-
At the end, we had a worse system and more corruption in both local and central government, not less, because there was much less accountability.
This is a pretty bold claim. Not to be that guy, but where is the evidence for a shift in corruption levels across the last 70yrs?
My 2p is people a being pretty basic about the reality of how a more federal system would play out vs a hypothetical ideal.
hugo7-
This is a pretty bold claim. Not to be that guy, but where is the evidence for a shift in corruption levels across the last 70yrs?
Would really need a whole separate thread, for people actually interested, to develop that.
My 2p is people a being pretty basic about the reality of how a more federal system would play out vs a hypothetical ideal.
I thought the debate was growing from simple openings to something more complex and nuanced and doesn't merit that dismissive judgement.
itsbruce
The whole point of federalism is that there isn't just one pot. There's a local pot and a central one; the local pot doesn't need to be fought for and there's a formal basis for the fight over the central pot. In contrast, what we get is central government politicos lying about how much they spend on the regions and no proper measurement to show that one way or the other.
Some countries with federal systems have failed at that, others have done well. The U.S. is a very mixed story. But this is not an endemic problem of federalism; it's a cultural problem in some countries. The problem you do actually have with federalism is consistency of administrative practices and standards across the whole country.
The idea you can't trust local authorities in this country and it's all better run from the centre is quite a Thatcherite one. She had an unwarranted reputation as a deregulator when what she mostly did was hugely centralise power in the U.K, removing power from local authorities, legislating to dictate how they spent their money, moving things like education and health from local to central control. At the end, we had a worse system and more corruption in both local and central government, not less, because there was much less accountability. Central control is not the anti-corruption panacea you seem to think it is.
Nobody was bashing the civil service here.