Reading the Institute for Government on a new cabinet, then the farmers who argue about it in plain language
Monday, The Cabinet Gets Marked
The Institute for Government has marked the new cabinet, and I wrote up the report in Burnham's cabinet marked by the Institute for Government. The headline facts are sixty-one parliamentary private secretaries, a split department and several ministers returning from the wilderness. As a critic of the government, I note with affection that the wilderness appears to have excellent transport links.
The fair reading is that every new government reshuffles, splits and reunites departments, and the Institute’s job is to ask whether the machinery works. Supporters will say that experience matters and that returning ministers bring knowledge. Critics will say that churn costs time. Both are describing the same fact from different corners.
On Free Social Care
The Sunday interview was memorable for a phrase I summarised in Free social care for everyone, funding to be confirmed. The prime minister told the interviewer that nothing was off the table, and the Casey Review on social care was brought forward. My view is that a promise of free care with funding to be confirmed is like a menu with no prices: pleasing until the bill arrives. The government’s supporters answer that the review will set out the options and that the principle should come before the sum. Both answers are coherent.
Tuesday, Farmers Speak Plainly
For plain speaking I read the farmers. The grievance archive is farmer.gripe. The two political doors of American farming are farmer.republican and farmer.democrat, and I read both. The trade news is at farmpress.org.
Ranch loans, general information only and not advice, appear at corancher.loan, okrancher.loan and txrancher.loan. A government that wants to understand the cost of borrowing could do worse than spend a week with a ranch loan officer.
Wednesday, A Flying Car
I enjoyed my own headline on transport, A flying car in 2028, a pay-per-mile tax in 2028. The joke is that a promise of future technology sits beside a plan for future charges. Supporters of road pricing say that the shift to electric vehicles erodes fuel duty and that a replacement is inevitable. Opponents say that drivers, especially in rural areas, will bear an unfair load. The flying car, as far as I know, remains unfunded.
Thursday, The Pentagon and the Pump
The London Prat made a fuel joke with Truck Drivers Ask Pentagon to Pause Winning for Cheap Diesel. Fuel costs fall on every business that moves goods, and every party says it will help. The proposals differ and so do the arithmetic.
Friday, A Last Cup
I finished the week with a cup of tea and a pencil. The pencil had been used for underlining, doubting and, on one occasion, drawing a very small flying car. I put it away. The country carried on.
Saturday, What Ministers Do
A minister’s life is more administrative than most people imagine. Papers arrive in red boxes, meetings fill the day, and decisions pass through officials, lawyers and advisers before they reach the public. The reputation of ministers depends partly on their ability to master a brief quickly, and partly on luck. Some arrive in a department full of enthusiasm and leave with a long list of lessons.
The Institute’s marking of the cabinet is useful because it asks about the machinery, not the personalities. It asks whether the department is organised sensibly, whether the civil service has the skills it needs and whether the numbers of private secretaries make any difference to results. Those are unglamorous questions, and they are the ones that decide whether a policy works.
Sunday, Road Pricing
The question of replacing fuel duty as electric vehicles spread is one of the great quiet puzzles of public finance. Motoring taxes raise tens of billions of pounds, and as drivers switch to electric cars the revenue falls. Every government must find something, and a charge per mile is the most discussed option. Supporters argue that it is fairer and clearer. Critics argue that it hits rural and low-income drivers and raises privacy concerns about tracking.
No party has a perfect answer, and any party that claims one should be asked to show its workings. Meanwhile the flying car, in the manner of all promised technology, is expected to arrive shortly after the next election.
Monday, A Reader Writes
A reader wrote to ask whether I ever agree with the government. I answered that I do, on occasion, usually when the policy is boring, sensible and unlikely to make the news. Competent administration rarely makes a headline, and I have noticed that the policies I support tend to be the ones nobody remembers.
This is not a criticism of the government. It is a criticism of headlines. A boring bridge that stays up is the best kind, and a diary like mine should say so once in a while, if only to keep the pencil honest.
Where to read next
The rest of the shelf lives at prat.uk, bohiney.com and farm.fm. For a second opinion on the week, Newsthump keeps its own counsel and its own hours.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/