Amid all the hysteria over the referendum a few other events are worth noting below the radar, though obviously on a much lesser scale. Two appointments and one non-dismissal have been notable in this last week alone, though these are only the latest examples of a long decline in proper accountability in this country.
After a string of well-known public figures had all turned down the post of the government’s choice to chair the BBC Trust, Rona Fairhead agreed to accept it. It is a position requiring a lot of sensitive handling after the Savile abuse saga, controversies over executive payoffs of £369m, and a failed digital media venture. Yet Fairhead declared that whilst she would ‘prioritise’ her job as the BBC’s chief regulator (so that’s all right then), she would also cling on to her non-executive roles at HSBC and the US multinational Pepsi – quite likely the terms she exacted from the government to take up the job at all. Continue reading
On Tuesday, an innocuous little announcement was dribbled out of Whitehall with little or no pick-up in the media. It said that the Government had decided to wind up the Appointments Commission. Since this Commission was set up as an independent body precisely to stop political interference in public appointments, particularly in the health service under the Thatcher Government, it starts to ring alarm bells when this notice of abolition has been issued by the Department of Health whose Minister, Lansley, has just announced ‘reforms’ which will effectively eviscerate the NHS. It strongly suggests the Tories are set on packing the NHS with compliant placemen/women to ram through highly contentious changes to privatise large chunks of the health service.