Death by a thousand policy initiatives

31 October 2005

With the latest ridiculous policy proposal by the government duly despatched back to Room 101, I’ve been thinking more and more – just what are New Labour good for? All we have had recently is a continual stream of vacuous, ill thought-out ideas, obsessed by ‘getting tough’ and ‘reforming’, when they are actually petty and always aimed at the wrong problem (if there is a problem, which often there is not). Over at Chicken Yoghurt, Justin has neatly summed it up:

Anyway. Is this how New Labour dies? Of shame, laughter ringing in its ears? I can’t remember a single policy idea put out by this government since the General Election that hasn’t been hung, drawn and quartered by pretty much everybody with an opinion. [...] All this thinking out loud in the newspapers and half-arsed legislation gives the impression less of power with purpose and more of a fug of pot-addled students fantasising about starting a band when none of them own instruments or have any musical ability.

 

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2 Responses

Paul Davies

You can probably replace ‘New Labour’ with ‘government’ and be done with it. Government is sadly inherently complete crap. Sadly, it’s a bit of a necessity. Can be amusing though.

tom

It’s all part of Blair’s legacy shopping, I think. The simple public service improvements – most obviously, increased spending – can never be allowed to get credit for making things better. Because then, where’s the history? It has to be the reform, always reform; tough choices, great challenges, thinking the unthinkable and radical agendas. Blair’s determined to make a greater impact on the country than Thatcher, and that’s not going to be achieved by, you know, doing sensible stuff.