My take is there was never a strategy for what to do in government. For a Party so obsessed with winning, it's startling that so little thought has been given to governing.
As any leader who's taken on a poison chalice knows, once you take over the reins, despite your best intentions, you end up consumed by immediate problems with little time to come up with a strategy to solve them.
The time for analysis was before the election. They should have come into government ready to enact a list of easy wins - like immediately setting up the Covid fraud investigation, action on water companies etc. But when you've not filled core vacancies and made a poor choice for Chief of Staff (twice) this is what happens.
I was a Campaign Manager for the local and general elections this year, and to say this is disappointing is an understatement.
This is so true. It's astonishing when one compares it to 2010 or 1997.
One other thing is the fact that our whole system - from civil servants to politicians to the people who lead reviews - seem to have just accepted that reviews or inquiries should take years. Why? What does this gain us? Especially on subjects where so much has been written by so many actors. The entire culture is too accepting of this.
If the Government did want to have a review on social care - perhaps to summarise what has changed since Dilnot - then very well, but why not say it must take no more than six months? One problem is there is no incentive on officials to show pace here - but ultimately the buck stops with Ministers (in both parties) who have been too accepting of such time scales.
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head of the elephant in the corner. Better to try and fail for Labour than to be a rabbit in the headlights. I worried from the outset that Rachel Reeves will be the Philip Snowden of this century. There are so many simple things they could do, yet seem incapable. Okay, a full Council Tax overhaul will be very difficult and politically challenging, but just unlock the restriction on the upper band from being no more than double band D or allow local authorities to put them up to 5 times with the next band 4x band etc. Raise a Billion £ plus and put it into local authority built and owned social care. The politics are sound as no-one in the A-D bands will be upset.
And Rishi Sunak with his Chancellor looked to bribe the electorate first by removing the NI increase that he implemented for Johnson’s apparent solution, and then a further, reduction. Reeves and Starmer fell into this elephant trap, and so what priorities can be advanced ? Is this Reeves / Starmer error why social care needs to be kicked down the road ?
My take is there was never a strategy for what to do in government. For a Party so obsessed with winning, it's startling that so little thought has been given to governing.
As any leader who's taken on a poison chalice knows, once you take over the reins, despite your best intentions, you end up consumed by immediate problems with little time to come up with a strategy to solve them.
The time for analysis was before the election. They should have come into government ready to enact a list of easy wins - like immediately setting up the Covid fraud investigation, action on water companies etc. But when you've not filled core vacancies and made a poor choice for Chief of Staff (twice) this is what happens.
I was a Campaign Manager for the local and general elections this year, and to say this is disappointing is an understatement.
This is so true. It's astonishing when one compares it to 2010 or 1997.
One other thing is the fact that our whole system - from civil servants to politicians to the people who lead reviews - seem to have just accepted that reviews or inquiries should take years. Why? What does this gain us? Especially on subjects where so much has been written by so many actors. The entire culture is too accepting of this.
If the Government did want to have a review on social care - perhaps to summarise what has changed since Dilnot - then very well, but why not say it must take no more than six months? One problem is there is no incentive on officials to show pace here - but ultimately the buck stops with Ministers (in both parties) who have been too accepting of such time scales.
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head of the elephant in the corner. Better to try and fail for Labour than to be a rabbit in the headlights. I worried from the outset that Rachel Reeves will be the Philip Snowden of this century. There are so many simple things they could do, yet seem incapable. Okay, a full Council Tax overhaul will be very difficult and politically challenging, but just unlock the restriction on the upper band from being no more than double band D or allow local authorities to put them up to 5 times with the next band 4x band etc. Raise a Billion £ plus and put it into local authority built and owned social care. The politics are sound as no-one in the A-D bands will be upset.
And Rishi Sunak with his Chancellor looked to bribe the electorate first by removing the NI increase that he implemented for Johnson’s apparent solution, and then a further, reduction. Reeves and Starmer fell into this elephant trap, and so what priorities can be advanced ? Is this Reeves / Starmer error why social care needs to be kicked down the road ?