Bernard Ingham: Our wasteful leaders will not change ways unless we stand up against them

There are those, including myself, who have to watch 
their spending in these straitened times – and I fully recognise that it must be easier for me than most since I have an index-linked pension – and those, politicians and officials, with access to the public purse in the course of 
their work.

In fact, we are probably three nations because however free politicians and officials are with taxpayers’ money, many of them are not so well-heeled in private life as to feel able to chuck their own brass around with gay abandon. The logic of this is that there are a lot of split personalities around.

These unfortunate people might be privately careful but, by jove, let them get their hands on somebody else’s money and they will have a ball.

They are a national problem. Indeed, they are an international problem, bearing in mind the European Union’s appetite for 
our money and the well-documented waste by national governments, the EU and 
UN agencies in dispensing overseas aid.

Unfortunately, they are 
nothing new. People have 
always found it easier to spend other people’s money than 
their own.

This takes us to the heart of the purpose of government. Is it to provide for the people’s every need from the cradle to the 
grave? Or is it to concentrate on securing a safe and healthy environment in which the population can blossom by their own efforts?

All the evidence in this, the sixth year of financial constraint is that too many in control of public finances think their job is to cosset people by maintaining spending on a wide range of services rather than cutting their coat according to the people’s cloth.

What other conclusion can we reach when a Tory-led coalition is finding it the devil’s own job to cut public spending and 41 per cent of local authorities, according to an official study, are insisting on putting up council tax? They have even snubbed a £450m government bribe it cannot afford to hold down.

And let’s be clear, many of the snubbers are not Labour but Tory-led councils.

It is not as though overall they did not have billions of pounds stashed away in reserves or that they could not economise. “There is still massive scope for councils to save billions by cutting waste and inefficiency,” says Brandon Lewis, Minister for Local Government. None of them is, of course, raising the council tax more than the limits beyond which they would have to hold a referendum.

Whether they are deterred by how they think the public might respond or the punitive cost of a referendum is not clear. It is probably the latter, given the state of political apathy in which Britain languishes.

Which brings me to the moral of this tale. Public spending flourishes where sanctions against inefficiency, waste and profligacy are weak.

They are so weak in Britain that there was even doubt in 2010 as to whether Gordon Brown would lose office after running up a monumental budget deficit of £156bn.

Only last week, the Liberal Democrats retained Eastleigh in a by-election – even with one of our hysterical sex scandals round their necks – when they are mad keen on tax increases instead of spending cuts.

So why should Tory-controlled Banbury Council feel imperilled for spending £10,000 on a fake gold mayoral chain lest the real one, worth £25,000, is damaged? Do councillors in Gloucestershire sleep uneasily in their beds for building a £400,000 six-bedroomed house at the behest of a jobless woman with 11 children? The answer lies in all those authorities putting up parking and other charges to maintain spending.

It is perfectly clear that far too many councillors think that catering for every whim and minority, however wastefully, pays a better political dividend than holding or cutting council taxes.

They will not change their tune – and we shall not be better off – until they see success lies in becoming an efficient, low-tax council with, for example, weekly rubbish collections.

The only people who can 
change them are you and me. We have to show them who is boss. We really do need to become one nation – resolute in pursuit of low taxes, restrained spending and efficient services. We can no longer afford split personalities and apathy.