Govt ‘must give up central control’
Downing Street’s “spider’s web” form of central control over the UK must be replaced with greater local and parliamentary accountability, according to author William Mason.
Mason and co-author Jonathan McMahon argue the present system can no longer manage the 2.5 million health workers, teaching staff and police currently employed by the government in a new report – Freedom for Public Services – published today.
The authors believe the current process of finding and repealing unfavourable regulation is no longer adequate and that a radical overhaul of the structure is necessary.
Targets, financial control and codes of practice for the public services are passed down from the government to each local authority without consideration of the areas uniqueness.
Doctors, teachers and the police need more freedom to exercise professional judgement and respond to local needs in order to perform their jobs to the highest standard.
This needs to change so that the workers in the area can tailor their actions to suit the communities they work in more effectively, they argue.
The authors said: “Diversity of public service, and not uniformity, should be welcomed.”
There is also a call for greater accountability at a local level from mayors, sheriffs and heads of the health service.
These positions should be locally elected and the only role the government should play is to provide information to the public via an efficient inspectorate who are accountable to parliament rather than government departments.
Mr Mason and Mr McMahon say that most of the regulations and quangos in place can be abolished – saving the government £15 billion by cutting the number of civil servants in the main spending departments by 80 per cent.
This radical change would mean national police targets would be abolished, all health regulators would be replaced with a single body answerable to parliament, central oversight of local area agreements removed and much more ‘red tape’ eradicated.
The approach is welcomed by the Conservatives.
Eric Pickles, shadow secretary of state for communities and local government, said: “No-one should believe Gordon Brown wants to listen to the views of local people, when a barrage of laws he has pushed through are creating unelected quangos which are stripping local communities of any say on housing, planning and rubbish.
“Rather than passing the functions of the unloved and undemocratic regional assemblies to another unelected and unaccountable regional quango, these bodies should be scrapped outright and their powers given back to local people.”
