Choice
Will the economic Liberals take note of the August findings in a Which? poll as quoted by Simon Jenkins in 'The Guardian' yesterday :
"...90% of people did not want choice,just a good hospital within easy reach".
The same is true of schools and most public services. Where is the evidence to the contrary.
2 Comments:
Of course everyone wants a good school, hospital etc within easy reach. I do, you do, we all do. The tougher question is: how do you achieve that?
As an economic liberal, I'm in favour of markets because they (i) introduce competition, which I think drives up standards; and (ii) allow us to prioritise scarce resources.
I dislike monopolies - whether private or state-run - because it restricts our freedom of choice.
Take the example of a council house... On one level, a tenant only wants a good, solid door. But they might also like to be given a choice of which colour it should be.
12:40 pm GMT
As an economic liberal, I'm in favour of markets because they (i) introduce competition, which I think drives up standards; and (ii) allow us to prioritise scarce resources.
So if the evidence was that competition in a particular public service achieved neither of these two things you would be happy not to see it then?
Take the example of a council house... On one level, a tenant only wants a good, solid door. But they might also like to be given a choice of which colour it should be.
This isn't a very good example ... (1) they have choice of whether to rent from the council or not and, (2)it is quite possible for a council to give tenants a choice of door colour and many other things besides.
9:17 pm GMT
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