If you contine to vote Tory...

was retorting tyrones post that the tory politicians were any different, wasn't defending labours management on the economy, although they did resemble a tinge of social justice in some of their policies unlike any tory gov't thats ever been.

 

The social justice of making us all have to work longer and shagging.those already retired

 

Prescott and darling are two of the biggest bankers out

 

read tory gov't

 

unless you already have plenty of money and dont actually do much real work anyway! Such as 90% of Bloody Parliament of all Parties!!!!

 

It beggars belief but there are some who think a second term of Brown was a good option. We'd have been fecked beyond fixing had he got another five years. And what's the alternative now... Bloody Ed Miliband, they even managed to allow the unions to elect the wrong brother.

 

Continuing to pursue Friedmanist economic policies will only make Britain "great" for a small select few. You won't be one of them.

Time for something new.

 

Bad management is to blame as is an over zealous attitude from unions.

But then again since the mid 1970's real wages have gone down. Hardly a coincidence.

 

No it didn't. Pursual of pure free market policies by both main parties did.

Not that we are bankrupt at all.

 

Blame the tax evaders.

 

The NHS has been ruined by Messrs, Ball and Brown's insistence of PFI. That is why one authority has gone bust - more to follow.

 

I agree with you. But this has been pursued as the Private Sector a) want their pound (kilo) of flesh and b) don't want to pay tax.

 

A lot of this notion about bureaucracy and inefficiency in the public sector isn’t actually true. I’ve worked closely with multi-national firms such as Atkins F&G and found they have exactly the same issues that the public sector does (from getting a letter signed through to procurement processes)

When it comes to local government people forget the nature of the sector. Council’s are vast bodies that provide a huge range of often competing diverse services. It can not be compared with the private sector. A prime example is older people care. It is incredibly expensive to deliver and deals with a vulnerable client group 24 hours a day. It makes no fiscal or business sense. But we can’t just stop providing it as a society.

If an area of a business was losing money it would just be cut from the business plan. Local government can’t just do this, it must find ways of continuing to provide these services, that have huge consequences if they go wrong. Take the Baby P example. Everyone complains about public sector red tape, well look what happens if you don’t have comprehensive procedures and sufficient resources to deal with high risk areas.

And the final point that gets forgotten is that local government is run democratically. It has to deal with an ever changing political landscape at both a national and local level. The agenda is set by democratically elected councillors and often changes at the whim of those individuals for ideological or expedient reasons. Whether you agree with local democracy or not is another issue, but it is a unique challenge that the public sector has to deal with which those who criticise from the outside tend to ignore.