With the new Labour government having already announced the establishment of a number of new quangos, we thought it would be a good idea to keep an eye on where our politicians are ceding power. That’s why each month, William Yarwood will update us with the most egregious examples of how arm’s length bodies are taking over our political life.
The reactions to Labour’s first King’s Speech were predictable. Pro-development Yimbys praised the planning reforms, civil liberty activists decried the smoking ban, and various think tanks celebrated minor policy victories while criticising new taxes and regulations.
However, if you care about democracy, there’s one aspect of Labour’s agenda that should particularly concern you: the Government’s plans to establish new groups for employment, energy, and transport. These include Skills England, Great British Energy, and Great British Rail, along with a strengthened Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), which the new Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, is relying on to prove her fiscal prudence. Since then, they’ve also added a new Office for Value for Money.
But what are Great British Energy, Skills England, and Great British Rail? Simply put, they’re quangos – quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisations. Operating at ‘arm’s length’ from the government, quangos have become deeply interwoven with our political process. Impossible to ignore and lacking democratic accountability, they perpetually seek more influence, with politicians often granting it to them.
Labour’s barrage of announcements since taking office might give the impression that they are keen to govern and put their newfound power to use. Yet they betrayed their true attitude when they announced that a black hole had been left in the finances caused partly by the failure to budget for the independent pay review bodies’ recommendations for public sector pay. Rather than examine the productivity of the public sector, Labour simply met their demands.
This and the litany of new quangos they’ll establish show that they adhere to the same managerial ideology that has plagued British politics for decades: stakeholderism.
Stakeholderism, as explained by the Adam Smith Institute’s Sam Bidwell, is ‘the idea that a dense concentration of power in the hands of elected politicians is inherently dangerous’. Hence, decisions usually made by politicians are delegated to so-called ‘experts’ – judges, regulators, bureaucrats, and academics – who make decisions on behalf of the elected political class. These actors, funded by taxpayers, form quangos that prescribe policy solutions to the government, often out of step with the average Briton.
The true triumph of stakeholderism was during the New Labour era when Blair and Brown ushered in a golden age of managerial elitism by creating institutions like the Supreme Court and granting the Bank of England independence, all the while stripping cabinet-level ministers of traditional powers.
However, the growth of the quangocracy continued after New Labour, despite David Cameron’s Conservative Party promising to reverse it. Cameron pledged a ‘bonfire of bureaucracy’, yet five in six quango staff members retained their jobs. He and the then chancellor George Osborne also established new quangos such as the OBR and the NHS Commissioning Board, both of which are still with us today.
Starmer’s new regime is expanding and entrenching this, and signals a continuation of a longstanding political culture of stakeholderism and managerial elitism – all of which will be paid for by us.
Quangos are not elected officials, have very little oversight and the majority of people have no idea that they exist. Nobody has ever voted a quango into existence, so their funding does not have taxpayers’ consent. And worse still, they often end up having their own agendas and interests which are contradictory to those of the British public.
The result of politicians ceding power in this way is that they essentially become glorified local councillors, muttering on about potholes and bin collections rather than legislating on national policy issues. If MPs want to give away all their power, what’s the point in voting for them?
With Starmer at the helm, the quangocracy will continue its irrepressible rise. It’s time that someone started to keep a close eye on the growing number of acronyms, commissions, and committees. Every month, this new column, ‘Quango Watch’, will interrogate a different quango – when it was set up, what it does, how it’s funded and whether it’s really worth the money. Stay tuned.
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