The TaxPayers' Alliance - Burning our Money

More branding waste

The Child Support Agency, now scrapped for being utterly useless, spent £60,000 just on consultants to "research brand development" according to the Express today.  Between that, big bonuses for its staff and £3.5 billion in uncollected fines it's hard to think of a government body that has represented worse value for the taxpayer.  Collecting unpaid child maintenance is basically a debt collection exercise and the same kind of thing is done day in, day out, in the private sector.  There is no underlying reason, beyond classic government mismanagement, for the agency's failure.

The BBC has been up to the same trick.  While it might be best paying attention to recent scandals it is putting in place a £120,000 rebrand of its radio idents (that's "logos" to you and me").  License-payers' money being poured down the drain.

Audit warns of more Olympic Overspend

A report form the National Audit Office today warns that the costs of the already over-budget Olympic Games could increase further.  Funding of Olympic venues, construction price inflation and the Olympic Park were areas the NAO highlighted as leading to possible increasing costs.  At £9.3 billion, the 2012 Olympics is already well over the original £2.4 billion estimate.

Although the Chairman of the NAO says the Games are on a “firmer” financial footing, as always we have to be sceptical about government’s ability to rein in spending.  Already raiding Lottery funds meant for good causes and charities, the government didn’t hesitate to plunder extra sources to fund its own incompetence.  With a contingency fund there too, what incentive is there to come in under budget? 

The system is designed to waste our money.  In having so many contingencies, be it the specially allocated fund or Lottery money, the government can be as lackadaisical with our money as they like – there’s always more left to use up if needed.  We need proper accountability of the way government spends our money with political consequences to massive overspending.

Latest criticism of the Olympics by the PAC

It’s already four times over budget and today the Olympics get another a rap on the knuckles, this time from the Commons Public Accounts Committee.

Committee Chairman Edward Leigh said to the BBC it was “worrying” that arrangements for monitoring progress and risk weren’t in place.  During the hearing, Mr Leigh had said:

Q2: “That sounds very logical, but if you look at figure 2 on page 10 there is a massively complicated structure.  There is no single person in overall control, is there?  For instance, this is a recipe for arguments and delay, particularly between whoever happens to be Secretary of State and the Mayor.” 

This explains in part why the original £2.4billion estimate has been dwarfed by the now £9.35billion overspend.  Sloppy mistakes, such as ignoring the costs for omission of tax, contingency fund and security, show how unrealistic the original cost estimate really was.

It’s staggering that government expected to manage such a grand scheme without the necessary oversight needed to keep costs under control.  This is yet again another instance of the government wasting taxpayers’ money when it could have been avoided with a bit of foresight and common-sense.