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Squandered

Author: David Craig
Publisher: Constable
Category: Book

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Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars

14 reviews
Sales Rank: 1333

Media: Paperback
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 7.7 x 5.1 x 0.9

ISBN: 1845298322
EAN: 9781845298326
ASIN: 1845298322

Publication Date: April 24, 2008
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Customer Reviews: Read 9 more reviews...

3 out of 5 stars

Enjoyable Enough, with Reservations July 17, 2008
I read this book on a train journey as it is fairly short. At times I felt overpowered by the profusion of figures, and I think here caution is called for.

After having worked in the field of healthcare IT for about 20 years, I like to think I know something about it. In his previous book "Plundering the Public Sector" Mr. Craig made at least one large arithmetical error favouring his general argument about the NHS National Programme for IT (NPfIT).

What's more, William Faulkner said "kill your darlings" referring to being ruthless in revising drafts, but Mr. Craig seems to have been unable to do that and still perpetuates the inaccuracy from his previous book that NPfIT was "sexily renamed" Connecting for Health. It wasn't.

Nonetheless, though this book doesn't present many reasoned options, it does give food for thought and is enjoyable enough.

5 out of 5 stars

Brilliant attack on misapplied spending July 17, 2008
David Craig, a management consultant, wrote the excellent Plundering the public sector, which showed how the Labour government paid consultants billions to loot and wreck our public services. In his new book, he shows how the government has wasted more than a trillion pounds. But this is no pro-Conservative account: he also condemns the Conservatives' closure of the coal industry, their privatisation of railways and utilities, their three recessions and their three million unemployed.

He looks at area after area of our national life and shows how taxpayers' money is being misapplied. He shows how the costly regulatory quangos are not doing their jobs. For example, Ofwat issued no enforcement orders or fines on Thames Water, which loses a third of its water through leaks. In 2006, Thames raised its prices by 21% and its CEO got 6.3 million, without a squeak from Ofwat. Ofgem does nothing to curb the big six energy firms, which raised their prices by 15% this year. Foreign energy companies make 30-40% profit on their British operations, but only 5-10% elsewhere. The National Audit Office has praised the 180 billion PFI/PPP programme, the NHS IT fiasco and the soaring Olympics budget. It even praised the Financial Services Authority's performance, just weeks before it oversaw the Northern Rock debacle.

Craig points out that there are far too many quangos, initiatives and advisers. Spending on quangos rose from 79.6 billion in 2003 to 123.8 billion in 2006. The bosses of the 100 largest quangos get 110K each; the head of the Tote gets 350K a year. Labour's health quangos cost 426 million a year. Spending on NHS management consultants has multiplied by ten to 600 million a year, while beds have been cut from 250,000 to 180,000, increasing the rate of infections. The government has wasted 12 billion on a useless computer system for the NHS.

2.7 million people are on disability benefit - the highest proportion of people of working age in the developed world. In total, eight million people are economically inactive, more than in any slump in the last 70 years. This costs 40 billion a year.

The government has raised spending on the police from 8.5 billion a year to 12 billion, employing 62% more admin and support staff but only 11% more police officers. The Home Office budget rose from 7 billion to 14 billion, while it lost control of immigration and prisons.

The government modernised the Ministry of Defence's HQ at a cost of 2.347 billion over 30 years. MoD projects worth 34 billion are over-budget and late. The Ministry is top-heavy, with more admirals than ships, more brigadiers than regiments and more air marshals than squadrons.

Britain's Olympics bid of 2004 was based on a 4 billion estimate, with the taxpayer paying 1.8 billion. The 2007 estimate was 9 billion, with the taxpayer paying 7 billion. Now the estimate is 14 billion. The National Lottery's contribution has risen from 1.5 billion to 2.175 billion, which has meant taking 125 million from the bodies that actually train our athletes. In 1972, after the estimated costs of holding the 1976 Winter Olympics had tripled, the US city of Denver had a referendum on whether it should still host them. 60% voted against, so the Games were handed back to the International Olympics Committee and held in Innsbruck, which had hosted the 1964 Games. Perhaps we should give the Olympics back to the IOC, who could give them to Athens.

Craig notes that Blair negotiated our contributions to the EU's budget up from 3.3 billion a year to 5.6 billion a year until 2013. The Common Agricultural Policy's costs will rise 10% by 2013, so we will be paying for its higher costs! The CAP subsidises the rich - a quarter of its funds goes to the richest 2% of farmers and companies. For example, in 2004 Tate & Lyle got 178 million euros and the Duke of Westminster got 500,000 euros. For every pound of EU aid to Africa's farmers, the CAP takes away two by unfair trading.

The eight EU-originated Regional Development Agencies, with 300 staff each and CEOs on 175,000, cost us 200 million a year. MPs' salaries and expenses rose from 100 million in 2001-2 to 155 million last year, 240K per MP per year. Britain's MEPs get 380K each a year in salary, pension and expenses.

We could save billions by scrapping most quangos, the NHS IT scheme, the Regional Development Agencies, the unworkable ID card scheme (saving 5 billion), and renationalising the railways and the utilities. Craig ends by proposing that we reassert our democratic control over society by holding a series of referendums on key proposals like the EU Constitution, ID cards and the Olympics.

4 out of 5 stars

Useful July 4, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful

This is a useful book. It's not as much fun as "plundering the Public Sector" It reads a bit like a listed indictment rather than a coherent narrative.

However perhaps that's the point. The current government has squandered money incoherently across multiple areas of national life for very little return. This book demonstrates exactly how much has been wasted, and where it has been wasted.

The case for the prosecution is well made.

2 out of 5 stars

Misleading and disappointing lack of focus June 6, 2008
5 out of 6 found this review helpful

It's no surprise to me that there is waste and inefficiency in Government. I doubt if that has changed much over the last 50 years but what I was hoping for when I bought the book was context and proportionality and maybe a better insight into what level of tax and public spending is required to provide the levels of service we demand. I was expecting issues like the impact of an aging population and the greater demands on the health service to at least get a mention not to mention the fundamental distinction between capital investment and current account expenditure. Craig does not seek to reconcile the headline numbers he attributes to wasteful expenditure to his explanations and examples - because they so clearly don't. In the chapter on the health service he quotes examples of squandering of over 700 million pa on new management and 2 billion on a failed IT system. These figures are a tiny proportion of the figure of 269 billion (over 10 years) that he quotes. Its a shame that a subject that needs some serious attention continues to generate more heat than light.

1 out of 5 stars

Polemic not analysis June 4, 2008
9 out of 13 found this review helpful

I came to this book having previously read the same author's (with a collaborator) Plundering the Public Sector. On the basis of that I was hoping for some reasonably detailed analysis of how and why public expenditure has increased so much for seemingly so little return, making use of the author's own professional experience and the insight gained. Perhaps as a result my expectations were different from those of some of the other reviewers of this book, for I am afraid that I was very much disappointed.

What we have here is a polemic rather than an analysis, a parade of New Labour's high crimes and misdemeanours, and context is for wimps. The author may also have allowed his partisanship to overcome his circumspection; either that or he has been too inspired by the New Labour Book of Statistical Presentation. Thus there are a number of places in graphs and in text where various little tricks have been rolled out to encourage the unwary to jump to a foregone conclusion. This rather detracts from the seriosness of the enterprise.

After a couple of chapters I felt I was reading a very long comment piece from the Daily Telegraph. Reference to the `Notes on Chapters' explained why. Just over 40% of the references (I'm afraid I counted) are to articles in daily and Sunday newspapers, mainly the Telegraph, the Mail and the Times, plus a few to the generally more objective and reliable Private Eye magazine. The term `cut and paste job' comes to mind.

If you are someone who just can't get enough of the Daily Telegraph, or you want a list of Gordon Brown's atrocities to reel off to your mates down the pub (or on the fuel duty demo perhaps), this is very much the book for you. If you are after an even halfway serious discussion of what may have gone wrong with public policy and management in this country I would advise you not to squander your money on buying this book, or your time in reading it.