the equivalent to making a profit in private sector.
In the past, the UK was happy to have a degree of redundancy in military and security services.
I wonder what the death rate of Universal credit and other austerity projects and the Covid-19 crisis is when compared to number of deaths of UK citizens from War and Terrorism. Crikey that was a bit of a dark thought. |  | | |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 15:11 - Mar 30 with 1123 views | BlueBadger |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 11:49 - Mar 30 by EdwardStone |
The one anomaly that I have never been able to figure out
The main drivers for the "Everything Cheap" philosophy has been the Tories...yet spend a bit of time with blue blood true Tories and you can see that they tend to wear high quality, expensive clothes, not Primark cheapies. They are usually shod with hand made Loakes or high end proper footwear, not Shoe Zone tutt. They mostly drive a posh car with tyres with real tread, not a 15 year old Skoda with economy rubber.
It is the disconnect between what they deem acceptable for themselves and the cheap old cr*p that they are happy for us to have....that is what baffles me |
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/72745-the-reason-that-the-rich-were-so-rich-vim |  |
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| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 15:46 - Mar 30 with 1087 views | EdwardStone |
Very good example....but surely if our leaders and betters really believe that the $50 boots are better, they would try to engineer a set of circumstances where could all benefit from the better quality items
Sadly, we seem locked into a death spiral to the bottom where the cheapest is seen as the correct answer | | | |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 16:22 - Mar 30 with 1064 views | WeWereZombies |
| Thoughtful long read on state capacity in the UK on 13:25 - Mar 30 by Darth_Koont |
Excellent article.
Our taxation (and tax take) has got to a ridiculously low level so I don't disagree in practical terms with an additional health tax. But it's not just the NHS that needs to be ring-fenced. There's also local government that's been savaged with an impact on all manner of housing and social wellbeing projects. Education is also being run in terms of hard-nosed efficiency rather than developing more rounded, happier and more productive adults.
It's all shockingly near-sighted and not at all helped by 5-year government terms and an old-fashioned neoliberal ideology utterly skewing the debate. It's turned into a debate about what we personally want now rather than what we all need now and in the future. |
But it isn't 'hard-nosed efficiency', the Panorama programme on Academy Schools last year uncovered some shocking practices. Feeding children exam answers so that a school has impossibly good scores to bump it up the funding league is just going to churn out kids who collapse at the first real tests they face, or who are permanently sidelined for the rest of their lives by not facing up to challenges.
And then there is this regarding the use of public money:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p06l25nf | |
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