Subject:
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Re: UK devolved government. (was Re: Harry Potter getting left out)
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Sun, 9 Sep 2001 21:57:30 GMT
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Viewed:
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979 times
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In lugnet.loc.uk, Simon Bennett writes:
> As you may know I work for Ken Livingstone indirectly, in Transport for
> London, so I can answer these two questions (the Underground one perhaps in
> more detail than you may need!)
No, actually, that's probably not as much detail as I could
withstand. :D I read pretty closely on the matter when I was
living in Hornsey and in Acton, especially after Kiley got
involved because I use Boston's and New York's systems quite
often and I'm always impressed by how comparatively well they
run (though the cars are usually pretty dirty compared to LU's).
> 1 - Sunday trading: The Mayor and London Assembly don't have the power to
> alter the law as they cannot introduce anything which overrules
> Parliamentary legislation. Legally this is because the GLA is established
> under an Act and is therefore subordinate to Parliament in any area in which
> it has not been given specific devolved powers. Practically this is because
> the UK is one of the most centralised democracies there is. I think this is
> a bad thing and it rankles that such a good multi-tiered system was devised
> by people who were culturally British and then only implemented where they
> lived and not over here! I'd love to discuss this a little as I have read
> a great book by Johnathan Freedland of the Guardian newspaper called 'Bring
> Home the Revolution' which advocates us moving to a system like the US'.
> When I lived in California I was amazed to discover the whole system of
> Propositions and Measures. That sounded like real democracy to me.
Much in the same way that a rat looks like food to a starving
person, or the way that to someone who's never seen a movie,
Steve Gutenberg looks like an actor? ;)
One of the nicest things about the US system is a real set of
checks and balances. IIRC, there are many many MANY cases where
the Supreme Court of the US has overruled state or Federal
authorities for overstepping their bounds in forcing their will
on matters that should rightly be reserved to the people of a
municipality or other smaller division. The UK doesn't have
a real history of struggle between local, state, and federal,
so it doesn't surprise me that the decrees go from the center
outward more often than the other way.
But in short, our democracy is still messed up, we've just found
other ways to befoul it.
> 2. PPP: As you may have read Bob and Ken's court case was thrown out. PPP
> is still on track ('scuse the pun). This revolves around the same issue.
> We argued that PPP would prevent us from having management control of London
> Underground (LUL) and this would put Ken in conflict with his duty under the
> GLA Act. The judge ruled, and I don't think anyone who understands our
> system surprised, that Government can tell him exactly what he can do. This
> was a small (tiny) victory for Ken and Bob as we can now say 'not our fault,
> we said this would happen' if LUL continues to underperform and 'look how
> we've sorted it out' if PPP works.
I've noticed that ol' Red Ken is quite good at putting his
opponents in an unenviable position of choosing to be damned
by public opinion or to concede. Not bad, really, given how
thankless a position he's got. The Press was falling a bit
out of love with him when I left, given the LU strikes and so
forth (maybe he's not Red enough anymore?).
> One last light at the end of the tunnel (there I go again!) is that last
> year John Prescott said the PPP would need to pass a 'public sector
> comparator' test to ensure it was value for money. TfL have recently won a
> case to force London Transport (which still exists as the Board for LUL) to
> publish a report by Parsons Brinckerhoff that Bob commissioned during his
> brief time as LT Chairman prior to the election. This report says the PPP
> is clearly not good value.
Everyone's said that. Virtually every commentator I have seen,
British or not, has stated that privatization of systems crucial
to the functioning of the state--in effect, the reversal of the
Attlee centralization and beyond--will spell disaster in terms
of reliability if not finance (although the evidence for both is
pretty good). One only need look at Railtrack's dismal record
of maintenance and response; it took *how* many days to get things
up and running after last fall's weather fiasco? Britrail always
had enough people to do the job quickly, rather than compete with
other, richer firms for limited private-sector resources.
> I hold little hope though and since I work in TfL Rail Services and we are
> going to have to sort this sorry mess out eventually I am extremely
> irritated by the Government's intransigence.
As is everyone. I'm especially irritated with John Prescott, who
comes across as a real buffoon (although some have said that he's
the fall guy for Blair and Gordon Brown and too dim to realize it).
Then again, NS in the Netherlands is the center of controversy too,
and they're nice and centralized.
But anyways, you're preaching to the choir. I had to laugh when
ES published a piece about how they should hire Giuliani to run
London. Oh, that would make Labour REAL happy. :D
best
LFB
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