good news bad news day

On a day when the national and local papers are concentrating on the mass murder which took place in the Cumbria outback the government finally implemented a plan first muted over 8 years ago, the release of information from the treasury as to exactly where every penny we pay in taxes is spent.

Now whether or not this information will be of any use to the every day man in the street is debatable this is not only due to the vast amount of information coming out (5gb plus to download) but because of the complicated nature of the data as it is issued in its raw state.

I am a cynical person at the best of times but this smacks to me as a generous helping hand to accountancy firms who have the knowledge and means to extrapolate the information and to digest and regurgitate it in a way for the man in the street to understand,IF HE PAYS FOR IT.

 This is from the COIN guide:

"COINS contains millions of rows of data; as a consequence the files are large and the data held within the files complex. Using these download files will require some degree of technical competence and expertise in handling and manipulating large volumes of data. As such it is likely that this data will be most easily used by organisations that have such expertise, rather than individuals."

"All of the data contained in COINS are recorded against multiple coding frameworks, with the same piece of data being used in combination with various other pieces of data to produce the documents that Treasury publishes. The way in which these data are combined is complex, and may not be immediately obvious."

"In addition, you may not be able to make comparisons between departments at a detailed level, as departments can, to a large extent, choose the detail at which they report spending on COINS."

Note the first paragraph aimed specifically (for me) at the friends of both the condemned alliance parties, they claimed before the election that the release of this data may in fact lead to up to 6billion pounds worth of savings by the fact that normal people would question inane decision making and thus the money could be diverted elsewhere to do some good, I now use my favourite word in capitals  BOLLOCKS the most likely scenario is that accountants and bankers who have the technological advantage will dissect the information and use it to general 6billion pounds and more for their investors not withstanding the huge bonus pay outs for those who do the work most efficiently.

Note also the last paragraph which states ambiguously that departments can if they wish keep the exact detail of their spending to themselves with impunity, this will of course infuriate the nit pickers and grumblers and set alarm bells ringing for the conspiracy fellows. the main problem I find with government spending is the way items/services are put out to tender but are set in such a way that not all of the best people for the jobs are included within the tendering process.

A lot of that is down to the time it takes to get payment out of a government department, we all of us at some stage have heard or even experienced the speed in which the tax office or social fund will retrieve any monies you inadvertently owe them for whatever reason, while on the other side of the coin smaller possibly more able companies than those employed to work for the government are unable to tender because they have a smaller cash pot and need to be paid when the job is complete not three or four months later when the minister responsible comes back from his latest fact finding mission to some exotic climate to sign off on completion.

So ultimately big business have the advantage when it comes to public outsource work because of the nature and size of the beast(government) so would making the beast smaller be any better for local/smaller business or would the same problems be found? after all most if not all local authorities are looking to make vast savings at the moment and by utilising the smaller firms who do not charge for the name as it were they could in theory make up for the Iceland debacle but unfortunately this will not be the case now the books are open for even the local council audits go through parliamentary circles.

For local government to work and work effectively in the true spirit of looking after their customer base as we the tax payers are looked on then tax at a local level must first be implemented if the Condemnation is to be believed in that they wish to decentralise government then they must be prepared to vote into legislation bills and laws which will ultimately lead to their own redundancy so I will not hold my breath.

On a lighter note to government spending I wrote an Email to my Lib Dem parliamentary incumbent to ask about his support or otherwise regarding the 55% rule for dismissing parliament, all I wanted to know as if he was for or against the idea something that a reply Email could  answered to my satisfaction. What I got           (I suppose in the nature of fair and more open government) was a package sent from the house of commons with a copy of Hansard parliamentary debates for Tuesday 25 may 2010 volume 510 some 48 pages of the days words within the house for that day. very nice of him to bother but the cost of the report £5:00 will no doubt be part of his running cost allowance as will the first class postage from the commons(my postman must think I'm important)which must have been in the region of a fiver as well. I imagine I am not the only one asking Questions of their MP in this new fair open government but worry at just how much more parliament is going to cost us because of this, perhaps that is why they have released the figures now so they can recoup some of the cost in the way of extra corporation tax for those who make fortunes out of deciphering it....