What a joke
The political situation in the UK has become a laughing stock, but it’s our outdated system that allows it to carry on as normal.
I usually try to ignore the political chaos that occurs in the UK.
Everyone has their political beliefs — normally passionately rooted in the things they care about, how they have been brought up, and their view of the world. When you meet new people, it falls into the category of things to definitely not bring up, alongside money and religion.
However, as British politics has descended further into a cesspit, I find it hard to see how our current system makes any sense at all. For example, how is it acceptable that ministers can be promoted to heads of departments, regardless of their exposure to that particular department? How is that acceptable? In the private sector, it takes years of experience, industry exposure, and multiple learning curves before you’d ever find yourself in a position with the same level of responsibility as some of our Secretarys of State.
Let’s take Thérèse Coffey, our new Secretary of State for Health and Social Care as an example.
According to https://www.gov.uk/government/people/therese-coffey, she has a Ph.D. in Chemistry — great, she’s smart then. Sadly that’s all we’ve got.
Everyone in the UK loves the NHS, and I’m pretty sure everyone would agree it currently faces tremendous chronic pressure. COVID, underfunding and a lack of workforce means its future is in very real jeopardy. Whoever leads this department for the next couple of years will need to be incredibly talented, and have a deep understanding of these pressures from the ground up. Therefore, it would be right to assume Thérèse Coffey has had some serious experience with the NHS and wider social care system, considering she is now the head of it.
Let’s take a look:
Nothing. She worked as an accountant. She worked at the BBC for a short period of time. She worked as a finance director.
The only thing that even mentions the NHS is a statement saying she has campaigned for the NHS to be better. What did she do? Share a Facebook post? Have an angry word with Matt Hancock? Unless I’m mistaken, these things have no relevance to the role she now has, meaning she is highly underqualified. She’s never worked in the NHS. She’s never worked on NHS policy. Even if by some miracle she understands the issues facing the NHS (and I highly doubt she does), she has no exposure to how it is run at a grassroots level.
Thankfully, Thérèse Coffey showed us how f***ing clueless she is, by bragging about sharing antibiotics with family and friends. The head of our entire healthcare system doesn’t understand antibiotic resistance, something that most school children will have a grasp of. She also voted against the bill that was brought in to stop parents from smoking with a child in their car. I mean come on. I don’t have anything against her, I just think she is wilfully underqualified to be the head of our care system, and with some of the policies she is trying to pursue, I think that's fair to say. Worse than that, does she even care? I wouldn’t want to answer that yes or no, but considering she’s never worked at the NHS or in social care, her record speaks for itself…
Next, let’s look at Jacob Rees-Mogg — who has found himself as the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. As the head of this department, we can probably assume Jacob Rees-Mogg has a deep scientific understanding of climate change. He probably also has exposure to the challenges we face in shifting to a greener economy. Someone that can help us become a world leader in Net Zero and green energy. Believe it or not, my generation actually cares quite a lot about climate change, and policies that accelerate our dependence away from fossil fuels would be highly welcomed.
Guess what? You’re right. He has none of those things.
In fact, not only does he not have any experience in this sector, it’s actually well-documented that he doesn’t really care at all about climate change. It’s 2022, and we have an elected official who is deepening our dependency on fossil fuels. All the previous policy progression that was being made will now slowly be undone. Also, he’s actually profited for a long time from fossil fuels, through his investment firm Somerset Capital Management.
It’s not just those two. I’d love to be shown a CV of a current Secretary of State that actually qualifies them for the job. Does it exist?
There's not even any point in getting started on Theresa May, Boris Johnson, or Liz Truss, who all captained the ship so pathetically.
This would never happen in the private sector, and if it did, you’d expect that company to be a complete failure.
In the UK, we pride ourselves on a fair democracy, where anything should be held accountable. Why does this not translate to our elected officials? It’s a joke, and it’s unbelievably infuriating. As a young person, I see these clueless people take decisions that do nothing to make me excited about the future of our country. Nothing.
Here are a few things that I would like to see introduced to stop this s***.
Stop putting people who have no clue about their department in charge.
This is an easy one. If an MP has no experience or exposure to the sector they are potentially going to lead, don’t give them the job. What’s even more ridiculous about this is how MPs can change roles in the blink of an eye. For example, Kwasi Kwarteng was Secretary of State at the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy for 18 months (the post now held by Rees-Mogg). This is (only just) enough time to start making some headway in that department and begin to understand what needs to be done to face our energy challenges. But no — all of a sudden he was propelled in as Chancellor of the Exchequer, responsible for balancing the books for our crippled economy. I didn’t even bother looking at his CV, and as it transposed, he clearly showed how he had no clue, qualification, or understanding of his new role, by breaking the economy and being sacked.
Those two departments could not be more different. That’s also only one example. I would hate to think how many times a change in position has happened, and the work on policy, white papers, etc that had been happening under its previous leadership is simply abandoned. A new slate every time. How can a system that allows that to happen ever make progress?
Stop allowing department switches.
To follow up on the above, it should be the rule that once an MP is elected, they have to choose the area of government they want to work in, and they have to stay relatively within that area. No change from energy to bookkeeper, pensions to health. It’s madness.
Time to move away from Oxbridge.
You’d like to think that Oxford and Cambridge produce the smartest graduates in our country. And they probably do in a lot of cases. I want the smartest people in our country to be the ones who lead our country. But it begs the question when you look at how many of our government came from Oxbridge, why are they so incompetent in governance? Something doesn’t add up, but they’ve shown time after time that a degree in classics from Oxbridge is a surefire way to be a terrible MP.
Fired? Banned for life.
Here’s another simple one. If a Secretary of State turns out to be so bad at their job that they are fired, they should be banned from politics for life. No disappearing under a rock for a couple of years to let things cool off. Banned. Forever. Overnight this would increase accountability, and maybe some MPs would question if they are the right person for a Secretary of State role.
Imagine a government you could actually be proud of? One that delivered for its people and was a world leader in policies that will ensure our future for the 21st century. At the moment, that seems almost impossible.
I know it’s an unprecedented time in UK politics, but our system has allowed the carnage of the last 6 years to happen. It’s me and you that face the consequences of this carnage…and that’s what's sad.
