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Creating a little economic miracle
• GORDON Brown will no doubt be proud of the writers of the Forum (Thanks a million, but we all need to fight this recession, February 26).
They seek to divert attention away from his mishandling of the economy and give the false impression that this small London borough has the capacity to create its own little bubble of prosperity, which can buck the national trend (and possibly avoid having to pay our share of Gordon’s legacy of debt in the future, no doubt!).
This is grossly misleading. As the writers suggest, there is plenty of evidence of local authorities throwing money at development and training schemes. However, there are very few concrete examples of long-standing successes as a result. On the contrary, government – local or national – rarely knows best and is as likely to divert investment away from the sectors of the economy which have the better long-term prospects for growth than they are to deliver it.
Camden is offering a sensible, costed package of measures which hopefully will alleviate some of the worst aspects of Gordon’s recession. But none of us know for sure, and there is no evidence to suggest that other local authorities have better proposals.
However, the two writers are employed as consultants by the Improvement and Development Agency (IDeA). This quango exists to go around and send folk from Rotherham Council, for example, to come and advise Camden how to do things differently. It costs nearly £30million a year, funding which is “top-sliced” off the money which the government says it is giving to local councils each year.
So if the writers really want to help local councils help local residents, then perhaps they could argue for IDeA to be scrapped, along with the London Development Agency and the other regional development agencies, too, and for their funding to come directly to Camden. Then, perhaps, Camden Council really could create its own little economic miracle as the writers suggest.
CLLR ANDREW MENNEAR
Conservative, Frognal & Fitzjohns ward
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