Jon Bright (London, OK): This blog in the Progressive is a little old now, but still worth a comment on. Dan McCurry argues that there is a contrast at the heart of the EU - between a culture of 'centralisation' and a culture of 'diversification' (for which we might read localism). The thing that struck me instantly was that he thinks it's the British who are committed localists. He gives the example of recycling:
In France, the whole country puts out their recycling using the same system. The recycling bags are a different colour for glass, paper and plastic. This ensures that wherever you are, you know how to do your recycling. Centralisation makes life simple.
The British choose not to impose a central system upon the people, for fear that central planning will quash the inventiveness of policy makers and service providers. This means that each of the 600 Local Authorities across the country have adopted their own system for recycling. If you go to stay in a different part of the country, or even, another London Borough, you will find a different system that you are unfamiliar with and you will become confused. This is bad for recycling, since the ease of recycling is proportionate to the amounts of rubbish that get recycled.
However, because of the lack of central control, the diversity model allows the system to change and adapt. In Britain, a new processing-plant invention came along. All the rubbish is chucked on a conveyor belt, and lasers identify which item is plastic, glass, and paper. Then jets of air fire the plastic into one hopper, the glass into another and the paper into its own hopper. So councils began to request that households put out just one bag containing all recycling, rather than separating it. This is a better way, since the ease of recycling is proportionate to the amounts of rubbish that get recycled. So the Diversity model adapts.
He goes on to claim that this is not a 'devolution' argument - that he is not talking about local and national government (though I don't see how is argument can be prevented from extending that way). But that's not the point - for the last six months OurKingdom has been publishing a range of posts who feel exactly the opposite of the way McCurry does - who feel central control is all permeating in our society, and completely squashes local solutions. Has he simply got it wrong? Or is even our system more 'local' and 'diverse' than our continental counterparts? I feel as if it's the first one. But even so, it's always interesting to find someone whose imagination of government in Britain is so totally different from your own.
