Reform The Week

20 March 2008

Reform – The Week

There is a growing body of opinion on both the left and right of politics (Charles Clarke, Alan Milburn, Philip Hammond, New Statesman) that further reform is required to deliver value in public services. Gordon Brown should take heed of this in his “third stage of public sector reform.” However, the increasingly gloomy economic climate is generating calls for further government intervention in the financial arena.

Michael Pullinger, Editor (Acting)

Reformer of the week

Philip Hammond, the Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, said: “by delivering an efficiency programme, we will pile up the headroom to be able to offer reductions in taxation”. This marks a move towards reform in Conservative economic policy.

Reactionary of the week

The British Medical Association argued that Patient Choice may “destabilise existing services” in their response to the Department of Health’s Patient Choice Initiative. Reform’s recent paper NHS reform: National mantra, not local reality argues that real choice will drive improvement in services.

Good week for

Scotland

Reform Scotland published its first report, Powers of Growth, on Monday, advocating greater financial powers for Scotland and a radical taxation change. John Swinney, Scotland’s Finance Minister called it a “welcome contribution” towards giving “Scotland a greater competitive edge”.

State intervention

After the Federal Reserve cut interest rates and orchestrated a bailout of Bear Stearns, calls are growing for Mervyn King, the Governor of the Bank of England, to “do more” to reassure British financial institutions that the Bank will provide help if needed.

Post-Blairism

Charles Clarke urged Labour to reform public services to ensure that the consumer comes first. Alan Milburn said that the “post-Blair agenda is the bridge now needed to close the growing gap between politics and public” whilst Hazel Blears said that Labour should not retreat into their “comfort zone” and need to tackle issues like crime.

. Bad week for

Expectant Mothers

The Conservatives have added to recent reports by the Healthcare Commission and the King’s Fund raising concerns about maternity service provision echoing Reform’s 2005 report, Maternity services in the NHS. Meanwhile, there has been an increase in the number of newly qualified nurses and midwives unemployed six months after finishing their studies. This shows a failure of NHS planning to link supply and demand.

Children

Keith Bartley, the Chief Executive of the General Teaching Council said that stress levels of primary school pupils have been raised by the testing and targets regime. Ed Balls proposed the idea of good behaviour contracts for the country’s worst-behaved children. Gary Pugh, Association of Chief Police Officers advocated the inclusion of primary school children on the national DNA database if behaviour suggests they will become criminals. Reform has already identified IPODs – 18-34 year olds who are “insecure, pressurised, over-taxed and debt-ridden” – perhaps the age limit should be lowered to cover the pressurised under 18s.

Social Mobility

James Rees, of Usdaw writing in the Guardian, talks of the Government’s initiative-itis in attempting to close the skills gap and improve social mobility. “The more the public subsidy focuses on skills, the fewer the opportunities for people who work in low-skilled jobs.” Reform will be launching a paper in April on how personal capability should be developed to improve social mobility.

Quote of the week

“The Tories will argue that the Government should have put reforms in place before pouring in money. But the left should make this an issue, too. After all, it represents the people who most depend on public services” (Leading article in the New Statesman).

Reform’s week

Reform held its first IPOD drinks party for 18-34-year-olds with Camilla Cavendish speaking on the challenges facing the IPOD generation.

Nick Gibb MP, Shadow Minister for Schools, addressed a breakfast at Reform on education reform.

Reform Scotland launched its first report Powers for Growth. The report was covered in a wide range

of papers (Scotsman; FT; Press and Journal Scottish editions of the Mail, Telegraph, Times, Express, and Sun). To obtain the paper, please contact info@reformscotland.com.

Reform’s pre-Budget report A Lost Decade, was covered in the Times, The Week, The Times Public Agenda and Andrew Haldenby wrote a comment piece on the Guardian’s “comment is free” blog (Guardian comment is free). The report can be found at www.reform.co.uk.