Downing Street Says » Lord Birt

» Friday, March 18, 2005

Lord Birt

Asked if it was correct the Prime Minister had commissioned work from Lord Birt about the Cabinet Office and the Treasury, the PMS said the story was completely without foundation, and was completely wrong.

Asked what work Lord Birt did do, the PMS said we never went into details about the work Lord Birt did. One Strategy Unit report he had been involved in had been published on their website. We had always explained he was an unpaid, part-time adviser to the Prime Minister who had looked into a number of different issues.

Asked where the PMS thought the stories were coming from, the PMS said she did not know.

Asked if there was a review being conducted into the Cabinet Office by someone else, the PMS said again that there was no foundation to the story.

1 Comment »

Lord Birt is there to think of lots of stupid ideas that Blair isn’t clever enough to come up with himself. New stupid ideas are necessary because the political system naturally rules out the adoption of every sensible idea that it has heard about.

The system, however, has no defence against stupid ideas that it hasn’t heard about yet, which is where out-of-the-box brains like Lord Birt’s are in demand.

So, in transport, there’s his idea of building all motorways in duplicate, one tolled and one old and free and which bears the costs of all the trucks. This is being implemented on the M6 and is stupid.

The sensible idea would be to not have so much f***ing traffic in the first place: double that in 1990, and we’re not noticeably better off. And we’ve got mobile phones now.

Then there’s the marketization of the telephone directory enquiries. It might not be Birt’s idea in particular, but it’s exactly the sort of dumb stupid incredible idea it’s his job to think of.

The House of Commons has been unable to interview this fellow for years, which has annoyed them bitterly. Is he not proud of his work or something?

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200102/cmselect/cmtlgr/655/65503.htm
Comment by Julian Todd — 23 Mar 2005 on 1:49 pm | Link

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Lord Birt

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