[A-List] UK corporate state: unhealthy accumulation

["Michael Keaney" <michael.keaney@xxxxxx>]

Here's a political problem of major significance to any rightwing British
government: how to privatise the NHS? Clearly, traditional models, and even
more up-to-date and innovative PPP-type approaches are beyond the pale,
given the complete lack of legitimacy these have when applied to this
specific symbol of socialism. One highly innovative answer is the supposed
brainchild of health secretary Alan Milburn, who has proposed "foundation
hospitals" to take over from the overly "bureaucratic" and "ineffecient"
ones currently operating within the NHS. Of course nowhere is it admitted
that it is precisely because of the auditocracy constructed by
targets-obsessed ministers and civil servants that these hospitals may
indeed be bureaucratic and inefficient. Nevertheless, foundation hospitals
promise to break that logjam by restoring to "local people" decision-making
power and therefore contributing not only to material well-being but
community democracy. The idea that Milburn, who is promising to "giv[e] life
to the Labour ideal of common ownership", is a born-again syndicalist is
more than a little far-fetched.

The idea that New Labour is committed to anything approximating local or
community democracy faces a major credibility problem, given New Labour's
history of centralisation, whether within the party apparatus or within the
state (e.g. the Treasury, Office of the Prime Minister). However we should
examine very carefully the rose-tinted paeans to democracy and
accountability emanating from government circles and try to trace their
origins.

For over a decade now an outfit called the New Economics Foundation has been
publishing pamphlets and booklets on "civil society", employing lots of
trendy stakeholder jargon and very consciously going along a "Third Way",
rejecting the "statism" of the past as well as the dogmatic privatisation of
Thatcherism. Instead lots of touchy-feely blather about local democracy and
participation has been pouring out of its surprisingly well-financed and
equipped headquarters. Its web site can be found here:

http://www.neweconomics.org/

"Welcome to the new economy," it states. "We are committed to fresh
thinking". A glance at NEF's publications includes one interesting title,
"The Mutual State: how local communities can run public services", authored
by Ed Mayo, executive director of NEF, and Henrietta Moore, a professor at
LSE (director, A. Giddens). You can download this document free of charge
from the web site:

http://www.neweconomics.org/uploadstore/pubs/The%20Mutual%20State.pdf

In fact, you will find a huge quantity of worthy-sounding publications
dealing with Guardian-reader topics like sustainability, stakeholding and
community development.  All available free of charge to download. How do
they do it? Just where does this organisation's money come from?

One clue is contained in the "Mutual State" booklet, which features a
foreword by Patricia Hewitt, currently HM Secretary of State for Trade and
Industry. In an earlier phase of her career, a crucial one in the
development of New Labour as it happens, she moved from having been Neil
Kinnock's press secretary during the 1980s to become head of research at
Andersen Consulting (now "Accenture"). Hewitt left that post in 1994, but
was able to arrange a specially gratis intensive briefing of Blair and his
shadow cabinet in the autumn of 1996 at Templeton College, Oxford, at which
the prospective government was given a crash course in how to govern by the
good citizens of Andersen Consulting -- free. In return AC got a government
ban lifted by Blair -- a ban that had been in force throughout the Thatcher
and Major eras because of AC's role in the disastrous DeLorean venture in
Belfast, in which lots of cash went awol without the then
closely-intertwined AC and Arthur Andersen noticing, apparently. Both firms
subsequently did very well in the apportionment of UK government contracts
until Arthur Andersen went belly up in the wake of Enron.

See http://archives.econ.utah.edu/archives/a-list/2001/msg04739.htm

Ed Mayo joined Andersen Consulting in 1987, leaving in 1992 to set up NEF,
"the radical think tank". "Ed" writes articles occasionally for the
Guardian, and advises the government on issues of exclusion, business and
finance. A glance at his online cv will show just how multi-faceted he is:

http://www.neweconomics.org/default.asp?strRequest=aboutnef&pageid=65

So, is it too much to presume that a goodly proportion of NEF's funding
comes from "Ed's" former colleagues at "Accenture"? I wonder what could be
in it for them. Let's see -- consultancy work on how to enact the fanciful
schemes dreamed up by the "blue skies" thinkers at NEF, with the full
approval of a government that has a very clear view of the long term future,
perhaps. Should you have any doubt on the latter point, here are Hewitt's
opening sentences from her intro to the Mayo/Moore pamphlet:

"The last ten years have seen a wave of demutualisation in the private
sector. In the next 10 years, Labour could create a wave of new
mutualisation in the public sector."

Ergo, we can engineer a demutualisation soon after that. "Foundation"
hospitals indeed.

-----

Public to run new hospitals

Patrick Wintour, chief political correspondent
Thursday November 14, 2002
The Guardian

Foundation hospitals, Labour's new model for public services, are to be run
by elected local people, the health secretary, Alan Milburn, will reveal
today in an attempt to underline the decentralising ambition behind
yesterday's Queen's speech, which focused on the NHS, the legal system and a
street culture of disrespect.

Mr Milburn will also try to deter union and backbench critics by announcing
plans to block the new local trusts from removing the hospitals' assets from
the public sector.

The new hospitals, which will be autonomous, own their assets and have
borrowing powers, will be run by a management board, a majority of which
will be elected by local people and recent patients. Staff will also have
seats on the management body.

All residents and patients will be entitled to become "members" of the
hospital and take part in elections to the board. The chairman of the
management body will be an elected member, and the appointment of the
hospital's chief executive will be subject to approval by elected members.

Currently NHS trust members are appointed by a government quango.

Mr Milburn will say: "Our reform is about giving life to the Labour ideal of
common ownership, not to resurrect the old Tory corpse of privatisation. The
reform will bind the NHS ever closer to the communities they serve."

He is expected to add: "The foundation hospitals represent a model for
public ownership in keeping with the Labour party cooperative tradition, but
right for our times."

However, the former health secretary, Frank Dobson, is planning to lead an
assault in the Commons today on the proposals, arguing that foundation
hospitals introduce an elite tier into the public service. He will also
claim it is perverse to give already successful hospitals extra cash and
freedom.

The first foundation hospitals will be drawn from the current crop of
successful NHS hospitals, but gradually the government wants to spread the
model across the service, smashing the postwar centralised structure.

Tony Blair underlined the message in a party political broadcast last night,
urging local citizens to get involved in their hospitals and schools. "We
need your help and your partnership in trying to make these changes happen.
There's always a limit to what government, particularly government from the
centre, can do," he said.

Despite the Blairite modesty, the heavily trailed Queen's speech contains 19
ambitious and often highly controversial bills.

Mr Blair told MPs: "We have a chance for the first time in a generation to
bring about radical reform in the public services."

Apart from foundation hospitals and a pitched battle over hunting, the
session will be dominated by five controversial bills from the Home Office,
bringing the grand total of anti-crime bills introduced by this government
to 17.

A populist anti-social behaviour bill is promised, with moves to extend
fixed penalty fines and a drive to crack down on graffiti, litter, airguns
and noise, and a restriction on the sale of spray paint to deter young
vandals. A sexual offences bill will cause further controversy inside the
Tory party over family values.

A licensing bill will let pubs remain open 24 hours.

But the criminal justice bill, designed to "rebalance" justice in favour of
the victim, came under fire from lawyers and politicians as an affront to
justice. The home secretary, David Blunkett, wants to scrap the "double
jeopardy" rule, allowing defendants to be tried twice for the same offence,
and for juries to be told of defendants' previous convictions.

The Conservative and Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesmen, Oliver Letwin
and Simon Hughes, made a rare joint appearance on the airwaves to promise
their parties will use their voting power in the Lords to defeat any attack
on the cornerstones of justice.

The Conservative leader, Iain Duncan Smith, in a strong performance, did not
shirk from the attack.

"Each year", he told a noisy chamber, "they promise bold measures and each
year it's the same old story. They promise bold reforms and they fail to
deliver."

In an unexpected move, the government dropped plans for a controversial
mental health bill, pleading it needed more time to consider the criticisms
from psychiatrists, especially over plans to place mentally ill people in
hospitals even if no crime has been committed.