Sita has in the past urged the government to create a "bin tax" and allow them to charge people according to how much they throw away. They also profited heavily from council awarded refuse and waste collection contracts.
We now see the highly amusing but unsurprising spectacle of Sir Peter Gershon, the failed business leader who still had the audacity to identify where the public sector was going wrong, jumping ship from adviser to Gordon Brown to adviser to the Tories. ‘Gershon efficiencies’ have been widely credited with a drive in local government to deliver savings – but it was hardly a test of the man’s credentials.
Councils already faced HM Treasury dangling the Sword of Damocles on budgets. Meanwhile the Secretary of State for Local Government determined to impose council tax capping on any malcontents who dared to challenge the assumption of a maximum 5% increase on council tax, leaving many councils either treading water or having to chop services. Arguably, therefore the scale and speed of delivery of public sector ‘efficiencies’ was less to do with Sir Peter Gershon and more to do with councils not wanting their financial heads chopped off by HM Treasury.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/dec/08/tories-convince-advisers-change-sides
Martin Read is of a similar ilk. Mr Read made some startling assumptions about what can be saved from IT and back office assuming around £4bn can be saved on back office activities alone. However Reads assumptions are flawed. His calculations depend upon multiple sources with very limited benchmarking information – IT is an area poor in performance information – and he has made sweeping assumptions based on third party advice from IT consultants and comparisons with the private sector and even other countries. At best we can describe his ‘projected savings’ as an estimate. But let’s not stop hard facts getting in the way of his headlines.
The truth is that public sector IT on shared big scale projects usually fails miserably – look at the NHS scheme that is likely to be scrapped in the Pre-Budget report. It is not just because there is a clear lack of skill in IT procurement within the public sector but the myriad of different requirements, data sharing issues and localised needs which are not suited to trans-sector schemes. How will Read repackage his flawed thinking for the Tories? Would it be rude to suggest he might dream up the idea that the public sector simply divests itself of IT responsibility and control in favour of a global IT provider framework under a compulsory competitive environment? Lets watch this space.
Perhaps the rats are not leaving the ship but simply returning home. Blair’s obsession with inclusive government, by which we in the movement understand means ‘bring in your private sector buddies’ – led to fundamental compromises on principles within the movement. The conflict of profit making in a public sector environment. The conflict of responsibilities to shareholders over public service values. The conflict of creating a ‘sellers’ market in the name of public sector pluralism.
There is no real chasm created by the running rats. Their ideas were vacuous and very much a case of old wine repackaged in new bottles with a label saying the market knows best. Bankrupt ideas from bankrupt entrepreneurs. Now is the time for the movement to bring some sense to the debate exposing the real value of the public sector and ending the rat infestation.
Anna Rose
