June 2015

Devolution settlement had ‘corrosive effect’ on UK, says Wales secretary

With all the talk in England about devolution this article make you think. It tells us:

When devolution began it was a process designed to decentralise government and give more powers to nations which make up the UK. Powers were transferred from the UK parliament in London to the Welsh Assembly Government in Cardiff, Northern Ireland Assembly in Belfast and the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh. This process began in 1997 in Scotland and Wales and 1998 in Northern Ireland following public votes. This article sets out what happened next. Wales Secretary Stephen Crabb gave a speech to the National Assembly for Wales this week where he announced plans to scrap the “conferred” model of devolution (in which Westminster grants certain powers) to a Scottish style “reserved” model in which all powers are presumed to be devolved unless otherwise specified. According to Crabb the original UK devolution settlement failed because it didn’t grant tax raising powers to Cardiff – and the Scottish parliament has failed to use the modest tax varying powers granted in its original settlement – and both have had a damaging effect. With talk of a northern powerhouse and city deals amongst MPs, what does the devolution process mean for rural England?

Australian territory bigger than Scotland on sale for £175m

When the land reform agenda and its implications for rural relations in Scotland is hitting the headlines – with policy resonances south of the border this article make you think!!! It tells us:

Australia is selling the largest private non-state and non-monarchical stretch of land in the world – a 39,000 square mile series of cattle stations worth an estimated £175 million. The family-owned estate – bigger than Scotland and three-quarters of the size of England – was founded in 1899 by Sir Sidney Kidman, Australia’s so-called “cattle king”. The infographic map in this article  – ‘how big is the estate and how much is it worth?’ – illustrates the vast scale of the outback compared to the UK.

The sale has attracted interest from more than 30 bidders across the world, including farming families, investment syndicates, meat companies, foreign investors and global pension funds from China, the United States, Britain, Switzerland and Canada. However, the sale has proven controversial in Australia and led to calls by some MPs to ensure the property is not sold to a foreign state-owned investor.

Britain’s roads are in a similar state to Namibia’s or Puerto Rico’s, says World Economic Forum

The World Economic Forum’s ‘Global Competitiveness Report’ gives each country a score based on a number of indicators, including quality of road infrastructure. The report reveals how the UK only just makes the top 30 countries surveyed by the Forum, and is ranked in the upper reaches of the world’s developing countries. Last year the Government announced a £15bn to upgrade roads and triple the level of spending on the infrastructure by 2020. Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin said at the project’s launch that the UK’s roads system had suffered from underinvestment  and that the upgrade would be the “biggest, boldest, and most far-reaching roads programme for decades”. Spending on all types of infrastructure in general has fallen by at least £15bn from its peak following sharp cuts in the early years of the Coalition government, however – according to a report in March from the National Audit Office.

Child poverty measurement set to change

There’s a scene in “Apocalypse Now” where the man sent to murder Kurtz wakes up and realises to his horror he is still in Saigon. I woke up this morning to a mention of an above inflation increase for the royal household and an increase in child poverty. I am not making a political point but from almost everyone’s perspective this must seem like a very unusual state of affairs. I think Prince Charles is a great rural champion but I do wonder what the implications of more child poverty mean for rural families where isolation makes living costs more expensive still.

Against this background this article caught my eye it tells us:

For years Conservatives have argued that the current poverty measure – the proportion of children living in households earning less than 60% of median income – is inadequate. The party’s election manifesto promised – once more – “better measures to drive real change in children’s lives”.

David Cameron argues the existing indicator has perverse results: child poverty is deemed to have risen when the state pension goes up. The Coalition Government carried out a consultation on. This included an evidence base that considered the key factors that make it harder for some families to get out of poverty and the key factors that make some poor children more likely to become poor adults. The evidence suggests the main factor is lack of sufficient income from parental employment which restricts the amount of earnings a household has: this is not just about worklessness but also working insufficient hours and/or low pay.

The evidence touches upon the differences between poverty in urban and rural places and suggests poverty is more prevalent in an urban context. I wonder if rural poverty is masked by official measures and statistics? Being more prevalent of course also does equate in terms of individual’s experiences with less acute!!!!

Why public sector workers need a Samaritans-style helpline

Its not true that all the fun has gone out of local government but as we approach budget announcements in July it feels there is little cheer left. I presented the reports of the findings from our interim evaluation of the Lincolnshire Well-Being Service today which I think can show it has delivered potentially over £6 million in acute health costs. This article therefore leapt out at me as I was compiling Hinterland. It tells us:

When we are vulnerable and in need of care for a serious problem, we want to be able to turn to someone we trust, who can give us their full and undivided attention. One of the measures of a civilised society is the capacity to care for its citizens in times of suffering and distress. In the UK, a large part of this fabric of compassion is to be found in our public sector health and social services. Current political debate about public sector care is dominated by the issues of funding and competencies. But this neglects a much more fundamental concern about the quality of all care: the fact that even if a doctor, nurse, social worker or therapist has the time, training and skill to help, they may not always be in a state of mind to do so fully. Our public model of the ideal professional care-giver is of someone who can be endlessly human to others without needing anything human in return.

All the attention of policy-making and strategy is on the quality of care delivered and almost none of it on the quality of support for those providing that care. And yet the two are inextricably linked. Staff ill health costs £45m a year in the social care sector alone, yet no one thinks to ask questions like “how much human distress can a professional hold in their mind before they reach their limit?” or “how much time and back-up do professionals need at work to process the daily emotional impact of what they are doing so that they can carry on doing it?” This article suggest a national helpline and website with confidential chat rooms available 24/7 for public sector staff. As well as create supportive peer groups and online spaces within and across professions, it could also flag up any organisations where staff were experiencing problems in significant numbers and where there might be toxic working environments.

Stone theft hits ‘epidemic’ levels

This article tells us: stone theft is reaching “epidemic” levels in parts of Britain and should be treated as a “serious organised crime”, the Policing Minister has said. Mike Penning said that specialist prosecutors will focus on bringing “high-profile” cases against stone thieves in coming months. The thieves have been switching to stealing stone and slate from pavements, roads, schools and churches after a government crackdown on scrap metal. Jason McCartney, the MP for Colne Valley, told the Commons that thieves wearing high-visibility jackets have been pretending to be council workers to steal stone.

UK unemployment falls as wages rise

Ostensibly good news apart from the fact that the most insuperable aspect of the unemployment challenge faces young people in rural areas. This article tells us:

According to the Office for National Statistics, the number of people out of work between February and April fell by 43.000 to 1.81 million. At the same time, wages have risen by 2.7% since August 2011 (including and excluding bonuses). Employment Minister Priti Patel described how the figures “confirm that our long-term economic plan is already starting to deliver a better, more prosperous future for the whole of the country, with wages rising, more people finding jobs and more women in work than ever before”. However, Anthony Reuben (head of statistics at the BBC) cautioned that with all surveys there is a margin of error so when the ONS estimates a fall of 43,000 they are 95% sure that the actual figure is between a fall of 121,000 and a rise of 35,000.

NHS patients to be monitored remotely in digital healthcare revolution

This article is all about the digital revolution of healthcare. Apparently, within five years patients across the country will be able to go online and speak to their GP via video link; order prescriptions or see their health records. And GP surgeries and hospitals could start providing free Wi-Fi. Companies are also developing health gadgets which can check blood pressure, monitor insulin levels and even pick up neurological conditions by videoing eye movement or depressive symptoms through language used on Twitter feeds.

With many people suggesting the current model of health is unsustainable – ageing populations, increasing demand and financial pressures – the answer here seems to be not to do less, but to do things differently.For example, telehealth delivered by Peninsula Community Health in Cornwall (http://www.peninsulacommunityhealth.co.uk/about-us/) provides equipment for patients to take key health readings. Using a normal phone line, these readings are automatically sent to a health professional – usually their key worker (Community Matron or Specialist Nurse). This means that they can quickly spot any change in a patient’s condition and follow up if necessary.

Councils fear they are losing the battle against ‘vicious’ urban seagulls

This may seem like a trivial issue, but many of us with a long history in local government know just how important issues like dog poo and in this case seagulls are. The story tells us:

Councils have been fighting a losing battle against seagulls. This had looked set to change when the government announced in the March budget that it would allocate £250,000 towards research into dealing with the gull menace. However, just three months later, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has withdrawn the funding. Faced with a £83 million cut to its budget, gulls are no longer a priority. This article discusses some of the pest control measures deployed by Local Authorities in Plymouth, Bath, Bristol and Herefordshire. Despite best efforts, the gull population continues to grow.

Government faces call to review ‘self-destruct’ email policy

This very interesting article makes me wonder where “serious” stops and where “trivial and ephemeral” starts. It tells us: The Government is facing calls to review a little-known policy under which Downing Street emails “self-destruct” after three months. Any messages which David Cameron’s aides fail to save and store are automatically deleted – a practice that campaigners claim is designed to thwart later freedom of information requests. The information watchdog raised concerns that senior civil servants may not have been warned by the Cabinet Office that their emails are wiped out so rapidly. Government sources defended the practice, insisting civil servants were given clear instructions on the retention of important information to avoid email systems getting clogged up with trivial and ephemeral messages.

I know how easy it is to save information with no inconvenience and I truly wonder how many important local issues have been excised from the prime ministers email archive?

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