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Yet more Evidence that the Coalition is incompetent

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Comments

  • A._Badger
    A._Badger Posts: 5,881 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper
    And the most evil thing about that little scheme wasn't even the outrageous waste of public money.

    When the sanctimonious 'Tories are evil baby eaters' brigade next think about polishing their halos in public on this forum by lecturing us on how wicked Conservatives are, they might care to recall that it was the 'liberal', 'progressive', 'cool' Labour party that tried to have us tagged like sheep.

    And I can say that as someone who doesn't vote Tory and loathes Cameron.
  • angrypirate
    angrypirate Posts: 1,151 Forumite
    LauraW10 wrote: »
    HA HA HA changes introduced under the Tories :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

    New computer models introduced by the Tories

    :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

    and :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

    to the 17 posters that thanked your brilliant post

    :rotfl:


    Soooooooooo uselesssssssss................
    Thats funny.

    Robert Peston suggests that it was due to errors in the economic models built by the civil servants
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19881240
    As I understand it, the entire bidding process was flawed - and that all four of the bidders were given erroneous information by civil servants when preparing their bids.

    When there are contests to award complicated long-term contracts such as this one, civil servants construct their own financial model.....

    It was because of assumptions in the department's own model about what would happen to inflation and passenger numbers (- which in turn meant that the ready reckoner given to bidders) was wrong.

    These assumptions made by civil servants right at the start in the invitation to bid document were wrong. It wasnt an error in reviewing the bids received, the error was in the invitation to bid document. That basically means anyone reviewing the received bids was going to come out with the wrong answer, whether they be Labour MPs, Tory MPs or civil servants without even knowing about it unless they went back and examined all of these assumptions in the economic model in the ITB document. Very much sounds like civil servant incompetence - I really cant believe its any MPs job to sit down and compile these economic models.
  • Generali
    Generali Posts: 36,411 Forumite
    10,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    Laura W is making a common mistake when it comes to the Constitution of the UK: Ministers make policy and Civil Servants enact that policy.

    If the policy is flawed (e.g. Dangerous Dogs Act) then Ministers are to blame. If the execution is flawed then Civil Servants are to blame.
  • angrypirate
    angrypirate Posts: 1,151 Forumite
    It gets even better from the Beeb
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19810845
    The Department for Transport was using an entirely new model for evaluating bids, a spokesperson told the BBC. The mistakes appear to have been down to errors made in the inputting of the data, rather than with the model itself, he says
  • Generali
    Generali Posts: 36,411 Forumite
    10,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    It gets even better from the Beeb
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19810845

    It seems pretty tough to make ministers responsible for the errors of every data entry clerk in their department.
  • Thrugelmir
    Thrugelmir Posts: 89,546 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    LauraW10 wrote: »

    Soooooooooo uselesssssssss................

    Think your the one that's slipped up on a banana skin............
  • BobQ
    BobQ Posts: 11,181 Forumite
    Ninth Anniversary 10,000 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    Generali wrote: »
    It seems pretty tough to make ministers responsible for the errors of every data entry clerk in their department.

    If true its probably not the fault of the senior civil servant 5 grades above to check on data entry.

    The only solution is to publicly vilify someone who was probably paid less than £20K because nobody involved in making the decisions could be bothered to check the data entry.
    Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are incapable of forming such opinions.
  • CLAPTON
    CLAPTON Posts: 41,865 Forumite
    10,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    Generali wrote: »
    It seems pretty tough to make ministers responsible for the errors of every data entry clerk in their department.


    maybe or maybe not

    data entry used to be done twice and the results compared; if they agree fine if not then they were input a third or fourth time.

    it has become the fashion now to do it only once to save money

    if the money saving is a result of policy then the minister could reasonably be held accountable.
  • Generali
    Generali Posts: 36,411 Forumite
    10,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    CLAPTON wrote: »
    maybe or maybe not

    data entry used to be done twice and the results compared; if they agree fine if not then they were input a third or fourth time.

    it has become the fashion now to do it only once to save money

    if the money saving is a result of policy then the minister could reasonably be held accountable.

    Very true. I can't imagine any Minister would get involved with that level of operational detail. It would be more likely for operational budgets to be agreed and operational procedures to be agreed within the budget. Lets face it, none of us really know.

    I suspect we're back to the problem of Government being so vast: nobody who cares is able to know what is going on.
  • Graham_Devon
    Graham_Devon Posts: 58,560 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    A._Badger wrote: »
    And the most evil thing about that little scheme wasn't even the outrageous waste of public money.

    Yes.

    And the ID card's were pretty diabolical too! :)
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