I
recently acquired a copy of a book by psephologists, Anthony King and
Ivor Crewe, considering the many blunders committed by our
governments. The book deals mainly with the period since the Second
World War but there were many before that and it has to be admitted
that blunders are not something uniquely British. But we do seem to
have been loaded with rather more incompetence than we deserve. Why
is this? I do not know but political dogma has been a key factor
over many years.
For
some time, now, I have been trying to put together a history of my
family in the last 300 years or so. Many times in that period there
have been examples of government incompetence — in many cases of
catastrophic incompetence. I cannot list them all but just look at
some of the major examples.
The
loss of the American colonies at a time when America did not want
independence, only the right to representation in the government of
their country.
Appeasement.
Over a period of years here was serious incompetence practised by a
collection of senior Tories but supported by many others. When did
Neville Chamberlain realise that Hitler was not to be trusted? Was
it only when the Germans marched into Poland?
Oppression
of Ireland. Almost everything about England's governance of Ireland
was a wrong-headed disaster. Ireland was treated as a colony rather
than an integral part of the UK. The country was subject to numerous
colonisations, Irish culture and religion were suppressed, the
majority Catholic population could hold no public office, almost all
land was owned by absentee landlords; tenants had no rights or
security and were often evicted with no notice nor any right of
appeal. For decades, most of the Irish lived in poverty and on the
brink of starvation but the biggest disaster of all was the total
incompetence when the British government needed to deal with the
Great Famine between 1845 and 1850. A government welded to the
principle of laissez faire capitalism that would not intervene to
tackle the fundamental problems of mass starvation and death, when
Ireland had enough food to feed everyone had it not been exported.
A
variety of Poor Laws that never succeeded in meeting the needs of the
deprived; a workhouse system that operated on the principle that
accommodation in a workhouse must be made so uncomfortable that the
poor would try desperately to stay outside. A situation made worse
in Ireland.
A
Great Reform Bill in 1832 that was to set us on the path to a true
democracy by widening the franchise. It gave no vote to women and
increased the number of men able to vote from 400,000 to 600,000 in a
country with a total population of 24,000,000. It took another one
hundred years to achieve the right of all adults to vote.
In
more modern times, the government of Mrs Thatcher introduced a Poll
Tax in order to reduce the tax burden on rich people who lived in big
houses. The exercise cost £12 billion and as local authorities
struggled to collect the tax, there were riots in the streets.
Thatcher had to give up and reverted to a system of property tax
based on valuation bands — it was like rates only less precise.
And re-introducing it cost another £12 billion.
At
present we have Cameron proposing to pack the House of Lords with
Tory life peers to stop the upper house blocking his legislation. We
have nearly 800 peers established in a revising chamber. Most of
them only turn up to have lunch and collect their expenses. The
house needs to be cut down to size. We do not need more than 400
peers to check government legislation. Perhaps no peer should have a
seat in the House of Lords for more than 15 years [say].
Then
there is immigration. In 2010 Cameron said that he would cut nett
immigration to the tens of thousands. In reality it has increased
and is now running at more than 250,000 every year. The last two
weeks have provided us with TV pictures of chaos in Calais and at the
Euro Tunnel entrance. Lorries are queuing all over Kent trying to
get on board ferries or the Eurotrain and some people have had to
abandon their holiday plans. Both the Britsi and French governments
have been unprepared for this and are doing little to tackle the
problem. It was entirely forseeable. When thousands of migrants
were being picked up from crumbling boats in the Mediterranean Sea in
May and June — see picture above, it was inevitable that there would be a surge in
immigrants trying to get into Britain. I don't know the answer to
the immigrant problem. The vast numbers pouring into the UK has got
to be stopped. Unless they go live in Northern Scotland, we are full
up. There were newspaper reports today of mobs of immigrants
turning up in Charnock Richard in Lancashire and being housed in 3
star hotels with free bedrooms, free meals plus spending money. This
at taxpayers expense and ignoring regular hotel guests who have paid good
money to stay in these new immigrant transit camps. It is not
surprising that word gets back to the Middle East and North Africa
that Britain is a soft touch. One of the immigrants from Sudan was living in a tented hovel and struggling to survive; now he is in a good standard hotel with clean bed linen, free food and some money for living expenses..Cameron, get your finger out and sort
this problem. It is yet another argument for leaving the EU and the
sooner we do so the better — even if President Obama is opposed!
And
then there is Greece and the euro zone. Thousands of people have
been involved in almost endless discussions about Greek debt and yet
again they have cobbled together an agreement that will do nothing
but kick the problem a few weeks or months down the road before they
start again; by which time Greek debt will have got even biggere and
their chances of paying off the debt will have got less. The EU will
remain a mess until they get rid of the euro and revert to national
currencies. And that is not a permitted solution.
We
have a lot of government incompetence but it extends to the banks and
public services all managed by very highly paid over-promoted
incompetents. Britain has some good people but their efforts are all
too often sabotaged by the public school educated, rich and powerful who spend all their time
in each others company failing to see just how bad they are at what they do. What
can we do about it? I have no idea!
#
