The money goes where?

“We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when people are afraid of the light.” Plato

Why should we worry about runaway costs in our Government spending? It’s only billions of loss and wastage, never mind fraud and error which accounts (February 2016) for between £22bn and £44bn per annum. At least the money goes somewhere.

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Control-less Costs

Is it worth mentioning the losses from procurement cost overruns? We see them almost daily, For example:

• the escalating costs of new UK Aircraft Carriers may be even more now
• the £10BN plus lost on NHS records
• the engines of the Type 45 Destroyer

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Charity begins at home … so save some cash

We may feel concern about the cost of supporting the poor in other countries when we’re feeling broke ourselves. We may ask where the money will come from. Control the runway costs of procurement and other waste and we may have an answer.

Margaret Hodge, the former Labour minister and then chair of the public accounts committee, stated:

“The carriers’ starting cost was £3.5bn, is currently about £6.2bn, and is likely to rise to up to £12bn. There will be nine years without a carrier, and it will be at sea for fewer than 200 days on average.”

What do these days of foodbanks, tragic fires, austerity and pollution killing 40,000 people a year tell us? We’re broke, the system’s broke and our leaders aren’t fixing things.

Can you understand why the crass incompetence of government expenditure and control remains unchallenged, covered-up and spun-away by our leaders? I can’t. My grandchildren will be paying for such mendacity and criminality for their whole lives.

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Sort it

How do we overcome vested interests? What should we do about the greedy/naughty/ corrupt people hiding in the wings?

If we fixed situations like these would we need much, if any, austerity pain? Would we question helping our poor and the broke and oppressed world-wide?

The ongoing costs of government procurement and the lack of control as typified by fraud and error is a national disgrace. Why isn’t this a key priority for our cash strapped government? Even writers are getting in on this …

Mac Logan