Posted at 30th June 2008 08:30The Kings clothes
I was speaking recently with a group of gentlemen who were involved with establishing the Broads Authority over twenty years ago. They are very largely no longer involved and surprised how the Authority had developed and emerged in a manner so different to their thoughts at the time.
“But what are the success stories?” enquired a noble Lord.
“There aren’t any” had to be the reply. “Water quality is better, almost entirely as a result of Anglian Water’s investment in effluent plant, beyond that the only conspicuous progress has been in the size of establishment, which has grown from under thirty to a reported one hundred and sixty.”
Despite millions of additional funding from central government and continuous compound increases in the price of river tolls, this unaccountable body doesn’t have a single success to its name. The rivers are in a worse condition than they were twenty years ago. Even the RSPB booklet put out last October argued that the condition of most SSSIs had worsened. The bottom has dropped out of the local tourism market without effective action. I was also reminded of a letter received from an elderly, longstanding member of an influential local society who’d worked long and hard towards establishing the Broads Authority:
“… sometimes, I wonder If we have not created a monster!!”
Nowhere has this arrogant and ineffective management been better illustrated than in the promotion of the Private Bill now in the House of Lords. Three years and half a million pounds down the line and the Bill might just stagger onto the statute book – unless of course there is a General Election in the meantime, when it’ll take longer and cost more. In the probable event of a Conservative victory, an early job is likely to be dismantling the very large government departments, with Defra early in the firing line. Far from being supported by the Government, the Private Bill has been promoted in the Commons by one of the more conspicuous loose cannons of the Labour Party (remember the in-breeding, gene-pool jibe at his constituents?) and a gullible cleric in the Lords. The government Chief Whip shepherded the 1988 Act. Might this not reflect a fall in the Broads Authority’s political capital?
The Broads Authority once enjoyed a reservoir of goodwill – but just like the Labour government, things started to go wrong when the Authority began to deal in half-truths. Not quite outright lies but not quite the whole truth either. Examples can easily be found and not just in Press Releases – they usually contain just enough information to hand off a casual observer. Once a cat of this nature is let out of its bag, all public respect swiftly follows and cynicism is the best greeting that can be expected. Levels of frustration with a body behaving in this manner increase dramatically when it is unaccountable. Comparisons with Dickinson & Morris, established in 1851 in Melton Mowbray are widespread but possibly we shouldn’t be at all surprised that the academics have failed to deliver.
Henry Ford said famously: “You can’t build a reputation on what you are going to do”. Over twenty years, the Broads Authority has failed to deliver on any count beyond an increasing number of staff pay packets and it’s run away with millions in central government funding and compound increases in River Tolls in this orgy of empire building.
Time is called. The King’s got no clothes and someone has to shout: STOP!
After twenty years, it’s time for a complete structural review of responsibilities.
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Category: Tourism.