Re: Civil servants overturned plan to offload lb 600m office block lease because of the 'lovely view'

On 2025-02-13 2:23 AM, Adam H. Kerman wrote:

It's an episode of Yes, Prime Minister!
 There are thoughtful ways to handle government efficiency like Lord
Agnew, and then there's Elon Musk. But Agnew is so infuriated by the
obstaclesn presented by the civil service that he's calling for Musk
tactics!
 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/02/13/civil-servants-overturned-plan-offload-london-office-block/

Yes, Minister and Yes, Prime Minister are two of my all-time favourite shows. I have all of the DVDs and the books as well. One of the things revealed in the bonus features on the DVDs was that some of the moments viewers found the most hilarious were also the moments that many viewers thought must have been invented. But according to the features, those preposterous moments were true. The writers, Antony Jay and Jonathon Lynn, apparently had access to retired civil servants who told them about these incidents.
I think Lord Agnew is very likely right: the British Civil Service does what it likes and the politicians are unable or unwilling - or both - to make them change their course. I see no reason to believe that this same situation does not apply in your country and mine.
I am very sympathetic to the idea that governments should be under the control of the politicians rather than the reverse. Having said that, I'm not certain that DOGE is the right way to go about it. But if the US bureaucracy is as effective in subverting the policies of its politicians as the British bureaucrats are, maybe DOGE is the only way that has any prospect of restoring some measure of control over the bureaucrats.
I'm looking forward to our politicians finally getting control over our bureaucracy again once we've finally had an election. The government has apparently grown 40% since COVID started and that's just insane. They hire contractors, often without competition, for much more than the cost of simply hiring someone to do a job, and great gobs of money have simply disappeared without a trace, sometimes to ministers who claimed aboriginal status without a bit of proof. It's all quite concerning.
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Rhino