A blogpost by Dominic Cummings has garnered a lot of attention today, understandably.
Among the many striking things in it was his idea that "many journalists wrongly looked at things like Corbyn’s Facebook stats and thought Labour was doing better than us".
Which brings us to Newsnight's incoming policy editor, Lewis Goodall. Naturally, he's been having his say....but, then again, so have his have critics:
Lewis Goodall: (Holiday) reflections about Cummings blog:-Wasn’t he leaving?-Does PM understand what DC is doing? Understand that blog? After all DC doing it in BJ’s name.-Should we be so interested in this man? If he’s so important, should there be more accountability in him and his actions?Jill Rutter (Institute for Government): If Johnson ever turned up to a Liaison Cttee MPs could ask him... key point to remember is that Johnson has to be held to account for it....Lewis Goodall: Agreed. Let’s see if it happens.Political Commentary: Gosh, Lewis is raging.Ron Swanson: Lewis is jealous...Patriotic ally: A new year but you're still engaging in activism not journalism I see...
Rutter is a pro-Remain nutter. She's been invited on BBC programmes countless times (introduced as a non-partisan commentator) to "explain" Brexit variously denying BJ could renegotiate the Withdrawal Agreement, get it approved by Parliament or win an election with such a massive majority. What a non-surprise to see her attack Johnson now.
ReplyDeleteClearly Cummings is a target.
Goodall's appointment is another nail in the BBC Coffin.
I'm a bit conflicted about Cummings. On the one hand without him a (real) Brexit probably wouldn't have happened. He did appear something of a master strategist pulling some master-strokes (with St Boris of Uxbridge's approval of course): cutting out the poison in the Parliamentary Conservative Party; the attempted prorogation; throwing the DUP under the bus; appearing to threaten to outspend Labour (so panicking Labour into an absurd level of commitment)...
ReplyDeleteIt's true also that recently retired heads of the civil service like Gus O'Donnell and Kerslake and retired ambassadors, trade negotiators and the like, have completely trashed the Civil Service's reputation, by wading into the Brexit debate on the Remain side exclusively.
But I am not sure that justifies throwing out the baby (an impartial civil service) with the bathwater. We saw what damage Blair did with his politicisation of the Civil Service.
The Government have a large majority. What do they want to do with that majority? If they can't tell us, that's their fault, not the fault of the Civil Service.
It seems pretty clear what needs to be done and a lot of ideas have already been floated e.g. changing the Treasury rules on cost-benefit analysis of capital investment, so as to allow a much greater level of investment in the North and Midlands.
Social care policy needs to be determined now. An insurance scheme for the over 50s seems sensible.
The government needs to sort out its migration policy. I am not sure it has the political will to do what is required, but we shall see. Certainly, some whacky ideas from Dominic will not make the difference either way.
Cummings is the genie of our times but perhaps needs to be put back in the bottle periodically.
It's too early to tell... so forecasting problems that have yet to exist isn't very helpful.
ReplyDeleteThe Civil Service mandarins are part of the country's problem for not doing what their masters tell them, and the masters/ministers are hampered by an inability to sack them for disobedience and failure because the "failures" with all their obfuscation and excuses are merely moved sidewards elsewhere or rewarded for failure in a quango or other public body where they can continue to be well paid for doing nothing much while pretending to be very busy and concerned about this and that outside their remit.