Double Choice

Since Tony Blair’s departure from government, we seem to have heard much more about ‘voice’ (people power) than about ‘choice’ (enabling people to exercise preferences) as a way of driving improvement in public services.  In his speech today at the Labour Party Conference Gordon Brown used the word ‘choice’ more than 20 times but only [...]

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Too much of a good thing

In a Work Foundation report, Public Value: The Next Steps in Public Service Reform, David Coats and Eleanor Passmore suggest that our pre-occupation with constant reform of public services may have its downsides.  They argue that, ‘the continued use of the language of reform has convinced the public that something is wrong. After all, ‘reform’ [...]

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The economics of biodiversity

In a collaborative study the United Nations, European Community and other organisations including Defra are exploring the economic benefits of biodiversity.  The study intends to put a value on forests, deserts, animals and plants to ascertain the value of ‘natural capital’. I fear that we are firmly in Thomas Gradgrind territory here, an unyielding obsession [...]

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Building schools for the future

I am continuing to enjoy the eclectic mix of ideas and views that come my way each day via the bloggers’ circle. One post that caught my eye this week was Joe Nutt’s piece about the building schools for the future programme. Joe paints a gloomy picture of the government’s attempt to rebuild every secondary [...]

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First day at school

Tomorrow, my younger boy starts school.  My two older children have been in school a few years now and it’s been a generally positive experience for them.  They’ve made friends, learned a great deal and had plenty of fun. And yet, I find myself fighting against this first day at school.  For one thing, there’s the dullness of [...]

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The tyranny of habit

The other day I was in a meeting where a number of us where talking about how best to initiate a conversation across the organisation about dealing with cuts.  We were talking about the need to deliver quantifiable efficiencies when a colleague pointed out that in our personal lives if we find ourselves with financial [...]

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