The paper is available here- is open access and very short but I think really important because if defence spending is increasing, it is really important it is democratically accountable
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
The Chair of the PAC could be told, the PAC itself could be told. These are all things that have been done in the past. And a super injunction does not trump Parliamentary privilege
We (me, Laurence Ferry and Aileen Murphie) argue in our recent paper in Public Money and Management that both these reasons were incorrect- there were established ways for MPs to hold the government to account for information that has to be kept secret- the NAO could be told
But what they didn't discuss was the implications for accountability: basically the Ministry of Defence concealed the programme for years because it was secret and there was a superinjunction related to it.
The Afghan Response Route was written up brilliantly and described by the National Audit Office in the UK and they explained the reasons why the route was created www.nao.org.uk/reports/the-...
The Afghan Response route may be slowly passing away from memory but there are important lessons. Last week the PM called for more military spending but what the crisis over the Afghan Response route exposed was that accountability for defence spending isn't working in the UK
I worked on that inquiry- and there was lots of evidence not just from the MPs concerned- but also from thinktanks like @instituteforgovernment.org.uk Kings Fund and Taxpayers alliance- that accounts were not being used and there is a lot of academic evidence too that backs that up.
Firstly on the "right" bit. The Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee did two reports when I worked there called Accounting for Democracy: in both reports the committee showed that currently accounts are not working for Parliament to help scrutinise the government
Mel Stride made a speech @instituteforgovernment.org.uk on Monday which included a line I don't think has been picked up on. He described "meaningless" figures in the accounts and called for much more granular data about spending to be disclosed. He is right and his speech is significant.
Sadly Alex I think the answer is no! Based on previous experience this metaphor for UK state incapacity will continue and as you say the consequences could be awful (I just hope if there is a fire it happens at night when noone is there because I shudder to think about how you evacuate the palace)
But there is something more here which I think is important and I see which is the undervaluing of humanities research- you see it in academic papers, in posts about how to do academia and in a general presumption even in my own discipline that all good academic work is science.
@hetanshah.bsky.social is completely right about @britishlibrary.bsky.social. The NAO should also do work on this- their remit covers the efficiency, effectiveness and economy of public spending and this fits right in there. We need our national library back at work!
Rwanda here we go again- a political debate which has little link to policy (again). None of the elections back to 2015, were covered as a choice of policies- all of them were covered in precisely this way, with politicians asked who is going to win not what are you going to do!
Absolutely right- its a problem throughout the NHS system too that we don't recognise Coeliacs enough. My partner is coeliac and was recently in hospital. At one point, she ended up with a dinner of mashed potato and carrots, as there was no other coeliac dinner option
This will be really good. Ben knows his stuff and I'm really looking forward to it.
Eg, if I was a Conservative/Reform swing voter- the media is doing a good job at the moment of telling me Farage is beating Badenoch- but a really poor one of informing me about what the difference between them is so I can choose which one I prefer. Similar on the left with the LDs/Greens v Labour.
A lot in this- one of the things I find really depressing is coverage of election campaigns which focusses on who is winning not what is the choice between the 2,3 or 4 parties? Not in the sense of this is the choice you voter should make- but this is the choice you are making...
The key details are all here so get your papers in! durham.ac.uk/business/new...
For those interested, we have another workshop at Durham in December- this time on accountability and participation. The deadline for abstracts is the 6th October with registration deadline in November. Its a really topical area both for academics and policy makers.
Really thought provoking article- captures both the farness and closeness of the past- lovely writing!
You might be a better researcher in your own subject (tho I'm not sure) if ybou aren't aware of other fields and other ways of thinking- but I don't think you can be a better thinker in general or understand more about the world yourself.
Its probably as important as a method of education as the formal stuff you do at university- and its good to have tons of different perspectives in the room- I learnt hugely from friends who did physics, medicine, English, engineering and economics and I hope I contributed too.
I completely agree with this. Also I'd note that students talking to each other about each other's courses and ideas beyond those courses is a key part of university education. The chat about the existence of God or the morality of Friends at 3 am matters
I kind of wonder about truss. She suffered the most embarrassing defenestration of any PM really in British history- and I wonder if this is the only way to cope.
And by doing so cutting state capacity- this is the crazy thing about university cuts- you are actually cutting the ability of your state to respond in the future... and worse you are contracting out the choice of what to cut to a group of uni managers with no incentive to maximise state capacity
Should have said the references in the book are to pages 64-5 where you will find the evidence behind the Zircon and Falklands cases mentioned above
I'd be really interested in the views of people who are more integrated into Parliament and policy than me like @ruthfox.bsky.social and @matthewfright.bsky.social
The examples that I mention above and a lot more about similar issues are included in the book that Aileen Murphie, Laurence Ferry and I wrote together about the NAO last year www.routledge.com/Holding-Gove...
Lastly, as context, whilst the National Audit Office would always take rightly account of security advice from government, it doesn't have to as its work is protected by Parliamentary Privilege and its head is an officer of the House of Commons.
I don't think the FT article covered whether @meghillier.bsky.social before 2024 or Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown since 2024 were informed about this spending but that could have been the route used to maintain Parliament's knowledge of events.
