4 Comments

• Nick 2nd Apr '09 - 8:33pm

  The Select Committee is well behind the times and in this instance I actually have some sympathy for Boris.

  At the instigation of the Liberal Democrats here the London Assembly conducted a full investigation in to the debacle, including taking oral evidence from the Mayor, and then published a detailed report all within a month. You can see the report here – http://www.london.gov.uk/assembly/reports/transport/snow-report-0309.pdf.

  We couldn’t quite work out why the Transport Select Committee needed to look at it again.

  Louise Ellman and the other Labour members of the Transport Select Committee were making political capital out of this. I bet they wouldn’t have conducted an investigation had such disruption taken place in any other city in the UK.

  The Select Committee would be more useful in taking this government, and particularly Gordon Brown, to task for the mess it has got London’s transport in to with the Tube PPP deal.

  I think I can guess what Gwynweth Dunwoody would have done.

• Tom 2nd Apr '09 - 9:12pm

  “At the instigation of the Liberal Democrats here the London Assembly conducted a full investigation in to the debacle, including taking oral evidence from the Mayor, and then published a detailed report all within a month. You can see the report here – http://www.london.gov.uk/assembly/reports/transport/snow-report-0309.pdf. ”

  Indeed there is, and I’ve read it, and it’s pretty scathing. In fact, this is presumably what Boris and Graham Stringer were referring to during this exchange:

  GS: … There’s been some criticism from the people who’ve already looked at this from the GLA that….

  BJ: Well I don’t think there have actually. I don’t think there have. You’re talking complete tripe

  Chair: Would you let Mr Stringer put his question

  GS: …that there was poor coordination between boroughs

  BJ: Complete tripe. Nonsense. Bollocks. Nonsense

  So is Boris denying that there’s been ‘some criticism from … the GLA’ (or, more accurately, the London Assembly) and then denying that there was poor co-ordination between the boroughs, which IIRC was one finding of the LATC report, or what is he saying? To quote the report, quoting *the boroughs themselves*:

  “The responses the Committee received suggest that the level of co-ordination was not what it might have been. The London Borough of Enfield cited ‘a need for greater co-ordination for gritting arrangements across borough boundaries’. It went on to say ‘without such co-ordination the efforts of those boroughs who are better organised are in part negated because … so far as the motoring and general public are concerned London is a homogenous area’.
  Similarly, the London Borough of Haringey noted ‘ we did not coordinate with any other London boroughs or TfL prior to the
  snowfall’. The London Borough of Harrow highlighted ‘a need for a coordinated London response at an earlier stage’. ”

  I’d say that proves Stringer was right and the report did indeed suggest that there was poor co-ordination between boroughs, based on the testimony of, er, the boroughs.

  This fits with a couple of anecdotes I’ve seen about the conditions in West London, too, where there was almost a line in the road where things became impassable at the borough boundary. Boris, in response to what his own boroughs are telling him, says ‘tripe’ and ‘nonsense’. I suggest Boris can’t even spin his story straight these days. Harrow and Enfield are Tory boroughs, so they’re hardly making a partisan point here.

  “I think I can guess what Gwynweth Dunwoody would have done.”

  Ripped Boris a new one, I suspect, given that it’s now pretty obvious that he wasn’t on top of the situation when he should have been. Part of the problem is Boris now being seen as a soft touch, after the Vaz affair. Throw him some questions, watch him squirm and get petulant, get a headline. The other problem is Boris not having a handle on the job after nearly a year.

• Nick 3rd Apr '09 - 8:51am

  Tom,

  I agree with you entirely about Boris’ poor performance, his lack of detail and his not having a handle on the job. It’s just that in this particular instance the Transport Select Committee wasted a session to indulge in what I think was pretty cheap political point scoring. A detailed and comprehensive report has been done by a devolved body, Transport for London, and the Mayor, have agreed to act on the report’s recommendations – and checks will be made to ensure they do – so what purpose does the Select Committee’s inquiry actually serve?

  What would Graham Stringer have been saying today had a Select Committee come and tried to have a pop when he was leader of Manchester City Council? He would have been shouting about how people in Parliament know nothing about life on the ground etc, etc.

  Right that’s enough of me supporting the Mayor. Off to find something more sensible to beat up Boris with.

• Matthew Huntbach 3rd Apr '09 - 10:12am

  To me this shows up the nonsensical nature of the directly elected executive mayor system. Someone elected to that post cannot be expected to have the detailed technical knowledge to take direct executive control of something like a transport system. A public election is simply not the best way of getting someone into a job which requires detailed technical knowledge.

  Elected members are laypeople and their job is to give a layperson’s input into the process, and to take final responsibility for its approval. So they need to ensure the right technical people are doing the details, and to respond when those technical people reach a position where there are options which require a customer input. Getting the balance right is crucial – the technicians need to be people who see it as their job to present options not to make the choices. The elected members need to know when it is best to let those with technical knowledge get on it with it, and when they need to lay down guidance. They need to be able to scrutinise the technicians, which includes getting advice from other independent technicians, if they feel the technicians have over-stepped their role by not presenting all reasonable options as a choice.

  It seems to me to be clear that the job of providing input, making choices, scrutinising the process, and accepting final responsibility must fall to a representative committee and not to a single person. Elections should be about choosing people who we can trust together would make the decisions we would make had we the time, ability and willingness to investigate thoroughly. They should not be about choosing who has the wackiest personality, which seems to be what mayoral elections come to.