Woeful tale of waste on defence work

ANOTHER bit of news slides out that essential equipment for our Armed Forces will be many years behind the times when it is delivered, and that a few more millions of pounds have been wasted on other items.

This follows the previous enlightening news that the last government had permitted the ordering of equipment which would be out of date before delivery and which has now been stopped or scrapped at horrendous cost.

The tale of woeful management by the Ministry of Defence is nothing new, and it must go down as one of the most inefficient departments of government under any political leadership.

Comments over the years are that the ratio of military staffers to civilians is heavily weighed in favour of the latter and that those who have worn uniform are of a type perhaps preferring desk jobs.

More recently there has been the allegation that the MoD employs more staff than active service personnel. None of this can be conducive to efficient management worthy of our fighting forces.

A key part of this much flaunted Military Covenant (Yorkshire Post, May 16) should be firm aims to ensure that equipment is at all times up-to-date and available in advance of any future excursions to follow our leaders, America, into another war, for that is what peacekeeping is for those who take it seriously.

It might also be a useful idea to have politicians with active service experience allocated to ministerial office at the MoD, with doctors to the Department of Health and lawyers to the Home Office and Justice Department. That might just lead to rather less waste in manpower and materials right across the ambit of government. It could throw up the question about what to do with the other MPs who have no useful work experience.

Although it may yet be a bit early to be triumphal it seems that Yorkshire-bred athlete and erstwhile politician Lord Coe is doing a good job with the Olympic Games preparations. Unlike the MoD he seems to be on time. Might it be to do with the fact that he knows the business?

French health system better

From: Les Arnott, Athelstan Road, Sheffield.

ELAINE Johnson wrote (Yorkshire Post, May 19) “the young man hit by a bus in last week’s television programme 24 hours in A&E would almost certainly have died, had it happened anywhere else in the world”.

This is untrue and this view is one of the reasons why people cling desperately to the present model of NHS which is top heavy, expensive, bureaucratic and most emphatically, no longer a subject of the world’s awe and admiration.

Far be it from me to praise the French, but their systems are so in advance of ours that it makes the hair curl.

Indeed, the last time I saw a set of statistics on health care worldwide, if memory serves me well, the UK was languishing in 28th position which is not exactly impressive for one of the world’s largest economies.

The problem – as always in our modern society – is that when these problems are “tackled” by politicians, they inexorably seem to shed jobs “at the sharp end” instead of in the non-productive areas of public service.

Playing the blame game

From; WG Scaling, Garden Way, Pickering.

I WOULD like to reply to Mr Jefferson (Yorkshire Post, May 16) and Mr Wood. The answer is simple, if we had a vote on the EU and by all accounts we would vote to leave, what would we do with the 1,200 who are engaged there? We could not put them on the dole or make them an OAP like me.

The people that govern us do not want to leave because when you have two organisations you have somebody to blame, if you have one you know who to blame.

If we voted to come out of the EU, we would have ourselves to blame if things did not improve. I don’t think this could happen, we have gone down hill ever since we joined the Common Market and we have had no say in the EU.

From: Roger Dobson, Ash Street, Cross Hills, Keighley.

NOW that David Cameron has been in office for more than 12 months is it not time for him to grow up and start taking notice of the general public?

The financial problems of Britain could surely be almost annulled if we left the European Union.

Justice will be far better served in this country if we had a Minister for Justice other than Kenneth Clarke and the Home Secretary was someone other than Theresa May, who appears to lick Mr Cameron’s boots.

The National Health Service, which is the envy of the world, should be left alone except for a great reduction in the inherent number of administrators.

Finally, our police force cannot control crime in this country when it is working with reduced numbers.

Ingham must be going soft

From: R Billups, East Avenue, Rawmarsh, Rotherham.

IF you bought the Yorkshire Post on May 18 you would have had a surprise. Sir Bernard Ingham has written a column without mentioning his beloved Maggie.

For pure hypocrisy of the highest quality Bernard says we must give Cleggy a chance. It only seems like yesterday that the most useless party leader, who was not worth a blow down a ragman’s trumpet, was the said Cleggy.

Bernard must be going soft. It must be all that southern air he’s inhaling. What Clegg should do is call Bernard’s bluff and walk away from being the scapegoat at No 10. That will bring Bernard back to his normal self.

Playing by the new rules

From: Max Nottingham, St Faiths Street, Lincoln.

I TRUST Gabby Logan is right and hope that the message-board excesses she has experienced do not lead to closure or excessive policing of internet sites (Yorkshire Post, May 14).

Twitter and other sites are a good outlet for non-professional writers. Some posters on these sites think it is like talking in the pub bar. It could never be that.

One needs a little knowledge of the law to make personal criticisms of public figures in a legal and decent manner. And direct lies on factual matters put the poster at risk; and spoil the fun of posting.

It is true that £50,000 super injunctions have cleared the pitch for comment. Why, oh why do professional footballers get married if they are not going to play the game according to the rules? Stay single chaps, or do the scoring on the pitch.