Keir Starmer

[InversneckieDob]

Some argue though that the State is already bloated and unproductive and that increases in taxation often result in reduced tax receipts. I’m inclined to the view that the Public Sector is often inefficient and that it generally doesn’t offer the taxpayer value for money … walk into any Council office or, dare I say it, the NHS and observe, critically, just how many front-line staff there are doing absolutely ***** all!

A lot of bell-cow innacuracies in play in that post.
The factual position is that, at front line, service provision level, public services are grossly underfunded.
The inefficiencies are much higher up the food chain.
The problems, in the short term, date back to the Major government's fragmentation of the broader public service into "Executive agencies" and such like (done with a view to privitisation and greater private sector involvement), run by boards and executives with a "style over substance" ethos.
Because successive Governments for the last fifty odd years have been hostile to the very concept of public service, there has been zero longterm, strategic planning and investment.
This has led to the current issues within public service.
Until a longterm cultural ethos is adopted, putting frontline service top of the aspirational pile, we'll never progress.
Greater private sector involvement doesn't work (see the utilities and public transport) and Governments remain hostile to them conceptually.

[Shetland Don]

A lot of bell-cow innacuracies in play in that post.
The factual position is that, at front line, service provision level, public services are grossly underfunded.
The inefficiencies are much higher up the food chain.
The problems, in the short term, date back to the Major government's fragmentation of the broader public service into "Executive agencies" and such like (done with a view to privitisation and greater private sector involvement), run by boards and executives with a "style over substance" ethos.
Because successive Governments for the last fifty odd years have been hostile to the very concept of public service, there has been zero longterm, strategic planning and investment.
This has led to the current issues within public service.
Until a longterm cultural ethos is adopted, putting frontline service top of the aspirational pile, we'll never progress.
Greater private sector involvement doesn't work (see the utilities and public transport) and Governments remain hostile to them conceptually.

“The factual position is that …”, debate over.