I have published this video this morning. In it, I argue that we have lived through a forty-year period when just about every government minister has believed that nothing government can do is as good as what the private sector does. There is, however, no evidence to support this claim. It really is time for politicians to believe in the ability of the government itself.

The audio version of this video is here:

The transcript is:

Labour could change the way in which the UK is governed and the way in which they govern it if only they would change some very straightforward things. These things that could be changed require it to spend little or nothing and they are, therefore, going to be within the possibilities that Rachel Reeves will allow ministers to put forward when she is claiming that there is no money to be spent.

One of those things that Labour could do is start believing in government.

There has been a tendency for decades for parties in government to believe that they do not know the answers to the questions that are required to be solved if they are to deliver the policies that the UK requires for the benefit of the people who live in it.

As a result, governments of both Labour and Tory perspectives have used vast numbers of consultants to advise government on what they should do, and have outsourced wherever possible to private sector companies the activities that were previously undertaken, usually very successfully, by government itself.

In other words, at the very core of our political process, and common to both our political parties who have been in government, that is, is the belief that somehow or other they can't do what the private sector can and nor can the civil servants who work for them.

They also share the belief that any company owned by the government or organization managed by the government is somehow inferior to one run by the private sector.

Now, that's not true. If you want the simplest and most straightforward evidence of that, look at how many private sector organisations fail a year. It is hundreds of thousands of companies that go out of business in the UK each year. And some of them aren't very small. So, the private sector is simply no more efficient than the state sector.

It is no better at decision-making.

It has no wisdom that is being denied to politicians, civil servants, or those in management in state-run organisations.

There is just this belief amongst politicians that, well, they're pretty rubbish when it comes down to it, and that the private sector, for some reason, isn't, largely because people in the private sector pay themselves more than people in the public sector get paid.

If Labour wanted to change government for the better, it should start believing that government is able to deliver for the people of this country. They've got to start believing in themselves, in other words.

Is that too much to ask of a politician? I don't think so.

Come on Labour, just do it.