Is it just me, or is David Blunkett a complete control freak? “You must all do as I say, or there will be legal action” seems to be the blunkett-to-english translation of everything he says. And a lot of what he says is twaddle.
Anyway, my concerns with this incarnation of “Blunkett’s twattishness”:
- Part of the reason that Humberside didn’t pass on data was because they misintrepreted the Data Protection Act, which is a stunningly stupid piece of leglislation. Toothless isn’t the word, vague doesn’t begin to cover it and totally slanted against the individual would be an understatement. I don’t like it, is the subtle point of this item.
- Huntley wasn’t convicted of anything before Soham. Nothing. So Blunkett is unhappy because the details of accusations against him weren’t passed on. Four words: innocent until proven guilty. In this case it wasn’t correct, but as a standard, it should be untouched. If you’re going to stop people working because of unproven accusations in general then we’re all fucked.
- The powers that Blunkett is trying to use are only recent, and untested, and smack of over centralism. Which I’m not a huge fan of. I get nervous of people who make up their own rules in response to every possible situation…
- Blair and Blunkett are always going on about accountability, and local accountability at that. So now they’re saying that local accountability isn’t good, and that they should be in charge instead. Just because the locals disagreed with them. Tossers.
- I get more nervous when such people have made mistakes in the past and are totally unrepentant to the point of appearing like zealots. Blair, for example, is bad in this respect (I’m not saying in Iraq, BTW, more in connection with domestic policy), but Blunkett is so much worse.
Will my concerns be listened to? No. Do I expect them to be? No. Do I think that this will all go horribly wrong and that Blunkett will claim that it’s nothing to do with him? Absolutley.