³ÉÈËÂÛ̳

Commentators look at the merits and shortcomings of government plans to abolish 192 quangos.

Senior fellow of the Institute for Government that the criteria for closure was not the money saved:

"[T]here was one test missing altogether yesterday - value for money. The government can find savings from removing duplication and some administrative costs, but the case hasn't yet been made to suggest a big dent in the deficit. It is a relief that the government has learned there is much more to this than a simple numbers game."

that the cuts may cost more than they save:

"[M]any of the bodies being abolished are already ghostly leftovers with no staff, budgets or executive functions. It's very good of Mr Maude to go round Whitehall tidying up like a housemaid, but the effort and money expended cleaning out the cupboard may exceed savings. British Shipbuilders, for example, once a controversial and powerful instrument of state socialism, was long ago wound up operationally, and exists in name only. Like the Norwegian Blue, this is a quango that has already ceased to be. It is not even resting."

The disappointment, with what it calls the "damp barbeque" of quangos which it said didn't go far enough:

"It would surely make more sense - and be in keeping with the Coalition's ambition of a smaller state - to outsource the tasks of these agencies to the private sector or to voluntary groups. And why stop there? If the Government really wants to generate revenue and help cut the deficit then it should grasp the nettle and privatise some quangos."

that the striking thing is how many of the organisations will stay "in one way or another":

"One worrying trend that emerges from this list is that of formerly independent bodies being absorbed into government departments. The Main Honours Advisory Committee moves inside the Cabinet Office, as does the policy responsibilities of the Big Lottery Fund. A host of tribunal services will now fall under the remit of the Ministry of Justice, and a number of health-related advisory committees will be consolidated into 'Department of Health/Public Service committees of experts'.
Ìý
"As I've argued previously, axing these quangos is less about delivering vast savings than about political positioning. Talk of 'bonfires' is all very well, but the document itself indicates that few of these changes will happen immediately."

what will happen now that decisions previously made by quangos will now be made by ministers:

"Politicians should have the courage to rise above vested interests. The unanswered question is what will happen when they don't. Many quangos sprang from political failure: the (reprieved) Food Standards Authority, for example, was a response to the collapse in public trust triggered by the badly handled BSE crisis. The reason the chief medical officer, not a minister, fronted the MMR vaccination debate was not just clinical knowledge but the fact that he was more trusted by parents, precisely because he wasn't a politician."

the end of what he sees as an unaccountable set-up but says the "Quango monster is wounded but not yet slain":

"Quangos have been an affront to democracy. Too many have pursued a fashionable Leftist agenda without taking account of public opinion. That is why Labour was so keen to expand them. Filled with self-righteous socialists they could promote multi-culturalism or European integration, or anti-family policies free of any real responsibility for their actions. That is partly why there is such a gap today between the elite and the citizen. Proper ministerial accountability must be restored and the assault on quangos will go some way to achieving that. But there must be fears the coalition has not gone nearly far enough."

Links in full

•
•
•
•
•
•