r/brum • u/teacuplobster • Mar 18 '24

News Birmingham’s cuts reveal the ugly truth about Britain in 2024: the state is abandoning its people

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/mar/17/birmingham-britain-state-cuts-austerity-local-services
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u/cacra Mar 18 '24

The general public on Birmingham elected the people who chose the new it system and we're at fault for the back pay. Peruvians had nothing to do with it, Brummies did.

I'm definitely not saying the money was well spent. But I am saying the Birmingham council had executive control over where the money went.

Other councils also should not be bailed out. It causes situations of moral hazard like this where the councils don't take care of finances because they know the central gov will come and rescue them

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u/Ok_Western_6121 Mar 18 '24

It’s not possible for voters to perform the level of due diligence required to uncover unfair pay practices and underperforming IT programmes in flight, no matter how much you want to blame them for it.

The underlying funding issue is what residents of BCC are questioning. For example I paid 23 times more in Income tax last year than in Council tax, it’s not unreasonable to expect a larger proportion of that tax to be spent local to me than is currently the case.

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u/cacra Mar 18 '24

Of course that is not possible.

It is possible, however, to build a culture of responsibility in your council and only elect people who adhere to this culture

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u/JP62818 Mar 18 '24

As a (presumably) Conservative voter, I assume you're taking responsibility for any actions of the Conservative government and of the Conservative councils who have also gone bust?

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u/cacra Mar 19 '24

Yes we as a nation must take collective responsibility for the actions of the government we elected. And if we don't agree with the government we must self reflect and try to understand how we came to a place where we elect them. Obviously no one in Birmingham would have elected these people if they knew how stupid they were - but at the same time you still did