Robert Buckland Weblog

Another snowy week has brought much disruption to our family life.   I must admit that sailing down the hill on a tea tray near to our house in Wroughton yesterday afternoon was a moment of stolen pleasure that caused much hilarity in the Buckland household, but our obsession with health and safety has meant that there were a number of wholly unnecessary school closures.   This culture of fear has spread to our own homes, where people have been reluctant to clear paths and pavements just in case someone tried to sue them.  Nonsense, I say.  I did clear and salt my path and the pavement in front of the house and have survived the threat of litigation so far.

Its all part of a thought process that is making everyone far too cautious.  The ability of public officials to make decisions seems to diminish day by day.  I am not just talking about the “death of discretion”, which I see most visibly in Court as the hands of our Judges become increasingly tied, but about the reluctance of public servants to get on with decision-making.  I was speaking with a group of local surveyors in Swindon yesterday, who made the concerning point that there is often a lot of delay and confusion in the planning process caused by junior officials not wanting to make decisions.

Everything we do has a consequence.  Some of them are good, and some of them may turn out to be less than good.  None of us is blessed with the gift of complete clairvoyance,  so we have to make the best of what we have.   A reasoned decision based upon the best available evidence (no dodgy dossiers, please) is the most we can hope for.  Anyting more is a counsel of perfection.

David Tennant’s luxury on Desert Island Discs recently was a solar powered DVD and the entire boxed set of “The West Wing”.  Sound choice.