Economy – John Vincent

Ideologies and Education

Listening to a new Labour Education Minister say, for all intents and purposes, that Gove[1] caused young people classed as NEETs (Not in Education, Employment, or Training) isn’t what might be called objective thinking.

Education and training in the UK have long been a victim of the classical political ding-dong. Right leaning politicians support elitism (masquerading as aspiration). Left leaning politicians support egalitarianism (within class hierarchies). Both claim to celebrate achievement, merit and social mobility. I say “claim” because the outcomes of their polices are often so different from their utterings.

It’s not too difficult to understand why. Historic social prejudices run deep. They remain embedded in our institutions. Public and private. Comedians Cleese, Barker and Corbett star in a BBC sketch of 66 years ago[2] that sums-up stubborn in-grained British attitudes. As a 66-year-old this doesn’t sit well with me.

Although the public are gradually freeing themselves from an addiction to political creeds, the current cohort of elected members and the media moguls still perpetuate a dated world of stereotypes. From Classical Greece to now, the phrase “everything changes, but nothing changes” still has its place.

Here’s a view that might be different. On a day when examination results are published, much of what has been said this morning is about education pushing young people out into the world. Like products coming off the end of a production line. Ready to be integrated into society. Both from political right and left this is horribly mechanistic.

If something isn’t working, it’s the fault of the implementation of policies, processes and procedures dreamed up by past Ministers.

What about looking at the subject from the other end of the telescope. Our society isn’t going away. Whatever the successes or failures, in 66-years from now, that’s 2092, people will be writing articles about education and training. The good and bad.

Within the lives of this generation of young people the rivers of change will flow ever faster. Instead of pushing young people out into the world, let’s imagine the factors that will pull them into different life outcomes. What will success or failure look like in their time between leaving school and retirement. Assuming such a condition as retirement continues to exist.

[This is where Gove got it mighty wrong. Retro education policies born of imperial public-school thinking contained no vision of the future.]

To thrive in let’s say, the period between 2026 and 2066, adaptability and resilience will surely be needed. Attitude comes into the equation too. A “can do” mentality will be an asset. There’s no need to downplay achievement, merit and social mobility. More a need to supress the pigeonholes and categories that hold people back. The forces that demotivate.

Our classical two faced political ding-dong does a lot of harm.

[1]UK Education Secretary (2010–2014): Led reforms, including the expansion of the academies and changes in what’s taught in schools.

[2] https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00hhrwl

Moments of Decision

It’s the time of year. Young people pass through a gateway. Exam results hit the streets. Through life there are moments of decision. Life is not linear or proportionate. Swaths of time will pass when nothing much happens. Then bang. There’s a moment of decision.

Certainly, education has a role to play in preparing people for those moments. This is where the race for superior exam performance statistics fails. It’s great for someone to struggle through and ace one subject. It’s great for a person of moderate ability to excel out of the blue. It’s great when a naturally talented individual gets more than their expected grades. The difficulty arises when people, consequently, are not prepared to know what to do.

Conflicting advice shovelled out by a fickle media isn’t the bast source on offer. Politicians juggling with volumes of statistic, a barrage of recommendations and a pile of prejudices struggle to find a line to maintain.

Is going to university important? Now, there’s a question mark that’s doing the rounds.

It’s true, I should not, on any account, judge the current situation as if it was the same as my experience of 50-years ago. 1976 was a world away from where we are in 2026. That said there are some fundamentals that stick.

At the deepest level there’s the reason universities exit at all. Let’s face it they are not an invention of the modern world. There’s a reason special places of learning were established in every human civilisation. It’s that basic hierarchy of needs. Once food and shelter are commonplace humanity gets around to asking endless questions about the world and the universe.

Is going to university important? I find the question strange in so many ways. Fine there’s a small number of institutions that don’t offer the ideals of university life or an uplift in future opportunities. However, the vast majority provide the next steps that a maturing adult needs. It may lead to a specialisation or a jumping-off point to a radically different destination.

A hardy perennial that keeps cropping up is this war of the vocational verses the academic. It’s a persistent theme.

Mechanics that fix semi-autonomous electric vehicles may not need a degree in oceanography. Researchers in the art of renaissance architecture may not need to know how to lay bricks. Engineers developing farm machinery may not need a qualification in linguistics. Need is not all.

What this presents is a false conflict. In my mind, people with a diversity of experiences are going to be much better equipped to deal with the future than those who tramline. Thus, the “hard hat verses gradation cap” is the most moronic of slogans. It’s the ultimate visualisation of the tramline. It paints a picture of a fork in the road (or rail).

I started by writing that there are moments of decision. The point I want to make is that the decision of university or not university shouldn’t be based solely on career aspiration or finances or popular fashion. Believe it or not it’s possible to read medieval illiterate and be a gifted welder. To be fascinated by the Greeks and Romans and fly a plane. To enjoy construction work and play a musical instrument to a high level. Motivation and passion are the key.

Please let’s think more widely about lifelong learning. Let’s build systems that enable lifelong learning.

Britain Needs a Written Constitution

Who cares? That’s what a lot of people might say. I mean look at our everyday problems. A cost-of-living crisis, crumbling infrastructure, conflicts in the world, turbulence of identity politics and a host of live issue that would take the whole page to list.

Lord Sumption, a crusty establishment lawyer debates with Baroness Chakrabarti, a lefty advocate and lawyer. Both capable and seasoned debaters with respectably different backgrounds. Listening to one I might say; that’s a sound reasoning. Listening to the other I might say; exceptionally good point. Thus, I my view remains the same whatever their debate.

So, for a brief few minutes this morning the subject of a written British constitution hit the airwaves. I can’t break the habit of listening to the Today programme on the BBC Radio 4.

Firstly, to explain. The UK, and its parliamentary way of doing business, is unlike our cousins across the other side of the Atlantic. They are now celebrating a nation’s coming into being, 250 years ago. The foundation stone and a launch into nationhood was a written constitution.

We have done thing differently in the UK. It’s not so easy to trace our constitution back to a moment of birth. Naturally, I will cite one document that has influenced both nations. The Magna Carta’s importance[1] is recognised across the globe. Not only by its influence on modern constitutions but what it says about the rule of law.

[Last year, was the 800th anniversary of the sealing of one version of the Magna Carta].

As an infant a school trip we made was to Runnymede. My teachers clearly wanted to plant an idea in our heads long before we would have any appreciation of what it meant.

[That primary school trip included a visit to the Rufus Stone[2]. A place where I wandered off and got lost in the New Forest but that’s a story for another time].

What I’d say to both Sumption and Chakrabarti is that the subject you debate is fundamentally important. However, it’s easy to get hung up on the word – constitution. As if there’s only two models of such a key construct. To put it basically, one we make it up as we go along and the other, we write rules on tablets of stone.

An argument for leaving things well alone is the flexibility that the traditional make it up as we go along approach can offer. Parliament being sovereign, without question. Even when it’s foolish and unrepresentative. To counter this supremacy of the executive is the dangers of fragility and vulnerability that can be exploited by an errant leader, despot or tyrant.

An argument for change, one I favour, is that our medieval system holds the country back and its not as if we don’t recognise the importance of solemn written commitments. Every Act of Parliament is as such. In fact, Acts can be enabling. So, why can’t a written constitution be an enabling document. It doesn’t have to be overly constraining or practically unamendable.

The problem lies not with agreements in favour of a written constitution; it’s more a problem of how on earth can British society take up this challenge when its mind is on so many day-to-day trials and tribulations. It’s a modern dilemma.

We have a partially broken system that’s unsuited to the coming decades, but we don’t know how to fix it. To fix it, everyone needs to engage.

[1] https://www.magnacartatrust.org/home

[2] https://new-forest-national-park.com/the-rufus-stone/

Travel Dilemma

A dilemma. Travel is a unique way of enhancing life’s experience. Travel inevitably has an environmental cost. It’s a predicament that’s impossible to avoid. I could look at this as a balance of pros and cons. That’s to seek a reason to balance the scales. It’s what I’m inclined to do. A highly rational way of viewing a dilemma.

This doesn’t work for everyone. Belief comes into the equation. For those who see the world on a knifes edge, tittering on the brink of environmental disaster, any argument about travel is shaped by trepidation. People can get quite puritanical about travel’s burdens.

Equally, there’s a group of people who fit in the “burn baby burn” camp. Those who will not give a tinker’s cuss about global environmental arguments. That’s a bit disingenuous. There’s always the belief that God’s plan is mysterious and these matters are not in our hands.

There’s a third category. I’ve met a few who fit this one. It’s to espouse great concern about green issues and then to act in a manner that’s inconsistent with that belief. Hypocrisy is nothing new. It’s a permanent part of the human condition.

Here, I’m only going down the rational rabbit hole. It’s to harbour genuine concern for the environment at the same time as understanding the power of travel to open minds and create world where we better understand each other.

To travel or not, that is the question. Whether it be nobler to stay at home or to suffer the hassle and crammed seats of a cheap flight, for the excitement of visiting an unfamiliar place. I’ll start by putting my conclusion up-front. It’s nobler to travel.

The pros and cons of staying at home or moving in familiar territory. Restricted circles.

On the upside then it’s possible to say with a clear conscious that you have done your bit to try and minimise the environmental impact of travel. You can stand at the bar in the local pub and lambast those who you think are ruining the planet.

On the downside, not everyone will appreciate how virtuous you claim to be. Probably citing some other environmental impact. Like your gas boiler, lack of recycling or guzzling SUV.

The pros and cons of trains, planes, and automobiles, exploring new territory. Global curiosity.

On the upside then it’s likely you will not be stuck for conversation. Certainly, you’ll be carrying home the knowledge of different cultures and how others live. In fact, the experience can lead to a better appreciation of how others tackle environmental challenges.

On the downside, a conscientious traveller must account for their CO2 emissions or, at least, have mind to compensate for them in some way. Time to plant trees.

I’ve framed this piece in terms of the substance of a personal decision. That’s not the biggest factor at play. The global growth in travel is the total of the behaviour of people from all levels of society, in a mass of different situations. One element is clear. As the economic circumstances of people improves so the propensity to wish to travel increases. I’ve not lined up a convincing graph to show this relationship. However, it’s hard to argue against it. As an example, the curve for global air travel keeps going up.

So, we live with a dilemma. Making travel more accessible at the same time as minimising the cumulative costs. A familiar dilemma. One that’s inherent in much that we do. A perpetual challenge.

Nostalgia vs. Innovation

My generation, and those a bit older than me, are inclined to shrug shoulders and, in a war wearied way, lament the passing of a great era. It’s not merely nostalgia. Although there’s a degree of selective memory in what we choose to remember as good.

This week, at the BBC Proms, I sat down in the bar at the interval and was joined by a friendly couple and another. We all had the grey hairs that qualified us as Prommers[1]. It soon became clear that the older gentlemen was a music buff who had been going to the BBC Proms since the 1960s. I’ve been going since 2018. Still an innocent bystander learning the Promming ways.

The intensity of my companion’s conversation was fascinating. Firstly, it was to comment, unfavourably, on the contemporary music that’s a hallmark of recent concerts. I liked it. I’d say it was a winsome winding through a wood accompanied by crickets playing soft percussion. Not so much adventurous as intriguing music for the Albert Hall. The view from the sofa was that these new musical fillers were a waste of time. There was a time when entire concerts were avant-garde and challenging. About the 1970s/80s, or thereabouts.

Let’s reflect. I think what the BBC is now going through is what a whole British generation is going through. An existential crisis. Not so much stop the world I want to get off, as a howl of irritation. Another sign is the annoying advert where the BBC heralds itself as a national treasure. Using the Monty Python line – what have the Romans ever done for us?[2]

The winds of change can be cruel. That’s not new. However, we’ve had a couple of decades coming to the realisation that some traditional ways of doing things are not going to nicely evolve into a recognisable future state. Incremental change has its benefits. Trouble is that it puts off the day when something more substantial needs to be done.

On two specific British cultural assets – music and comedy, we can’t afford to hang onto repetitive formats and a dependency on the likes and dislikes of an aging population.

Ghastly mush like, Mrs. Brown’s Boys is a blight on our televisions. Although it was an important part of my youth, endless repeats of Top of the Pops belong in a museum. If the BBC takes the road that only mines the past or tickles one section of the country, its fate is sealed.

Take Monty Python as an example. When first proposed it looked foolish, hopeless and niche. What’s the betting that there are creative people out there now who are being told to go away. The plethora of MBAs in media decision making roles shudder at taking risks.

Yes, there is a future for the BBC. Thing is it needs an immense kick up the backside in the fashion of Bishop Brennan. https://youtu.be/7PyI9q9AX1A?t=1335

[1] https://www.royalalberthall.com/visit/bbc-proms-faqs

[2] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079470/quotes/?item=qt0471953

Call for Action and Change

When I hear promising ideas, I instinctively say to myself – don’t be negative. Try and see the plus side of these proposals. Afterall the proposer is doing their best to solve a problem. I hope. Same with the recognition of a problem, even if solutions are nowhere to be seen. Just saying it or writing it out is an acceptance that something needs doing. Action needs to be taken. As is often said, every journey begins with the first step.

It ‘s easy to be cynical when so many first steps have been taken before. Well-meaning, and not so well-meaning, individuals have stood at lecterns saying what needs to be done. So, tackling the troubling situation of social care in the UK is a great ambition for a Prime Minister to have. A good task to set before a new Cabinet. Where they will go with it, no one knows, at the moment. Making a commitment, in public, is a good place to start.

That’s not what I’m going to write about this morning. There’s a ghastly term that has entered discussions of recent. I say ghastly because it’s a faceless product of statistical analysis. Carved out of a pile of numbers it proports to describe a whole group of young people as if there were a homogonous lump.

The term is NEET. It makes me cringe every time I hear it. Meaning – the number of 16 to 24-year-olds not in Employment, Education, or Training. A moral panic sets in when people say this is “a lost generation”. It’s as if a million young people had wandered off into oblivion. Makes me think of the 1960s/70s and the moral panic that set in as young people – turned-on, tuned-in and dropped-out. The counterculture slogan of those decades. Like so many situations the truth is a lot more complex. It usually is. Here’s a number of factors that undoubtably come into play.

Yes, that hardy perennial, the decline of “real” apprenticeships. The low value society still puts on training craft and manual skills of a practical nature. Despite the nice words of successive politicians. I’ve yet to see a Minister’s daughter start aircraft maintenance training.

Penny pinching that’s turned local colleges into factories. Pile them high and get them through the door fast. An attitude to young people that’s driven by key performance indicators.

The pernicious side of social media. Past generations may have had their excesses but didn’t have this inescapable attention draining impact on mental health. It’s unrelenting.

Role models are hard to come by unless they are family members. Many potential opportunities appear unobtainable. The media often portrays a future wrapped in glamour and littered with overnight success. Perhaps, Andy Warhol was right.

Lack of orientating to dramatic changes in the future working environment. Pushed by Conservative Minister Gove and alike, education has taken a retro path in emphasising academia and rote learning. Exams as the pinnacle. The wrong path.

The “new” Labour Government must address all of these and more if they want to shift the dial. On this score, I’ll say a word about a past opponent of mine. We were both local Councillors at the same time. In 2017, as Minister of State for Skills and Apprenticeships, Conservative Anne Milton at least tried to shift the dial on this subject. Then that menace Boris Johnson came along, and Brexit took the whole country backwards at a very rapid pace.

I look with optimism. However, the “new” Labour Government is a bit like the “old” Labour Government. Ministers carved out of an Oxbridge tradition. Happy to talk about their illustrious working-class origins but a million miles from real word experience of leaving school at 16 years old and getting a paying job. Supporting themselves through training.

Transforming lives will require focus on multiple issues, as I’ve illustrated, and it would be nice to see actions take precedent over nice speeches. Wittering on about the value of apprenticeships isn’t enough.

POST: Technical pathways for 14-year-olds could build on UTC model

Future of Aviation: Enhancing Safety and Resilience

The aim is clear. A safe, secure, sustainable and resilient international aviation system. I’d add to that list an ambition to continuously improve.

And that’s in the face of the challenge that was recognised 30-years ago. With an aviation system that knows how to archives a high level of safety, even incremental improvement is challenging. Factor in projected air traffic growth that’s unabating. What we know is that that continuously improving the global accident rate requires active interventions.

Since here I can only highlight the key priorities, I’ll choose three aspects of active intervention. Back to what I said earlier in my talk. Aviation is still climbing a maturity ladder. Digitisation has facilitated a growth in proactive work. Initiatives and plans identify actions aimed at solving known aviation safety problems. But the next step remains some way off. It’s that ability to anticipate safety problems before they occur. To predict.

We have the notion of safety intelligence. There are Big Data projects that are gathering large quantities of aviation safety data. Today, what might be called prognostics continues to depend on expert judgement. That’s not negative, as such. In fact, that augmented by objective and trustworthy safety intelligence is a route to the next step in maturity.

In my view, here’s the three categories that must be addressed now and, in the next decade.

One is a foundation stone of aviation safety work. It’s the capability and will to react in a timely manner to events. Not just accidents and serious incidents but any event that elevates aviation safety risks above acceptable levels.

Top operational risk that are likely to need immediate actions are those involving loss of control and those concerning runway incidents.

To take timely corrective action the results of investigation need to be readily available. As pointed out by the industry, across the globe, there’s much scope for improvement here. Timeliness matters.

My next category is that of systemic risks. System wide safety risks. People, organisations, processes, procedures, the human factor and human performance issues.

Much is being done to ensure the effective implementation of safety management systems (SMS). The four pillars of SMS have proven to work – safety policy, risk management, safety assurance and safety promotion.

The acceptance, elimination or mitigation of risks is not an act that begins on one day and stops on the next. Digitation can help but there’s always the dangers of the needle in a haystack or even problems sitting in plain sight.

What’s often weak is the communication of what’s discovered. Believable, understandable straightforward communication to decision makers is vital.

Thirdly, what’s ahead of us is an order of magnitude more complex than what’s gone before. And a rate of change that mindboggling.

I’m calling this emerging aviation safety risks. The question arises; are we ready for advanced leaps in technology? Hydrogen, hybrid propulsion, machine learning, quantum computing, complex airspace networks and robotics. Humans as executive manager whilst retaining control only in emergencies.

It’s a famous quote; data is the new oil. We are ushering in extremely large and complex datasets that will be essential to the workings of automated and autonomous systems. Could data be the new quicksand? This is a huge issue in dense airspace where crewed and uncrewed aircraft must share the airspace.

Another emerging aviation safety risks, that industry and regulators are starting to address is the fact that safety and security have become inseparable. In the past, these disciplines were addressed as silos. That’s no longer viable.

Another emerging aviation safety risk is that of the workforce. Aviation has attracted dedicated professionals who acquire experience and train to a high level of competence. A safety culture has been embedded. In this respect the fundamentals of aviation safety remain constant.

The rapid growth of technology is a two-edged sword. Now, there are many opportunities for future generations, but aviation may not be at the top of the list of choices, as it has been. There’s a serious aviation safety risk if serious investments are not made, people are not motivated and able to gain the competencies needed by a rapidly changing industry.

To sum up. Everything I’ve spoken of can only be addressed in partnerships. In the past, the aviation industry and its regulators have proven themselves to be imaginative, resilient and forward looking.

The challenges ahead, dare I say, are even greater. Levels of integration, interdependency and rapid technology adoption are off the charts. Yet, I believe we can continually improve global aviation safety. We can step up.

POST: Farnborough International Air Show 2026. 20-24 July 2026.

Current State of Aviation Safety: Data-Driven

The present day. Today. There will be Press Releases galore at this air show. I expect ambitious and upbeat predictions. More orders. More growth. More developing markets. Demands for more skilled people, more performance, more pressure for the early adoption of rapidly changing technologies.

My subject is safety. Where are we with aviation safety in the present day? There’s a sound legacy. Afterall aviation has a long tail. What we have now, and if I look at the Farnborough Airshow catalogue of ten years ago[1], is digitisation. The ambition to be data-driven. A continuing drive to exploit data of all kinds. Extracting information from ever increasing sources in aviation.

This desire for actionable safety intelligence is not new. On my desk I have a coaster celebrating the UK CAA’s MOR Scheme[2]. That’s been alive for 50 years (1976-2026). Occurrence data has been, and is being, used to construct all sorts of safety performance indicators. These indicators can be useful but it’s not always so. They are fuel for safety management systems.

I used the word “actionable” with purpose. Today, making the results of safety data analysis useable by front-line actors and responsible managers has been a challenge we wrestle. I’ve often heard it said – that’s great but what do I do about it? Too many “greens” on a chart and complacency can set in. Too many “reds” and everyone goes into panic mode.

I have been fortunate to work with a number of safety initiative. One called the Commercial Aviation Safety Team (CAST) in the US. To match its work, on this continent, I set up a European version; ECAST in 2006. The focus was on data-drive analysis. There’re safety teams for Rotorcraft and General Aviation too.

These safety initiatives came about a reactive way. Reporting in 1997, the Gore Commission, was a reaction to dilemmas that is still with us. What to do in the wake of catastrophic accidents. And more pertinent to this talk; what to do when the global accident rate curve looks flat at the same time as predictions are for a significant growth in global air traffic. Reading this report now, the predictions were horrifying. Predictions of one large aeroplane fatal accident every week by now. Luckily, commercial air transport didn’t suffer that fate.

I should NOT say “luckily”. Current safety performance is down to an enormous amount of work done by thousands of aviation professionals over a sustained period. Not only this but shocks, whether they be financial crisis, volcanic eruptions or global pandemics, have tested this industry severely.

Taking on board what was learned over the decades, safety management has developed and matured. Incorporated in aviation’s safety regulatory framework, it’s now practiced across the whole industry. Almost. We don’t just react. We now have Safety Plans. Lists of actionable tasks aimed at continuous safety improvement. On the scale mentioned earlier – we are proactive.

Let me stop. This is not a utopia. I’d say at least half the global aviation industry is struggling with the need to be proactive. So, the road we are travelling on remains a long one. We don’t just need the capability to do better; we need to maintain the will to do better.

[1] 50^th Farnborough Air Show in 2016.

[2] https://www.caa.co.uk/about-us/make-a-report-or-complaint/report-something/mor/occurrence-reporting/

The Evolution of Aviation Safety: A Historical Overview

A quick tour of the history of aviation safety. In a couple of minutes.

As powered aircraft took to the skies it quickly became apparent that, of all the means of transport, aviation was less forgiving than others. Moving at speed in four dimensions, with the necessity to take-off and land safely, has inherent risks. By no means does this mean that flying is an dangerous activity. What it does necessitate is an exercise of sound engineering, preparation, and proficiency. When these are missing, and in cases of misfortune, accidents and serious incidents happen.

In the days between the world wars, aviation moved from the military and a circus-like amusement to a viable means of public transport. Progressively, more passengers had the opportunity to experience the wonders of flight.

Today, it’s not the early days of flight I want to focus on, but we do owe the engineers and aviators of that time a great debt. Much was learned as aeronautics matured. Since the end of the second world war the production, promotion and application of standards has embedded what had been learned. This has established the way that international civil aviation works.

One simple expression of the stages we’ve been through is Prof Patrick Hudson’s[1] model. This model describes five distinct levels of cultural maturity. The steps are pathological, reactive, calculative, proactive and generative.

This model sits alongside steps in the development of technology that have been a hallmark of aviation. Different categorisations exist. AIRBUS[2] has one that’s easily understood in terms of generations of civil aircraft.

First are the “classics” of the 1950s and 60s. Next, the second generation starts down the road of more electronics. More safety critical systems. Third generation starts flying in the early 1980s when automation becomes the norm (early fly-by-wire, glass cockpits, flight management systems). The fourth generation introduces safety systems, which address the major causes of fatal accidents, namely Controlled Flight Into Terrain (CFIT) and Loss Of Control In-Flight (LOC-I). That’s the early 1990s. When I made that move from industry (design and production) to an aviation safety regulator.

Now, I’d say we are well into fifth generation aircraft, with composite structures and integrated modular avionics. In fact, we are well into speculation about what the sixth generation may look like. Machine learning, single pilot operations, hybrid powerplants, aircraft as a node on a network.

Because aviation is a learning industry, and a conservative one, the expectation is of progressive improvement in maturity throughout the aviation system and innovative technology applied to enhance safety.

This is not to say that the potential for error, missteps and recklessness don’t exist. They do. I expect continuity in a way that takes full advantage of advanced methods without scarifying the legacy of an astonishing good global aviation safety achievement.

Later, to cover a lot of ground in a short time, I’m going to condense all the above into three distinct categories. But before that, I’ll talk about the present and a vision of the future.

POST: UK Farnborough Air Show on Thursday 23rd July 2026. Time: 13:00-13:15 BST. Location: Hall 3 Stage. Session title Where Next for Aviation Safety?

[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0925753507000227?via%3Dihub

[2] https://d10x.airbus.com/generation-of-jets/

Restoring Regional Voices

He’s right in some respects. The new Prime Minister (PM) in waiting. The UK is highly centralised. Those Portland stone buildings in London encase power in a way that was necessary during war time. Served us well. Weirdly we’ve not been able to wean ourselves off this addiction to a concentration of power. Vested interests have made agreements that reinforce the route to disappointment. That’s the story of the last decades.

It’s got worse since Brexit too. This outdated imperialism, which puts a badly prepared elite in charge is the hallmark of Boris Johnson’s time as PM. What’s strange is that lots of voters bought that combination, even when it was destined to fail from day one. It’s a wee bit ironic that those who shouted about sovereignty during the referendum, ten years ago, are the once most guilty of disenfranchising the regions of the country. Promoting the idea that there’s a mythical national saviour who can ride in and restore past glory. Quite often these folk are male, prosperous and have a similar educational background.

During the UK’s membership of the European Union (EU) there was a distinct recognition of the regions. It was the basis for electing MEPs. It gave a voice to regional concerns and built relations between European regions. Those with shared challenges. It focused resources on specific regional needs.

However, the UK was so often constrained by those Portland stone buildings in London that fine words rarely turned into actions. The idea that Turin and Coventry or Liverpool and Cologne might have similar challenges was too much for classical imperial mentalities to make a connection. Politically too, in so many cases UK MPs and MEPs did not work well together.

Optimist as I am, the formula for future prosperity promoted by the PM in waiting is old-fashioned. Let’s take re-industrialisation. This is sold to people as a restoration of industrial landmarks from the days of mass employment in large factories. I’m not saying this isn’t needed. For some in-demand products, like wind turbines, electric vehicles and storage batteries mega factories will be needed. These will not provide mass employment in the old-fashioned way. Automation inevitably plays a growing part in production.

Whether we like it or not, a new industrial revolution is underway. The new oil is data. I’m echoing the British mathematician Clive Humby who is quoted as coming up with: “Data is the new oil.” Isn’t that classic. Back in 2006, when the iPhone arrived, it was a British mathematician who coined five words that summed up what was happening. 20-years have elapsed, but our political debate is still grounded in a mechanistic post-war philosophy.

As for Brexit’s high horse, namely “sovereignty” in respect of data we seemed to have seeded that to others. This is more of the Brexit illusion. If I was of a conspiratorial way of thinking, it’s as if diverting people’s attention has enabled powerful entities to control the future.

Now, Mr Prime Minister (PM) in waiting, take up your position at the lectern and say something that addresses the direction the windvane to the future is pointing.

I’m not saying cover the country with vast energy hungry data centres. No, where it’s happening, that’s really proving extremely unpopular. Instead make sure that the UK’s data infrastructure works as well at Lands Ends as it does in at the tip of the Shetlands. That education and training move to practical working with data rather than the theoretical. That no one is left behind.