I am sometimes asked why I seldom write about matters in my local part of the world. Partly this is because local events are too depressing, but it is also that there is a ‘culture clash’ between myself and the local environment, something that becomes even more apparent if you compare the political fate of ‘conservatives’ in Kettering Northamptonshire and Kettering Ohio.
Recently a political leaflet from the ‘Conservative’ party landed on my doormat. The leaflet boasted of the ten thousand Pounds that ‘Conservative’ Country Councillors were each spending on local projects.
For a few seconds I was impressed. True some of the councillors are wealthy people, but none is the league of Bill Gates – ten thousand Pounds is a lot of money for them.
But then I understood that it was not their money. It was local taxpayers money that the County Council, which is ‘Conservative’ party controlled, had given to the councillors to be spent on various projects.
Now in some parts of the world this would be called a ‘slush fund’ or ‘pork’ to buy votes. But in the United Kingdom it is called ‘pavement politics’ and is considered entirely ethical rather than corrupt ‘political machine politics’.
How different things are across the Atlantic when you consider how the Republicans lost Congress partly for following a similar line of policy with many of the ‘pork barrel’ projects getting so much negative publicity with suggestions of impropriety. The Republicans in Ohio (Kettering Northamptonshire is the ‘sister city’ of Kettering Ohio and there are links between the Ohio Republicans and the Northamptonshire ‘Conservatives’) turned the State into the third highest taxed in the nation – and thus lost control.
The problem is that the situation is different. The Northamptonshire ‘Conservatives’ really are not being corrupt by the prevailing local standards in Britain. It is just that their minds are so different to mine that no real mental link exists – it is of limited use to write about people one does not understand.
I disagree Paul. It is VERY useful for you keep pointing out that “pavement politics” is intensely corrupt and that all these bastards are doing is stealing people’s money in order to buy back their votes.
The reason that PORK BARREL = BAD in the USA is BECAUSE people like you keep pointing that out. The reason the same behaviours here in the UK is greeted with a shrug is because the Lamestream Media says nothing of the sort. In my view that sort of thing is what Samizdata and other blogs exist to do!
I have to agree with Axion, Paul. To quote from our own sidebar:
The points you make in this very article, comparing how in the political culture of the USA pork is a negative and how in the UK it is just accepted as ‘the way it is’ is a very useful observation that needs to be made.
If you use the dismal ‘conservatives’ of Kettering to make that point, that seems like a very worthwhile exercise. Pointing out the reasons underpinning the complete non-meeting of minds is a big step in the process of changing the meta-context that just accepts something as a given (to wit, ‘pavement politics’). Our job is to change the frames of reference and you do that rather well Paul.
Hear, hear.
Repulsive as they are we need to let these politicians know what we think. Since they are essentially morally vacuous opinion-driven entities with all the self direction of a weather vane we might even get some change in policy. Even without that it can be very satisfying seeing the look on their faces when you come out with what they regard as heresy. The elderly Tory canvasser who came to my door did listen politely to my views on drugs and admit that I had “given him something to think about.” But, I will always remember the former libdem mayor (wife of a previous libdem mayor and a bigshot at the town library) and her reaction to my comment that I really wanted a tight fisted Thatcherite who would fire local government workers and lower my council tax. She looked like she had trodden in something unpleasant and could not get away fast enough.
Up here in Darlington we also have a council that produces gushing press releases about funding that will becoming available for various things (refurbishing the parks, helping ‘young people’, or sometimes ‘disadvantaged people’, you know the old story). The local paper is quite a fine publication but clearly cannot rock the boat too much as it depends on council press releases for its editorial material and council adverts for its livelihood.
They haven’t yet spotted the connection between the articles of this kind that they publish and the little column fillers ‘local company goes bust after eighty years.’
These people are not at all evil or dishonest; they just don’t understand.
I concur wholeheartedly with the above comments.
Recently, I was cruising the “Volokh Conspiracy” site and wandered into a discussion in the comments about liberterianism. The entire comment thread turned into a (rather pointless) argument with one poster who completely rejected any non-statist possibilities, and insisted, relentlessly, that nothing good could ever happen without the action of the state.
It was obvious, as Paul mentions above, that there was no mental connection between the statist and the various more-or-less lib commenters, but the argument was instructive, nonetheless.
One of the hallmarks of the statist mindset is that they simply cannot conceive of any course of action which does not involve a state component, and the more state, generally, the better, as far as they are concerned. It may never be possible to construct any argument which will penetrate such willful obtuseness.
However, there are any number of people who are not so committed to collectivist action over individual freedom and responsibility, and those people are often open to a well structured argument which demonstrates the folly of statist assertions.
Much collectivist doctrine has become an unspoken, default premise upon which enormous programs and expenditures are undertaken without any critical examination of whether or not these claims are justified or have any track record of success.
I appreciate the time and energy it takes for Paul, and many other posters here, among other sites, to examine these issues, organize an analysis, and write the careful examination that truly sheds some light on issues that would otherwise be passed over and forgotten.
It is not the choir that needs to be preached to, nor the obdurate opposition, but those whose minds are still forming various premises upon which to base their approach to life and its problems.
The concepts of individual rights and liberties are the most powerful, revolutionary ideas that have ever been developed, which is why the response from those who oppose those ideas is so venomous and violent.
The greatest threat to the collectivist mentality is an independent mind which knows it exists for its own sake, and has the right to think and live as it sees fit.
Paul, you are a teacher. Don’t stop. Nothing is more desperately needed in an irrational, violent world.
The question arises, to what extent are these “local projects” things which the local people actively want? In general, the smaller the scale of the government, the more responsive it is to local and individual needs, the less its compulsory powers, and the easier to remove oneself from its sphere of incluence, making it more like a co-operative society than a state.
If the money is being spent on projects which the people of the borough would have contributed to voluntarily, in other words, the activity is rather less unjustifiable (if one is prepared to admit gradations of unjustifiability) than if it is being spent on surprises. The round sum of ten thousand pounds (hah!) each, however, makes one suspect the contrary.
I sometimes wonder how different things are in the United States (when I hear the word “investment” or “reinvestment” being used to describe government spending – for example on education or health care).
However, there does seem to be a difference between Britain and some other parts of the world. Here government spending (at least on “local community projects”) is seen not as pork to buy votes, but as highly moral – indeed the highest form of morality.
Even “free market” journals like the “Economist” have this view of government spending (indeed the Economist has that view of even central government Welfare State spending in virtually every country it writes about – although it did recently draw a line in France where the socialist candidate for President has promised everyone the Moon and stars, without a word of how she will pay for her promises).
This attitude is why me carefully explaining that “our sister party in Ohio followed this line and it turned out badly” would be met (at best) with a blank look.
The local Conservative party people really are NOT being corrupt. They just have a different “meta-context” (to use Perry’s term).
Of course, in Britain (and increasingly America), local government is a creature of central government anyway – indeed in Britain the idea that national government can just list a load of things that local government MUST spend money on (and have a big say in how much it spends on them) goes back to at least the Act of 1875 (although things have got lot worse since then), the concept of local ratepayers (property taxpayers). Indeed elected local councils (elected by the local taxpayers – not the modern system of “if it has got a pulse, it has got a vote”) only go back to the 1830’s anyway.
Perhaps what is (to me) a slush fund of ten thousand Pounds per County Councillor is seen as a highly moral thing.
I can hear the arguments without asking “people are always asking for some good little thing to be done, but it is impossible when one has to go through the bureacracy of the County Council, now we can really do some good – why are you looking at me like that Paul?”
Oh yes – there is also (just as one of the comments above suggests) going to be a (local taxpayer financed) “newsletter” explaining the good things the Councilors are doing for the people.
The Labour party started this practice (in various parts of the country) – but the Conservative party people have taken it up.
They regard it (with total honesty) as a highly moral thing to do.
It is indeed a different metacontext.
But (of course) such things are also common in the United States.
I don’t know how it works elsewhere. In York, there is a “ward committee” budget (I don’t know why it’s called a committee, since the only people on the committee are the two or three local councillors). This is maybe £30,000. People in the ward are invited to propose ways of spending this money – projects in the ward. A list of these is sent out to all electors, who can then vote for or against each project. There is also the option for the money to go back into the council’s central pot to be allocated centrally. There is not the option of the money being used for a reduction in council tax.
At this point, I thought that the winners of this ballot become the ones which get the funding, but actually the ward committee (i.e. the local councillors) then gets to sift through and make the final decision.
Anyway, all councillors are given this money to spend, regardless of their party affiliation and there is participation from the public in how it is spent. So in the end, it’s money probably better spent than most of the council budget.
What is pork for the barrel is when leading councillors ensure that the best improvements for the city occur in wards they control, and dumping problem developments in wards of other parties. This appears to happen a lot in York – and I guess all over the place.
On Perter’s points:
I am sure this County Council taxpayers money goes to all councillors (not just Conservative party ones), as I said they are (by the standards of this culture) NOT being corrupt.
On the local point – yes Kettering councillors (as well as County Councillors) also get a ward slush fund budget -accept (of course) they do not think of it as a slush fund.
Interesting to see a man of York on the site.