Letter to the Public Accounts Committee, 2nd April 2012
We have recently written to the Prime Minster that Westminster must stop looking the ‘other way’ re the public sectors corruption of ‘good governance’.
One looks to the Commons Select Committees to bring to account the numerous inept officials guilty of mismanagement that causes enormous waste, fraud and theft within their domain. There is also the iniquitous revolving door set-up that allows many 'poor value' officials to escape public scrutiny.
Concerned citizens would like to see the Public Accounts Committee investigate those Senior Officials who are long guilty of promoting and protecting the ‘inept official’. These base promotions have ruined the expected level of public sector accountability that we are entitled to.
This Whitehall promotion of the inept to high office is the cancer at the heart of our democracy.
The complete abandonment of ‘good governance’ is seen in the following public sector obscenities. (1) National FireControl costly abomination, officials abused their mandatory powers in setting it up. (2) The A4e abused our jobless citizens, our coffers and the rule of law, and (3) The 7 year failed attempt to improve the overall delivery re government projects and ‘good governance’.
The officials who created and staffed the FireControl saga, the A4E monstrosity and the 7 year non-starter programme were clearly lacking in leadership, and were unconcerned re the scale of costly failure, as they allowed their debilitating ‘quagmire of calamities’ to continue unabated.
We have stressed how the promotion of inept officials within the public sector is rife, and disastrous. For instance, despite their enormous salaries and perks and pension rights, the bungling incompetents promoted within the Home Office and UKBA led to the failure to protect our borders. Most other departments have more than their fair share of promoted failures.
For years the likes of Gus O’Donnell put a “lid” on civil service incompetence by issuing false statements designed to deceive the nation, he once claimed that “If you break open a civil servant you will find’ running through him, like a stick of rock’, the words’ Honesty, Objectivity, Integrity and Impartiality”. We pointed out to Gus that under his leadership, his civil servants had helped public sector fraud theft and waste grow to a staggering £21b in 2010. Senior civil servants were guilty of paying themselves millions in unearned bonuses and perks every year.
Gus, the then head of the Civil Service was always ready to take part in the abuse of ‘good governance’, as seen in his approval of the inept Lin Homers promotion to the equally dysfunctional Revenue, claiming that she would ‘excel’ there. It can be seen that Gus O’Donnell has positively encouraged the promotion of the inept; this purposeful promotion of the incompetent is pure corruption of ‘governmental accountability’. These officials easily become ‘bunglers’, and because of their lack of worldly nous, they employ extremely expensive consultants and contractors who are not always ‘fit for purpose’ anyway.
One is reminded of Greece being ruined by its costly mandarins and its corrupt public sector, where bureaucrats (similar to those in the UK) showed a ‘couldn’t give a damn’ outlook that led to wholesale fraud and theft and waste from Greece’s public purse. Over the years the exasperated and drained Greek taxpayer joined in the abuse and started fiddling their tax returns - paying less and less. The long years of fraud theft and waste within the Greek public sector eventually led to melt-down of government. Many Greeks finally joined the uncaring civil service and took part in the spiralling wheeze of ‘fiddling the state’ as best they could - until the state collapsed.
Because of the too numerous inner fraudulent costly ‘cock ups’ within the UK, much of our state is now no longer seen as a ‘force for good’. It is pure corruption of our democratic audit that the Civil Service does not have to answer for its gross errors, its fraudulence, its waste and its sheer dysfunctionality. Inept officials are insulated from being questioned about their errors because of a biased Civil Service Code; even civil service thieves are rarely penalised by their departments.
This Mafia-style public sector “institutionalised protection racket” has saved the neck of many official; and in doing so, has severely damaged the nation’s governance and rule of law.
Like thousands of others, as a former front-line soldier - a war pensioner, I did not put my life-on-the- line so that fraudulent officialdom can abuse our democracy by ‘milking’ our coffers as though it was an undeniable right. By devious design officials have avoided the much needed ‘Westminster’ scrutiny of unrestrained salaries, pension rights and perks and their inability to deliver projects.
Troops should never have been asked to put ‘life and limb’ at risk while using inferior helicopters, armoured vehicles etc, obtained through the MODs Mafia-like procurement strategy, especially when better equipment was available at less cost? Such acts that put our troop’s lives at risk should be seen as ‘treasonable’. Because of the billions involved, one is entitled to think of Kickbacks?
When faulty Chinook helicopters crashed, MOD officials wrongly blamed the dead pilots. Many people started to take an interest in our ‘corrupt officialdom’ and found it to be widespread, self-serving and blatantly persistent in error – and all done without a care in the world. This age-old pandemic regime has destroyed the public’s confidence in the government machine. They see with sickening regularity, incompetent officials with little or no acumen, negotiate and sign-up costly complex contracts that they are incapable of managing!
The Mafia style “institutionalised protection racket” is often brought into play saving the neck of many a failed official – they are simply moved on – away from justifiable exposer!
We have moved into an age where seriously dysfunctional mandarins can hand out £millions to each other in unearned bonuses as if on a whim – then ask for more year-in year-out. From such fraud/theft from the public purse there is no expectation that justice will ever be done.
Ever more citizens are becoming restless at this abuse of power; many see the only way to rescue our democracy is to dismantle the corrupt machinery of government.
Whereas we once suffered from the ‘divine right of kings’ we now suffer from the ‘divine right of inept officialdom’ where no abuser is ever held properly accountable – no matter how great the crime against the state! This reappearance of ‘divine rights’ within our government machine indicates a debilitating ‘inner cancer’ that’s aided and abetted by officialdom and government lawyers.
Yours sincerely
AW&I Tanner
cc Ministers, MPs, media, J Heywood, Bob Kerslake, & those interested in governmental corruption.