The Madness Begins

Originally posted at:  http://barryphelps.posterous.com/the-madness-begins


Coalition Plans For Abolition Of Many Quangos

The Daily Telegraph published today, Friday, 24 September, a leaked document providing details of the 177 quangos that the Coalition government will be abolishing, as well as some 94 public bodies that are still under review.  You can read the story here:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/8021780/Quango-cuts-full-list-of-bodies-under-review.html

This blog strongly regrets the proposed abolition of the Standards Board for England as readers of this blog will know what an important role the Standards Committee, the port of first call, has played in holding to account the then Councillor Barry Phelps in the complaint made by Mr Donald Cameron.  Although this blog has criticised the failure of Jennifer Ware to publicly declare an interest concerning her friendship with Phelps, and Sophia Lambert's failure to exclude Jennifer Ware despite knowing of her friendship with Phelps, the Standards Committee is nonetheless an important institution which this blog believes needed to work better and within the proper rules of natural justice.  The abolition of the Standards Board takes away an important safeguard for residents who have a legitimate complaint against a councillor, and removes any independent scrutiny that can ensure that councillors conduct themselves with probity.

But looking at the list of those public bodies proposed for abolition, this blog was also dismayed by the recklessness of this government in abolishing other public bodies which perform an important function and service which will affect people's lives.   The blog considers that there are many public bodies that are to be abolished which it believes provide an important function for people and will adversely affect people in the borough.  One such public body  which it is unwise to abolish is the General Social Care Council.  The GSCC regulates social workers and was partly set up in response to the series of failures by social workers in providing child protection.  It regulates all social workers, by requiring them to register with the GSCC and comply with their code of conduct.  This provided, for the first time, a means by which members of the public and service users could make a complaint against a social worker concerning fitness to practise that would be independently investigated and adjudicated.   The abolition of the GSCC will have an adverse affect on standards of social care in that a professional body which was there to protect the public and ensure a good standard of care from social workers will be removed and replaced by what?

The effect of some of these abolitions will be to remove important public bodies which offered protection for the public and a means of holding government and local government service providers to account.  Far from empowering individuals against the state, the Coalition seems to be doing its best to leave us at the mercy of unregulated public bodies, where those in power and that make decisions affecting our lives will not be properly held to account.  At the Town Hall this increases the risk of poor standards of conduct from our councillors, poor service provision, and an entrenched culture of corruption and sleaze. Print this post