Heavy Stuff

Public/Private Ownership

The current debate in the UK about the apparent partial privatisation of the NHS through the back door prompted me to think about attitudes to private and public ownership in the UK and France. The point is that infrastructure in France seems very largely to work well; in the UK, it seems frequently to work badly. Why?

Their is a definite contrast between the UK and France in this respect. The French seem to have a very clear view of arrangements between private and public ownership. Almost all infrastructure in France is owned and run by the state. Road infrastructure is owned by the state but maintenance is let out to private organisations. Railways are state owned and run. So are electricity (effectively) and gas; a risible 25% of electricity is theoretically liberalised as a sop to EU directives. Telephony is minimally liberalised at the moment but could become more so. The French like it this way and, whatever Brussels decrees, are determined to keep the status quo.

In the UK, I would argue that liberalisation of telephony has been an outstanding success; rates tend to be between a third and a half cheaper than in France. But it is difficult to point to any others. Electricity and gas are arguable, although electricity in France is still cheaper than that in the UK (piped gas is generally available only in sizeable conurbations). Roads and railways in the UK are certainly inferior to those in France.

The health service is interesting, as I have touched on before. In France it is totally privately run, with chargeable rates set by the state; and the service is generally excellent. It is the effect of the state setting chargeable rates that interests me. If you want to see an eminent surgeon or other specialist, he/she will charge more and you will have to pay the difference; but perfectly competent specialists seem to charge much lower rates than do those in the UK. A recent conversation with an ex-hospital consultant friend in England revealed that he had the alternative of waiting some 10 weeks for an appointment or going private, with a £150 fee for a consultation. The cancer specialist I see, gratis, can normally make an appointment within ten days and I know that his charge to the state is around £50. The point is that since the large majority of people can pay only what the state reimburses most medical staff set their fees accordingly. This could, and no doubt will, change in the future but seems a better arrangement than that pertaining in the UK. It seems likely to me that, in France, there will be a growing divergence between what the state will reimburse and actual medical charges, resulting in the patient having to contribute more; but the state reimbursement rates put a useful brake on price rises. The UK expectation of a totally free service means that access to the service, and the quality of that service, has to supply that brake.

Behind all this is the effectiveness of private/public arrangements. Numerous, disastrous so-called PFI initiatives in the UK indicate that the Civil Service has no idea how to negotiate with private enterprise. In France, state bodies are notorious for their hard-nosed negotiations. Therein, perhaps, lies a key difference between approaches to this question in the two countries. Possibly equally key are how and why the two sides get together. In France, there seem to be generally agreed and established roles for each; in the UK, cooperation often seems speculative, arbitrary and designed primarily to cut visible state expenditure (in theory if not in practice). It may be this speculative and arbitrary aspect that militates against the Civil Service's ability to negotiate. Whatever the reasons, the private/public split seems to be better managed in France than in the UK.

Citizenship and Democracy

This Sunday, as I usually do, I had lunch with Steve and Jo and the conversation got around to democracy, citizenship and communities'(see below): big topics, though we've already between us put the world to rights so often I sometimes wonder that it can till be in the mess it in. However, these are topics that simply won't go away and are good conversational fodder to enhance an extended lunch.

We all believe that western democracy, imperfect though it undoubtedly is (made even more so in the case of the UK by the proposed crass press legislation), is a cornerstone of western European society. Which turned my mind to the citizenship commitments proposed for new immigrants and a conviction that a commitment to democracy should be included specifically. That means not simply a commitment to obey the law, which is pretty obvious but too general, but a commitment to uphold democracy. Forget the nonsense about God, the Queen and British history, which are really no more than incidentals in this context, and focus on democracy and language. I don't believe anyone can function usefully in a country without at least a minimal mastery of its language; and overt support for a principle at the very base of its constitution (written or not) is also required. I understand that this assertion can provoke a number of quibbles but believe, if implemented, it would solve far more problems than it creates.

Communities

I've commented before on the great sense of community which I value here. Comments from various friends living elsewhere make me realise jut how valuable this is and also where it does not seem to apply. Large towns always seem capable of it, even if they do not achieve it in all areas, and so do villages, albeit needing some kind of subsidy in many cases. Where it almost never seems to apply is in suburbs or housing estates. Which makes me believe that these are not natural environments in which human beings can thrive. But they exist and countles people live in them.

So what's to be done? Clearly, some kind of catalyst in the form of a community officer is indicated and I know they exist but have little idea of what they do. Clearly also some kind of physical community centre is required, which often does not overtly exist (but underused schools do). Then it is a question of will and cost. I see bits of this picture in areas of the UK that I know but also huge untapped potential. The problems, I suspect, are that the results would not be easily quantifiable or show on sacred government targets and that local government budget is far too centralised in the UK. Against that, the gain in quality of life could be huge with a similarly considerable economic pay-off (reduction of crime, enhanced social care, etc). To me, it seems a small risk for a potantially large gain. It simply (????) needs someone to break the current mould of legislative goals and priorities within which it doesn't fit.

Making Points

Communities Of Communes

This could be another Clochemerle moment. The French government has decided to get rid of some administrative layers, a move that is indirectly making waves in Mollans. The layer affected is the community of communes, which lies between departments, of which there are 95, and communes of which there are thousands. The idea behind communities of communes is that they acquire and share resources that individual communes need or want but which they are too small to afford individually. The general assumption is that communities of communes should become more important and many communes should effectively disappear (i.e. have little or no budget).

The current situation in Mollans is that it is part of the Buis community of communes. This is a collective of 22 communes, 10 ten of which have fewer than 100 inhabitants and one of which has only 26. Whatever the commune's size, it has a mayor, councillors, secretarial support and a budget to match. This looks like obvious administrative overload and so some rationalisation is overdue.

Part of the government's plan is that all communes within a community should be geographically contiguous, to avoid isolated outposts. That seems sensible but creates problems in that communities at the moment are not stacked up in that way. So there has to be a reshuffle. This in itself does not affect Mollans and, at a meeting of commune mayors with the departmental Prefect in 2011, Mollan's mayor voted to stay part of the Buis community.

Two nearby communes affected are Brantes and Savoillans, which are part of a Vaison community but not geographically contiguous with it. So they asked nearby Malaucène to switch to the Vaison community to create land contiguity between them and Vaison. Malaucène declined. So they asked Mollans and Mollans changed its vote and agreed. Thus Mollans is to become part of the Vaison community as of next January. The obvious question is why; and therein lies the rub.

The mayor sent out a letter which failed to mention the change of vote and gave a number of high-sounding but for all practical purposes meaningless reasons. No one took much notice but suspicions were raised that local taxes would go up. Then the Buis community called for public discussion of the issue at a meeting in Mollans which the mayor promptly banned on very flimsy grounds. So the Buis community switched the meeting to Pierrelongue and provided a load of facts and figures explaining what Mollans contributed and got from the community. So where was the equivalent from the Vaison community so that the citizens of Mollans could discuss the issue and make up their minds? Not forthcoming, it seems, although one of my neighbours is planning to ask Vaison for that. From the Mairie there has just been a deafening silence so far, compounding suspicions raised by the failure to mention the change of vote and the banning of the public meeting. Are dark Machiavellian forces at play here? This story could run and run.

As a footnote, although it is inevitable that some communes will disappear, it is also sad. I view the very considerable decentralisation of budget for local government in France as a democratic strength; it means you can go along to see your local mayor personally and demand answers (although you may not always get them, as the current case shows). However, economics will prevail, which means that getting local accountability will become more difficult in the future.

Rewards For Points

I recently decided to use some of the points I had accumulated on my Super U supermarket loyalty card to acquire a toaster on offer as a reward. I was told I would have to wait a fortnight, as is normal when claiming rewards (they might have to order some rewards specially). But they had the toasters on the shelves. OK, I thought, maybe there is a different inventory system for rewards. Then, when I went to claim my toaster a fortnight later, the girl on the reception desk said: “Just a minute; I'll get one from the shelves”. ???????????? It seems that, whatever improved customer service might suggest, you have to wait a fortnight to claim a reward. Rules are rules, after all (and customer service is a minor consideration in supermarkets).

The UK Establishment

The Royal Family

A buzz around the French contingent at the pizza evening this week was the gender and birth date of Kate Middleton's forthcoming baby. I was quizzed but had to confess total ignorance. I haven't been following this new item and, frankly, neither know nor care about it (whilst understanding that it must be very important for the couple concerned). The same clearly can't be said of the French and there is an equally clear assumption on their part that the English should know more than they do. I don't.

Maybe I'm not typically English in this respect but the point reinforces an early perception that the French were more interested in the English royal family than the English. I remember, on only my second visit to France, being quizzed by me friend Claude's family on why an English newspaper was in trouble for reporting that that the current queen was pregnant. I tried (in vain) to explain that protocol at the time dictated that the correct phrasing was that the queen was going to have a baby, not that she was pregnant. They protested; perfectly logically, that if she was going to have a baby then she must be pregnant. I could only agree but.............Anyway, what struck me most was that this working class French family was apparently fascinated by the English royal family; why? And they expected me to know more than they did. Once again, phraseology apart, I didn't.

HMRC

The dear old UK revenue “service” has reared it's head again and I can't work out whether to laugh or cry (hysterically in both cases).

Five years ago I entered the French tax system and attempted to extricate myself from the UK one, via an apparently simple P85 form. It took three years of intricate communications actually to do so. I thought I was finally shot of their shambles. However, my mother's death put the two of us in contact again, since they needed to know details of her estate and to establish her tax position. That I understood.

My mother died three months into the tax year and, given her income, there could never be any question of a tax underpayment, only possibly a very small rebate which I explicitly renounced and said should be given to a charity of HMRC's choice. She had a small pension from NAAFI for which one overpayment had been made and which I immediately reimbursed, with ackowledgement from NAAFI that the matter was closed.. I subsequently received from HMRC a letter stating that I had to inform NAAFI of my mother's death since they were unaware of it and her pension was still being paid; they couldn't close my mother's situation until that was resolved. The letter quoted my mother's NI number as a reference. So, I sent HMRC the documentation from NAAFI. They duly replied saying they couldn't process this as they needed my mother's NI number. I am about to reply with a copy of their own letter quoting the NI number and an assurance to the person dealing with this that, if they ever forget their name, they can rest assured that I can supply the information as I have it on file.  I shall also suggest that any overpayment be donated specifically to Mencap.

I remember, some 30 years ago, my ex-wife being enamoured of Shire Hite at the peak of her feminist fame at the same time that several American universities, in their statistics courses, were using her as a prime example of the abuse of statistics. If ever any universities want an exemplar of extreme administrative incompetence in a developed country, they probably could do no better than study HMRC.

Gardening

The clement weather has enabled me to get to grips with gardening. The plants I expected to come through our very average winter have largely done so, with the jury still out on one of the three solanums which I covered with protective material; I've watered it and will just wait to see. I was very pleased that some of the snowdrops that I took from my mother's garden after she died have flowered; they should be moved only “in the green” (while the leave are still showing) and had got past that stage when I took them. It will be another thing by which to remember her.

There's still some clearing up to be done but a lot to anticipate. I've planted several new roses and am keen to see how they progress. I've also bought several dahlias which I shall start off at the end of the month to provide colour at the back from mid-summer onwards, plus a couple of lavenders which are already planted. Everywhere is manured so it is more or less “all system go”.

Dear Diary

Dear Diary

I feel I need to make a new posting on the blog but there is not a lot that has happened over the past three weeks. The bees that buzz around in my bonnet from time to time have stayed quiet and most aspects of my life here have experienced little change.

Perhaps the most significant event was that my PC went down with an untraceable bug. The local fixer '(and he's good) couldn't identify it and ended up stripping the machine of software and rebuilding it from scratch. Unfortunately he's a man of these parts and so doesn't answer his phone or respond to messages left so it took me a week to track him down. He has just acquired an office and is presumably expanding his business, or hoping to, but the lack of communication doesn't augur well for him. The bug deprived me of Internet access for nearly two weeks and made me realise how much of a drug it has become in my life; I didn't get the shakes or hot flushes but I was definitely twitchy.

I mentioned in a recent posting that the village entertainments' committee was in a mess. It has subsequently been found that, while doing very little in terms of organising entertainment, they managed to spend some money for which they can't account. The result has been a clear out of the whole committee; a new one is being assembled.

Daniel came round to eat one evening and I decided, without any great expectation, to see if he could give me any guidance on the use of prepositions in French. The use of prepositions seems to be almost arbitrary in all languages I am familiar with. For instance, the French say “il est difficile de faire quelque chose” but “quelque chose est difficile à faire”; they also “décident de faire quelque chose” but “se décident à faire quelque chose”. I challenged Daniel to explain this and also pointed out that my French teacher at school had claimed that the French language was a masterpiece of logic. Daniel disclaimed this latter point and could offer no explanation for the former, except to suggest that the answer probably lay somewhere in the upper branches of some Chomsky grammatical trees. I don't think I shall be going there to look.

With luck the winter is now over. We've had two days of snow, about a fortnight apart, with the snow staying around for about a week afterwards, accompanied by some really cold days but interspersed with very warm ones. We're now back with the warm ones and, if the weather runs true to form, that's the winter done and dusted. The earlier warm days stirred me to do some gardening: clearing up, pruning the vines and spreading some general fertiliser. The ground has remained too hard however to do much more. A week of warm days should do the trick and then I should be able to do the rest of the work needed.

I had been doing some search engine optimisation work on my website, which will continue. However, the official village website is now up and running and seems to be almost purely administrative, which gives me a clearer idea of how I can develop mine. I shall exclude administrative material and probably add a section on writing (the Académie Mollanaise?) and put more effort into the accommodation section. I want it to appeal to villagers as well as future visitors.

Apology
In my last post I aid that Jim Sluszny was Polish but Jim has corrected me.  His parents were Polish but he was born in Belgium before going to England and is thus Belgian.  Sorry about that mistake