Dan Lewis: How the drive to release government data to the public has given birth to UkCrimeStats.com

Dan Lewis is Chief Executive of the Economic Policy Centre.

Yesterday, the Economic Policy Centre launched a new website, www.ukcrimestats.com - the country’s first free to view crime-ranking platform for Neighbourhoods, Police Forces and streets with maps, analysis and reports. It has taken just over two months to develop and brings a number of new capabilities beyond those of the Government’s own website, www.police.uk. For example:

• It has a unique and searchable crime id, linkable url page and map for each registered crime in England and Wales (unfortunately growing by 500,000 a month)
• It displays which of the 43 Police Forces has the highest or lowest total crime / crime rate or in violent / vehicle / robbery / burglary / other / asbo crime and how they rank against one another
• Discover which neighbourhoods in England and Wales have the highest total / violent / vehicle / robbery / burglary / other / asbo crime or crime rate in this month or between two months
• Discover which streets in England and Wales had the highest total / violent / vehicle / robbery / other / asbo crime  in this month or between two months
• Discover where your neighbourhood ranks in the Neighbourhood Crime League table - within five miles of a given postcode

Dan Lewis: More energy efficiency will ultimately increase, not reduce, demand for energy

Dan Lewis is Chief Executive of the Economic Policy Centre which has just published his new paper, Securing our Energy Future: Why and how it must be done

When it comes to getting bang for your buck, you’d be lucky indeed to get a small pop or even a pipsqueak out of a whole gamut of spectacularly expensive and ineffective energy policies we have in place in today’s Britain. As I wrote yesterday in the Yorkshire Post and as covered in The Engineer, we have got to get back to basics and put energy security first, affordability second and environmentally clean power third.

Unfortunately, right now, British energy policy is all back to front. We are over-rewarding low impact, intermittent technologies while failing to secure investment for big impact, long lifespan, clean and secure technologies like large hydro, nuclear, interconnectors and a Severn Tidal Barrage or Tidal Lagoons. This will only lead to even greater future dependence on expensive, tight supplies of imported gas from the LNG spot market and very possibly, power cuts from the middle of the next decade.

And in surveying the miserable, rent-seeking landscape that we call British Energy Policy, it would also break a long British policy-making tradition not to set up or help finance an oddly-named quango of questionable benefit. I was astonished to find a Wales Centre of Excellence for Anaerobic Digestion, partly sponsored by the Welsh Assembly. I wonder, is this a good use of taxpayers' funds?

And then aside from the general lack of focus and waste, there are those policies which actually have the opposite effect of that intended. Exhibit A has to be energy efficiency and that is the theme for this platform piece today.

Conservative Home's expert panel previews the Budget

In advance of today's Budget, ConservativeHome assembled an expert panel of political figures and commentators to outline what they hope to see from today's Budget in their area of interest or expertise. Their thoughts are below and once Alistair Darling has delivered the Budget, we will post their reactions here on Platform later this afternoon.

Andrew Lilico, Managing Director of Europe Economics, on Growth

The Budget should be realistic about the growth situation - planning against a recession at least as bad as the early 1980s and a material fall in the sustainable growth rate of the economy (to perhaps just 2-2.25%), cutting our spending cloth accordingly.  The Government should admit that on a recession that bad its previous plans would take spending above 50% of GDP, and that this is unacceptable. 

To keep down the growth of spending as a proportion of GDP, it should immediately announce a £50bn reduction in growth in spending between 2008-9 to 2010-11 (e.g., by freezing the cash budget of most departments), with a commitment to seek further reductions of up to £50bn, if necessary, for later years.

In addition, the annual inflation targeting regime should be replaced with a target of average inflation at 3% annually between now and 2015 - with the inflation measure changed to include housing costs.

Dan Lewis: We need a Gordon Ramsay approach to the quangocracy

Dan Lewis is Research Director of the Economic Research Council and co-author of the The Essential Guide to EU Quangos 2009, recently published by the ERC and Global Vision.

What I really admire about Gordon Ramsay is his formulaic approach to dealing with a failing restaurant. It goes - every time - something like this: recoil at the terrible food, shorten the menu, get fresh ingredients, upbraid the chef with attitude, bark at the slackers, redecorate with tasteful fittings and furniture, invite in local celebrities for a panicky relaunch night, followed by an easing of tension, commercial success and well-deserved praise all round for Chef Ramsay.

I’m sure we could have a similar systematic attempt at reforming the quangocracy – the low-hanging fruit of our oversized state. No question, there will be some very rich returns from doing this - not just to the taxpayer, but above all to the consumer of public services that they provide. So how could we do it?

The questions all quangos need to be independently annually assessed on are:

• Do they duplicate work already performed in the public sector?
• Can their function already be performed by an existing body?
• Are they crowding out private sector activity?
• Are they in receipt of uncontested government contracts?
• Can their functions be contracted out competitively to a private company?
• Can they be relocated to a much lower cost location?
• Can they be privatised?

And then the governance issues:

• What productivity gain did the Chief Executive make in order to gain an above inflation pay-rise, who approved it – or have they just obtained a rising share of a bigger budget?
• Is there anyone sitting on the board of an agency who is in receipt of grant or contract to an organisation of which they are part?

Both of these would be a breach of the Nolan principles (which some allege happens all too often) but anyhow, the UK today faces two quangocracies – a fast-growing one in Europe and a much bigger one at home.