So I pushed the simple plan on various people.
Here’s a scorecard.
LabourList: Henry Root-esque NO REPLY.
Liberal Conspiracy: Initially, NO REPLY. Badgered, Sunny Hundal said it was in his queue to read but it was so long. Politics is hard, let’s go shopping.
Dave Hill at the Guardian London blog: Hasn’t read it.
Will Straw’s Left Foot Forward: NO REPLY. Not surprising given some of the things I’ve called his father, really.
Divers housing/architecture/design lefties: Eeeeuw. BTL properties are ugly. [badgering] Well, needs must when the devil drives…
Thanks, comrades. (All that time spent stumping for the Lib Dems is looking a shitty investment right now, innit?)
Look, it’s not like I’m suggesting minting a trillion dollar platinum coin to fix the US economy or something. Using money that is going to be spent anyway to buy out busted operators and prevent the Great Housing Disaster of 2013 is actually something London Labour councils have implemented within living memory, almost within my lifetime.
bit whiney, but I think your entitled to a whinge.
It’s a great idea and un wanktanky in that it actually has bits where youve thought about implementing it.
did you try it with any labour councilllors ?
I’ll pick my arse up and see if I can get any labour bods in Brum to pay attention.
We joke a lot about “Very Serious People” but this is a great example of an interesting idea that can’t get any attention because it steps outside the Overton Window.
1) Interference in the market.
2) Assumption that local councils should do something tangibly useful.
I’m sure there are others…
You asked some people about your idea.
Simple Plan is an interesting idea, but it is not THEIR idea.
In a group where there is little implementation, care and feeding of untestable ideas is what there is to do. It was much the same with naval tactics in the Edwardian era, until 1914.
Well, it’s basically metropolitanisation. OK for the 70s, but in 2012/13 you’ve got to be Stalin or some kind of freaky beatnik to advocate that stuff. Go back to your drawing board and think of the most insane way possible to privatise the NHS. Then people will sit up and take notice.