Tony Blair on Progressive Governance
Tony Blair sets out the progressive case for public service reform at the Social Democratic Futures pages of The Euston Manifesto. A forum has been created and the PM will respond to comments.
The Prime Minister makes the case for empowerment:
Our strategy for public services has been through three phases. The first phase was a zero tolerance approach to failure, with strong central direction and public targets, to ensure that under-investment could not be used as an excuse for endemic failure. This was then followed by a correction of the long period of under-investment. We are now into the third phase: progressive reform.
The driving idea behind reform is to transfer power from providers to citizens. To give power to the people- it is as traditional a left-of-centre slogan as there is.
Aneurin Bevan once said that the purpose of power is to be able to give it away. That idea is our guide too. We want to put citizens in charge because it is both right in itself and it is a way of ensuring that services are tailored to their needs and that services constantly change and innovate as required. So, power to the people is both the means by which the vision will be achieved and is a progressive end in itself. It is no coincidence that the least well-off, the people with least power, consistently tell the polls that they want choices the most.
If the citizen has a choice they have a power. The service is likely to be more responsive to their needs. Their voice is a lot more likely to be heard and acted on. The service has a stimulus to improve.
He also stakes out the terrain on which the Party can defeat the Tories at the next election: progressive governance versus 'let sunshine win the day':
The progressive left’s belief that government can be a force for good is a major advantage. David Cameron has understood that he needs to be seen as a centrist. He is doing his level best to sound reasonable, although his various policy reviews keep giving us an unfortunate glimpse of the contradictions he falls into whenever he is actually forced to confront tough questions rather than simply pose them.
This will be critical when he is finally forced to make decisions about policy. It is all very well to talk about some of the questions that government faces. But if you put yourself in a position where you can’t determine the solution, then sooner or later this will become clear to the British public. In the meantime, the serious reform, to match the profound changes to our country, goes on.
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