01/03/2014
An excellent piece languishes on
Autonomous Mind, attended so far by a single comment, written by this author. But then, Saturday is the quietest day for blogging, so if you want a piece to be more unread than usual, today is the day to do it â and more so since the faithful are at play in Torquay.
AM's theme is a familiar one â the manifest inadequacies of UKIP. Such criticism as is on offer though is kindly meant. He like most of us, wishes UKIP well. We want to see it succeed in its declared goal of leading us out of the EU. We just wish it would do the job better and, unlike the faithful, will continue to criticise it until it does.
On the more substantive point, the essence of the criticism is over the handling of the Somerset floods (and the floods in general), which afforded the anti-EU movement an excellent opportunity to point out the malign influence of EU laws and policy-making, all within the context of a major and long-running disaster for those involved, and for the taxpayer who is going to have to pick up the pieces.
The particular insult for the taxpayers is that they will find themselves paying twice â one for the formulation and implementation of policies which were a major causal factor in the flooding, and then again to clean up the mess left by these failed policies.
At the very least, those in office owe to the hard-pressed people to pay the bills to diagnose the causes of the problems properly, and then institute the correct remedies. And, if they fail to do so, that is where political parties come in â identifying and then highlighting the failures and then offering effective remedies.
Even the kindest of UKIP's critics, however, will admit that the party's response has been lacklustre, and it is of little use now bringing the issue up now at the Spring Conference, when he failed to do so earlier, when the media circus was in town.
Even then, Farage has learned nothing from his experience,
telling the faithful that we need a public inquiry into the handling of the floods by the Environment Agency.
"We have handed over the day-to-day management of many important aspects of our lives to quangos like - yes, you've guessed it - the Environment Agency," he says, then displaying the shallowness of his appreciation of the issues by continuing:
... whose priorities appear to be more concerned on the preservation of molluscs, beetles and water voles than our farmer and our householders; compliance with EU directives being more important than flood prevention. If I lived in Somerset, I would be very angry at the lack of dredging, which this time last year, people cried out for.
This post is not the place to take apart these "man-in-pub" nostrums, or do much more than utter a weary groan of dismay when all the man can tell us is that: "A full public inquiry is needed to establish the basis upon which this quango operates".
AM has already taken his scalpel to the fatuity of the inquiry idea, which has even now narrowed just to an examination of the Environment Agency.
A brief glance at the pages of this blog, however, would very quickly tell acquaint even a casual reader with the complexity of this issue, in which the Environment Agency is but one player and, as a contributor to the events which led up to the flooding, probably only a minor one.
Basically, we are dealing with ten layers of government here, starting with the global dimension and the 1992 Rio
Convention on Biodiversity, which has then been hard-wired into UNECE agreements and then into EU directives, in particular the Habitats and Birds Directives, the Water Framework Directive and the Floods Directive.
Already there we have three layers of governance â global, regional and sub-regional, and then we have national government, represented by Defra (but also with the malign presence of DECC in the wings), plus the Non Departmental Executive Agencies (not quangos), in the form of the Environment Agency and also Natural England.
At a local level of governance, we have the two-tier system of local government, which means that we have Somerset County Council, and then the local authorities, such a Sedgemoor District Council, all of which have been active players.
With that, because of the peculiarities of the ancient system of water management on the Levels and Moors, we have the Internal Drainage Boards, and more recently the Somerset Internal Drainage Board Consortium, which has had its own separate part to play at the intermediate level.
Then, as we are discovering, there is the shadowy role of NGOs, such as the RSBP, the WWF and the Wildlife Trust, plus many others. Unlike the other actors, these range freely through all levels of governance, from global to local, often publicly-funded but with not the slightest degree of accountability or responsibility.
Yet, of all the actors, it is these NGOs which have probably been the most influential in shaping policies which led to the Somerset disaster. The organisations have been so fully integrated into the mechanics of policy-making and implementation that they have become part of our government.
Even at this superficial level of analysis, however, one can readily see that an inquiry into the role of the Environment Agency, could only scratch the surface. The call to look at one actor of many, in ten layers of governance, is shallow, fatuous and ultimately self-defeating.
Yet, if UKIP is ever to be taken seriously as a party, it must start exploring fundamental issues such as "who rules Britain". In the context of the Somerset floods, the answer is as much likely to be the RSPB as it is the EU and its directives. Locally,
Tory MPs are doing a far better job of explaining the problem, and are avoiding the mistake of focusing on the Environment Agency.
Unfortunately, what typifies Farage and more than adequately marks out many of the people who join UKIP, is that "man-in-pub" superficiality. That is why the party and its leader can never be taken seriously and why â as long as they fail to progress â the party will never be much more than a dustbin for the protest vote.
