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item0052D 826, 827
826
29 September 2003
Busking
parable for our time
 The
London Underground is being transformed, by a simple "political" device.
As part of an imaginative management experiment, busking is being permitted and licensed - rather than
prohibited, as it has been since time
immemorial. Conflict
has been removed, use
of Police time has dropped by 82%, and many more musicians have a
legitimate chance to earn a living.
For all my life, busking has been prohibited on the London Underground -
in spite of the pleasure that it brings to many travellers - including
myself. For the last fifty years, snarling recorded announcements have
resonated through the tunnels, warning travellers against encouraging the
illegal buskers - and yet the travelling public, motivated by common-sense
and appreciation, have continued to support them.
And the truth has at last dawned. " Prohibition"
has been abandoned, and a licensing regime introduced - the buskers are not
paid, and they must rely entirely on donations received. And the
world, suddenly, looks quite different.
We should learn this lesson, in other
spheres. We are wrong to perpetuate the prohibition of psychoactive
drugs - the awful mistake made by the USA in 1919, and copied by the UK in
1920. We remain in thrall to the US obsession with the criminalisation
of "narcotics", and that obsession generates untold criminality and distress
throughout the globe - for those who seek to abandon prohibition check out
the Angel Declaration.
We are wrong to perpetuate the idea that "immigration
is illegal" - when migration has been one of the principal
driving forces of global development, particularly British emigration.
While new political problems are indeed posed by current rates of global
population growth, our whole stance must change - from one of prohibition to
one of managed movement, sensitive to the perceptions and feelings of host
populations. By reinforcing anti-immigrant feelings - as current EU/UK
policies do - we are stirring up greater problems for our societies in the
longer-term.
Akin to
prohibition, we over-use coercion in the management of civic
order. We gain little by fixing the school-leaving age at 16 - better
to reduce it to 14 and strive to maintain the school population by
persuasion and attraction (including school allowances) rather than to use
force against our children and their parents. There would be fewer
classroom conflicts, much less pupil violence, a better quality of learning
- and a massive reduction in disruptive "exclusions". The imprisonment
of parents, for the truancy of their children, is a barbaric practice, and
should be discontinued see Schools wrongfully coerce. And we are also wrong to encourage Police and
Court intervention with curfew and social control orders, sadly beloved of
New Labour.
The challenge is to devise systems of civic
order which are rooted in consent and consensus, in mutual respect and
sensitivity - not to send in the Police at the drop of a hat, and expand the
size of our prison population. In our social attitudes, we have become
too censorious, too authoritarian, too insensitive to the dignity and human
rights of our fellow citizens.
- The time is right for a change of key.
Drop me a line
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827
3
October
2003
Hidden
Blair Agenda: TU High Noon
What is Blair's game-plan?
Bournemouth was characterised by a bewildering lack of substance.
I
think he is planning a High Noon show-down with the public sector
unions. He knows how popular, electorally, that would be. And
remember,
he is the man who joked about
the scars which he bore, from attempts to achieve structural public
service reforms.
Between Blair and the TU Left there is no single "Big Issue"
- but there is an accumulation of pin-pricks, and he plans to orchestrate
them, for his High Noon.
Just consider the logjam of issues that is building up, on many of
which the TU Left is in a weak strategic position.
- an issue of blinding triviality, having had the stuffing knocked out of
it by Gordon Brown last Autumn - the whole project is now a shadow of its
former self (Wales will not be having Foundation Hospitals anyway..)
- yet the Left continue to treat it as a cause celebre -
Conference's symbolic opposition will play into TB's hands.
Better "Employment Rights"
- New Labour has a good record on
workers'
rights, but "employment rights" is code for "trade union rights"
- and on this, the TU position is in my view misconceived - TB will win
this one.
Two-tier workforces
- this is also an issue which the TU Left will probably lose, in spite of
the apparent "victory" in the local government sector - the TU approach is
in my view wrong in principle, and will fail in the longer-term - they are
giving TB an easy ride on this one..
No more privatisation
- here, the TU position is absurd - I share a concern with the
scope of outsourcing,
which in some sectors has already gone too far - but political judgment
should be exercised for each sector, each proposition - there can be no
blanket judgments here, and the TU Left has painted itself into a corner.
Private Finance Initiative
- the same considerations apply here - the TU demand for the abandonment
of PFI as a contractual system is, quite literally, absurd, and TB will
will on this one.
In all these respects, TB can accuse the Trade Unions of being rigid,
protectionist, dogmatic, and selfish. The truth is that the contemporary
TU movement is - first and foremost - a public sector staff
association, whose members enjoy better-than-average terms and conditions
of employment and who are determined to protect their privileges, in
particular index-linked State-guaranteed pensions. These are worthy
TU causes, and the public-sector unions are perfectly entitled to pursue
them. But they have precious little to do with the future of
socialism.
- It will be quite a shoot-out.
Do you think
I am talking through my hat? Drop me a
line
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