Liberal Vision

What do you get if you put a dictator, a movie mogul and Lord Mandelson in the same room?

Answer: Pretty much anything they want – it would seem.

 

The latest loony suggestion from the Government, announced today, is to FORCE Internet Service Providers to suspend access to those internet users who illegally download music and films.

It’s a stupid suggestion – forcing ISPs to take action on offenders. If piracy is illegal its surely a police matter – not a matter for business. And who exactly is going to police the ISPs to ensure that they do as instructed, another quango? And in any event who’s to say that those most adept at piracy will not be able to evade ths ISPs ( i dont know how but I’m sure they do). All we are likely to see are the occassional offenders and the inept being caught in this particular trap. Wrong.Wrong.Wrong.

And talking of wrong..  How long can the unelected Business Secretary be allowed treat this country as his own personal fiefdom? He returns to the scene of last years crime (yachts, Russians, George Osborne) to holiday with the Rothschilds. He meets Gaddaffi’s son, and within days the whole Libyan bomber fiasco unfolds. On the same holiday he meets the billionaire producer David Geffen (who co-founded Dreamworks with Steven Speilberg) and before his Corfu tan has faded his department is announcing a major u-turn on illegal downloads.

Hollywood film companies are reportedly losing hundreds of millions of pounds from illegal downloads, and have launched a very active lobbying operation to change the law to make it harder. Coincidence?

Well I for one can imagine the conversation that Lord Rothschild has with his mates… “Fancy a few days in Corfu Mr Geffen? ” ….”No thanks Roths,bit busy”… “Did I mention that Nat is bringing along Mandy from the UK?” …” Really? Shall we say Friday 6pm – I’ll come in the yacht – no need to make up the beds”.

I am sure that the unelected Business Secretary will produce some sneary response and call any suggestion of a link between the meeting and the u-turn on policy as “insulting” “absurd” or some such thing.

But we will remember that he’s said all that before and not once but twice has been forced to quit from UK office (you remember the undisclosed home loan from Paymaster General Geoffrey Robinson and the Hinduja passport affair). So here’s hoping his arrogance does for him again. In the meantime it will be well-worth watching where he spends his Christmas break. Ski-ing anyone?

Tags: David Geffen, illegal downloads, ISPs, Peter Mandelson

Police to focus strategy on winning over the Tories

An internal report released by the Metropolitan Police under Freedom of Information laws has revealed that  fewer than one crime is solved by every 1,000 closed circuit television cameras per year. Thats a lot of cameras for not very much.

And yes its a pretty shocking waste of money that could have been spent better elsewhere (or better still been in our own pockets). And yes we are way too spied upon, with 1% of the world population and 20% of all cctvs. And yes its laughable that the Home Office have defended the use of CCTV’s, saying cameras could “help communities feel safer”…… But in reality that’s old, if still troubling, news.

What worried me was the part under a section headlined “Strategic Issues”, where it said: “Potential change of Government – the Conservatives are not CCTV friendly – we need to start showing that we are targeting serious crime.”

 So if I get a knife put to my face in the street this evening – that somehow the nine cctvs on my 4 minute walk to the newsagent miss – are the police going to take it even less seriously than they did last time (and trust me that would be pretty difficult even for them)? Answer would appear to be, yes. 

Depressingly here we have another organisation that is clearly intending to spend the next 9 months focusing on ways to “meet targets” and win over politicians, rather than get on with the job of policing the streets and solving crime. Call me old-fashioned but I liked it when the BBC did good tv programmes, doctors did medicine and police did crime-prevention. I dont see how any of them have the time to do their day job if they are all going to be spending  the next nine months trying to second guess what the next Government (most likely a Tory one according to the Met police you’ll note) wants.

Tighten your seatbelts, its going to be a bumpy ride! Oh and be careful when you’re out and about on the streets – and if you do become a victim of crime, best make sure its a “serious” one if you want anything done about it.

 

Tags: cctv, Metropolitan police

Vince Cable’s moral compass

It is said that you can judge a person by the company they keep. In that case, Vince Cable’s halo has slipped a bit.

His decision to give his support to Compass in its campaign for a High Pay Commission to curb “excessive” pay is bad politically, economically and morally.

Compass is an avowedly socialist campaign group, the primary focus of which is the Labour Party. It is a partisan body that has for some time sought to make Labour even more interventionist, statist and illiberal. Vince Cable should not be giving it intellectual succour.

In addition, the very idea that the government should impose maximum wages upon individuals should be anathema to him both as a liberal and as an economist.

I have written an article on the Institute of Economic Affairs blog explaining some reasons why maximum wage legislation is a bad idea. On the one hand, “There is no reason, functionally or morally, why a person should not enjoy any amount of wealth”. On the other, free economies have a far better reputation for wealth creation, poverty alleviation and even wealth distribution than interventionist ones. So maximum wage legislation is unfair both on an individual and a community-wide basis.

On top of this, Vince’s reason for supporting the High Pay Commission is flawed. In his words “There is no justification for massive pay and bonus awards in financial institutions, the most important of which are guaranteed or owned or have been rescued by the tax payer. Transparency and tax are important but a High Pay Commission looking at both equity and economic aspects is a welcome suggestion too.”

Firstly, the justification for “massive pay and bonus awards in financial institutions” is the same as it always was: it is necessary to attract the best talent. That the industry spectacularly failed in 2007 does not mean that there is no need to chase talent in 2009. What was wrong with the bonus culture in 2007 (and before, and indeed since) was not the size of the bonuses but the behaviour for which they were being paid. Had Compass proposed a Short-Term Gain Bonus Commission they might be on to something, but that is not what they are proposing. In attacking the size of the bonus rather than the behaviour they are rewarding, Compass is off the mark.

It is also not true that “the most important” financial institutions “are guaranteed or owned or have been rescued by the tax payer”, unless he is referring to the Bank of England’s lender of last resort function, which is centuries old and has been exercised without the need for maximum wage legislation for all that time. Only some financial institutions are actually owned by the taxpayer; Barclays and HSBC did not require a bailout and should not be subject to interference. Indeed, Lloyds TSB would be in a far better state had the government not effectively strong-armed it into merging with the bankrupt HBOS.

Of course, the government should not have a stake in the banks. Even if a bailout was necessary it should be reversed as soon as possible. But while the government does own shares in the banks it has a duty to taxpayers to get the best return on its investment. This will require the best talent available in the industry, which means that state-owned banks will need to compete with the rest of the sector by offering pay and bonuses commensurate with market rates. In fact, one cannot escape the feeling that the idea of limiting pay in the private sector is just a means of keeping down the costs to state-owned industries; a case of government being forced to intervene further to address the consequences of its past interventions.

His final point is the one I have discussed at in my IEA blog posting. The “equity and economic aspects” of government intervention are far more harmful to the poor than are the effects of leaving people alone. Free societies are not only fairer than less free ones, with the poorest owning a larger proportion of the nation’s wealth than in more interventionist economies, but they also create more wealth, so that the poor enjoy vastly more absolute wealth in free economies than in command economies.

Maximum wage legislation is a bad idea. It is also a bad idea for the Liberal Democrat’s shadow chancellor to support the socialist wing of the Labour party.

Tags: Compass, Maximum wage, Vince Cable

MacKaskill : a man out of his depth

The decision to release the convicted Libyan bomber was botched from start to end. Lets ignore for a moment the unelected Business Secretary’s involvement in the process.

1. Why did MacKaskill – the Scottish Justice Secretary – feel the need to MEET the convicted bomber ? There was no need. Representations could and should have been made in writing without the need to actually go and have a chat with the man.

2. Why did the bomber drop his appeal immediately following that meeting ? What was said at that meeting that led to that extraordinary decision? Under Scots law, dropping an appeal is not a necessary precondition of compassionate release.

3. Why was the decision released to the media BEFORE the relatives of the victims or the Scottish parliament were told?

All round this was handled about as ineptly as it could have been. Why? My suspicion is because it did involve business deals with Libya, pressure from the Business Secretary and the Prime Minister, and the desire for the appeal not to be heard (quite possibly where failings in the original trial would be highlighted). That led to hurried and poor decisions being made. Overall, I am afraid this speaks of (yet another) senior official,when really tested, just not being up to the job.

The Scottish parliament meet this afternoon in an emergency session. I doubt that anything satisfactory will come out of the emergency debate. But will watch with interest.

I hope that the Lib Dems will continue to put pressure on the Prime Minister to be questioned on this. Why parliament is in recess for so long – when important issues of state go unexamined and unexplained – is beyond me.

Tags: Gordon Brown, Libya, Mackaskill

Gordon Brown : a man with no sense of priorities

Gordon Brown has been under pressure, for several days now, to say something about the release of the convicted Libyan bomber, Abdulbaset al-Megrahi.

And rightly so. After all Colonel Gaddaffi has gone public thanking “his friend” Gordon Brown for the release of al Megrahi. And Gaddffi’s son has made it clear that the convicted bomber was always part of Libya’s discussions with Britain on oil and other trade. But to date, nothing from our Prime Minister.

Last night I was listening to the radio five live news (Sunday 2230) and I hear that Downing Street are describing the England Ashes victory as ”exhilarating”  and that “Gordon Brown will be writing to the captain Andrew Strauss to congratulate the team”.

Can someone tell me how it can be construed as, in anyway, appropriate to maintain radio silence on the release of Megrahi, yet come out promptly to comment on a game of cricket?

Tags: Andrew Strauss, Ashes, Colonel Gaddaffi, Gordon Brown, Libya