Shaun Wright Wins South Yorkshire Police and Crime Commissioner Rubber Stamp Election!
ElectionOracle / UK Politics Nov 12, 2012 - 02:11 AM GMTBy: Nadeem_Walayat
The people of South Yorkshire will be asked this Thursday to vote for their Police and Crime Commissioner by selecting a name from a list of unknown persons that have been put forward by each of 5 political parties, which means voting will be purely along party lines which given that the Tory / Lib-Dem coalition government at mid-term is at it's maximum level of unpopularity virtually ensures that the election for South Yorkshire will purely amount to a rubber stamping exercise by the 18% or so voters who will actually turn out to vote, regardless of the fact whether the candidate is actually any good for the job or not.
The PCC elections were flawed right from the outset because of the extremely large £5000 deposit required to stand that is ten times the size required to stand as a candidate as a Member of Parliament, which has resulted in the exclusion of all independant candidates. Therefore the ONLY candidates to stand in South Yorkshire are -
Shaun Wright - Career Labour politician
Robert Teal - Retail Businessman - Liberal Democrat
David Allen - Sales Manager - English Democrats.
Jonathan Arnott - Career Politician - UKIP
Nigel Benson - Former Chief Inspector for Manchester Police - Conservative
Q. Who is the best man for the job?
A. None of the above!
In my opinion the least best persons for the job are career politicians, instead it would have been far better to employ Police Commissioners on the basis of merit i.e. persons with experience in accounting, auditing, analysis, journalism and the law who actually are competent enough to hold the police to account because as we keep discovering the police are only human, they are just as capable of engaging in criminal conspiracies such as the Hillsborough disaster conspiracy as any other section of the population. But career politicians are definitely not the answer, who are only good at talking at length without actually saying anything meaningful.
As mentioned earlier, probability strongly favours Labours Shaun Wright winning the SYPCC election as illustrated by the graph below that it would literally take a miracle for any other parties candidate to win as the voters of the peoples republic of south yorkshire will be expected to rubber stamp the Labour candidate without having any clue of either who the candidate is or exactly what the PCC is supposed to do.
Conservatives Hand Over Control of UK Police Forces to Labour Gravy Train Riders
As I discussed in a recent article (Police and Crime Commissioners), the PCC elections are a total disaster, something that the general public never wanted but what are literally being rammed down their throats at a huge expense of £100 million just for the elections, never mind the increased bureaucracy that will accompany the PCC's.
The reason why the Labour party is going along with the PCC's is obvious because the Tory / Lib-Dem coalition will be lucky to win one fifth of the 41 posts up for grabs given that the Coalition at mid-term is at it's maximum level of unpopularity. This is indicative of a very weak government that is prone to making huge blunders right across the spectrum and is sowing the seeds for a landslide Labour victory at the 2015 general election.
So those that were the most critical of the role of Police and Crime Commissioner, and many of whom have no relevant experience, will now be in charge of the police forces as a consequence of the huge carrot of £100k+ annual salaries plus EXPENSES and so it remains to be seen if we will see a re-run of the MP expenses scandal with PCC's in a few years time.
What is the Big Picture?
What is the Conservative party's over-riding strategy behind PCC's ? I suspect for the answer one needs to look deep into the belie of the beast where we will find politicians eager to auction off police contracts to private corporations that they have interests in. Therefore under the guise of saving money, police activities will increasingly be contracted out to the private sector by BOTH Labour and Conservative PCC's.
Who Will Hold the PCC's to Account?
The answer is mostly current Police Authority members, which illustrates the degree to which the whole exercise is a complete farce that will result in an increased ineffectual bureaucracy at double the cost all to the benefit of political parties at tax payer expense.
What's Next?
More jobs for politicians as commissioners for Fire Brigades, Schools ? Housing ? Refuse Collection ?
Eventually there will be an elected party political commissioner for every public activity. Too much democracy is just as bad as living in a totalitarian state!
By Nadeem Walayat
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Nadeem Walayat has over 25 years experience of trading derivatives, portfolio management and analysing the financial markets, including one of few who both anticipated and Beat the 1987 Crash. Nadeem's forward looking analysis focuses on UK inflation, economy, interest rates and housing market. He is the author of three ebook's - The Inflation Mega-Trend; The Interest Rate Mega-Trend and The Stocks Stealth Bull Market Update 2011 that can be downloaded for Free.
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