There is an old Scottish proverb which runs as follows: “If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.” This came to my mind after seeing the brief note in the Daily Sceptic about the apparent award of a £70 billion contract linked to Net Zero projects by a small company in Stevenage to another small company in Cornwall. Even if there is a typo in quantifying the money involved, £70 million would still be a serious sum of money. However, we are not dealing with real money but some indicator of “value”, probably more in the eye of the provider than of any of the supposed beneficiaries. This is where the important story lies, in the bizarre incentives that exist in a world of bureaucracies committed to vague and ill-considered targets dealing with entrepreneurial types who have lots of sales panache but limited technical competence.
My background stimulated my interest in this story. Among other things, I manage companies which operate broadband networks in Scotland. Quite separately, I have published a lot on the economics of climate change and renewable energy, while in the past I managed large energy and infrastructure projects. I would not claim a total value of £70 billion but the total amount of real money at stake in these projects was more than £20 billion. Such sums may seem like funny money but they are not unrealistic when dealing with a large sector in a large country. That experience gives a clue to the lesson that we need to learn.
The company which supposedly awarded the £70 billion contract provides networking and other broadband services to schools. They seem like many other small IT companies in the area with, apparently, limited and not especially sophisticated skills. Managing high performance networks is a very specialized business quite separate from the management of IT facilities run over such networks. The consequence is that local authorities, private companies and other organisations often employ a hierarchy of sub-contractors to provide and maintain networks, IT and network services.
This hierarchical structure applies similarly when dealing with large infrastructure and energy programs. Even with decades of experience, the reality of such programs is littered with grotesque cost over-runs and failures to deliver what is promised. Politicians, bureaucrats and private sector managers do not have the incentives or the skills to deliver what is promised on time and within budget. The combination of project hype and poor management mean that the outcome is all too often an expensive disappointment.
Now, consider Net Zero as such a program. It is based, from beginning to end, on wishful thinking – that costs will fall rapidly, that new technologies will transform sectors within years rather than decades. There are thousands of companies – and academics – who claim that everything will be different in some way or other if only they are given lots of money. Anyone who takes a cautious view based on what we can do now and what it will cost knows that the goal is not feasible within the timescale promised and that the costs may be ruinous. But that is not the right answer, so instead we have “If wishes were horses…”
The public sector and large companies provide dozens of examples of how this works. In the last decade the public has been deluged with propaganda for Zero Waste – recycling all garbage rather than sending it to landfills. What could be wrong with that? But suppose you are a harried manager in a local authority which is setting up a recycling scheme but has no idea what to do with the stuff that will be collected. You go to some conferences and come across a group with some very pretty slides and a plausible story about how they are going to sort recycled waste to make plastic bags or packaging materials and send the rest to an energy-from-waste project (aka an incinerator). The council is persuaded to invest in the scheme and seemingly your problem is solved. However, two years later it comes out that the sorting facility doesn’t work, there is no market for the recycled plastics, the incinerator couldn’t get planning permission, and all of the “recycled” waste is being shipped to West Africa or Vietnam.
Such cases are not rare. They happen all of the time because developing and implementing new technologies or ways of working is expensive, time consuming and very prone to failure. Venture capitalists, whose primary skill is to assess risk, expect that only 1 in 10 of their investments will really pay off and that may take 10 or 15 years. Why should bureaucrats with less experience and skill expect to do any better? Yet politicians, urged on by lobby groups, set Net Zero time scales of five-to-10 years for changes that, on a realistic assessment, might take two, three or four decades.
The whole field is riven by conflicts of interest and the absence of any serious penalties for failure. There is a tendency to assume that if the goal is worthy we need not explore who really benefits in too much detail. Yet the truth is that governments, in particular, are very bad at managing large projects and programs. The reason is that it is difficult, tedious and often unrewarding work, none of which fits well with a political and administrative culture that is focused on hype and short-term goals. Whether it is the PPE saga or Test and Trace or HS2 or NHS IT contracts or any of the other blunders of our Government, the one thing we should have learned by now is that major Net Zero projects will not be delivered on time or on budget.
With Net Zero the situation is even worse because nobody knows what they are doing but there is a lot of ignorant money seeking a home. Local authorities, private companies and other organisations want their share of this money. The result will be a few successes, a larger number of partial or complete failures and a vast amount of money wasted. That is routine in venture capital and technology R&D. It is less acceptable when the money comes from taxpayers and is, in practice, diverted from more immediate ways in which the well-being of the population or the environment could be improved.
It is a sad reflection of the current media environment that anyone who challenges either the goal of Net Zero or the means to achieve it is likely to be labelled a “climate change denier”. Hence, I will be blunt: that is defamatory codswallop. Thirty years ago I was co-author of one of the first international analyses of climate change. I have written as much or more about global adaptation to climate change as anyone. Our difficulty is that the policies followed to date have been a spectacular failure and nothing which Britain or Europe can do will change what is already baked in for 2050. In these circumstances, it is worth asking whether throwing billions of pounds at an “If wishes were horses …” program is a sensible use of public or private money.
Gordon Hughes is a former Professor of Economics at Edinburgh University and was a senior adviser on energy and environmental policy at the World Bank until 2001.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
Good that Roberts sided with the majority.
As is so often the case, it’s worth reading Justice Thomas’ concurrence in full. He sets out very clearly the constitutional, historical basis for the judgement and then proceeds to lay into the case for “affirmative action” with clarity and vigour.
A good day in the fight against discrimination.
In the film, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Tom Doniphan’s black servant Pompey can’t remember which truths are held to be self-evident and is reminded – “that all men are created equal”. Lawyer Ranse Stoddard tells him, ” that’s alright, a lot of people forget that part”, and frankly it’s shocking that this discrimination has been allowed to happen in “American” universities for so long.
In some ways more importantly it’s another good day in the fight against judicial activism and favour of democracy, and for interpreting the constitution according to the meaning it would have had for the people who adopted it, and a further blow against the absurd notion of a “living constitution”.
If you want people to improve themselves treat them as if they can, not as.if they can’t.
Indeed
I doubt that the primary motivation is the improvement of the supposed beneficiaries. It certainly improves the lot of the grievance industry, of political parties that rely on the support of the coalition of the fringes, and assuages middle class white guilt which oddly seems to afflict many people but not me (I suppose because I am a Bad Person).
I can only feel guilt about things I’ve done.
Collective ancestral guilt is only ever applied to whites, despite the fact that we’ve done nothing remotely like the Bantu extermination of the pygmies and San.
Some people seem to feel guilty about their good fortune. I think that’s crazy. One should simply feel thankful about good fortune.
Sounds like Sotomayor is having a hissy fit and chucking her toys out the pram because she lost.
Why, what has she said?
Her dissent is worth reading. It’s rabid!
It’s not her job to help make her country “racially equal” (absurd, meaningless phrase that simply provides a limitless and eternal excuse for making mischief), just to interpret the law as it was understood by the people who adopted it, at the time it was adopted.
Eventually the replacement of white Americans with people from Central and South America and points further afield will mean the Democrats will never lose another election and they can pack the court with social justice warriors, or abolish it, and eventually amend the constitution. I think we might see some majority white republican states looking to leave the Union eventually. The demographics are against us. We are outnumbered by “people of the global majority” (non whites, in plain English).
Yes, ‘national divorce’ is being discussed more often in the US. However, people are also fleeing states they live in for ones that better suit their values. The brilliance of the USA, when the federal government keeps out of things, is that you get to choose any of 50-odd different countries to live in. The problem is that ‘The Great Sort’ means fewer purple states and more hardcore red and blue states. That being the case, the extremely populous, wealthy blue states might overwhelm the red states. And the spectre of the real ‘ruler of the world’ – Larry Fink – is always there…
You’ll see from my posts here down the years that I favour some sort of diaspora across the West. Politics have polarised, mostly because the left has gone so outlandishly ‘out there’ into reality-denying, postmodern insanity that even the centre left of 30 years ago seems hard right now. We’re at a point where people who have coexisted for centuries simply can’t all live together anymore. I liken it to a house-share: the way things are right now, the housemates would all want to move out. In order for there to be peace in the future, there are going to have to be new countries.
The Labour government that seems inevitable here next year is an oncoming storm for me – I dread it. It’s going to be the worst knee-bending, rainbow flag-waving, property- and wealth-taxing government in history. I also loathe, fear and despise the Tories – when they stole our freedom, they made it possible for the left to be far more draconian and their politics widened the Overton window to make things like wealth taxes possible.
Politically, I’d rather live somewhere like Florida. I know the UK is never going to give me anything close to the country I want to live in ever again. I love England – the land – and its history. I hate the concrete and tarmac jungle that it is the modern British state. Until the last hundred years or so, if the country you lived in was so awful, you’d find a way to move to another one: it’s how America was created.
America is in a strange place right now: it has a corrupt, far left administration and a sensible, grounded SCOTUS that is starting to help restore the best aspects of the US Constitution. I think the country will inevitably split in the next century. Europe, with its history of bigotry and intolerance is going to become very dangerous, though, because the people in power in Europe have rarely tolerated dissent. The leaders, in cahoots as they are with the Gateses and Soroses of the world, are going to make us bleed and slash our throats to silence us unless they let us move away.
Yes I think you are right.
It’s hard to get US residence unless you are fairly rich and willing to invest or have some extraordinary skill that is is short supply, or manage to get a firm to sponsor a visa connected to your work.
South Dakota seems quite appealing other than the long cold winters.
I doubt any state would be allowed to leave the Union. There could be a bloody war. Our enemies do not want to leave us alone. The US is large and sparsely populated and has a lot of natural resources so you could excuse people for wanting a piece of it, but Europe is small and crowded yet every day they come. Imagine some new countries could be formed in Europe for people who valued freedom and hard work. They would quickly be more successful than the other countries and people would want a piece of it.
A fine post Dom.
I thought the Spanish are “white”…
Indeed they are. Not sure what you mean though. If you’re talking about people from Central and South America who are flooding into the US they are not the conquistadors, who will tend to be the rich people running the show in most of those countries.
There is one Latin American country, possibly Bolivia, which has quite a high percentage of native Americans. Still a minority though. And there is Brazil, which has a lot of Yoruba and so on. I’m still not sure though exactly what people mean by people from “Central and South America”. I mean there’s so many different groups. A whole bunch of Germans and Welsh in Argentina for a start.
Most of the immigrants are mestizos or indigenos
There is a difference between native Spaniards and many Spanish speakers.
Yes. See my post above. Spanish spoken in America is also different to that spoken in Spain.
I recall my 1906 encyclopaedia in an article on Argentina describes a native tribe (around Beagle Channel?) as being of “low intelligence”, whatever that meant. I don’t think such groups form any sort of majority now though.
Most central and South American countries have populations of largely mixed race – natives, Spanish, Portuguese and African. The only country with a majority of duly European origin is Uruguay I believe.
I wonder if they would have the balls to overturn the travesties that were the gay marriage and Obamacare rulings.
They’d probably prefer to lock you up for talking about “having balls”…
I know plenty of women with balls
Reminds me of that Bond film (CIA propaganda that it is) – “Sometimes I wonder if you have the balls for this job”… “at least I don’t have to think with them”!
I can think of something else that should be deemed unlawful. Hasn’t June just basically been a free-for-all for the flasher community? I mean, they even get to ditch the obligatory yet cumbersome mac. What would be classed as ”indecent exposure” for the other 11 months of the year gets tossed to one side, Pandemic Preparedness Plan style, and zero f*cks are given, seemingly! It’s basically a month long networking opportunity for the deviant freaks of society. I need a rainbow detox, stat.
https://twitter.com/GoldingBF/status/1673708734890090500
Yep, ”Pride Protects Perverts” alright. You have the protection of the law as long as it’s June ( and especially if you wear rainbows or are dressed as a dog ). Interestingly, haven’t seen any fandangos on display, it’s always the sexual predator men with their bits hanging out, and as long as they don’t wear a sinister facial expression then it’s all good, wholesome family entertainment. How to condition your child to accept your sick version of what’s ”normal” for the other 11 months of the year!
https://twitter.com/GAG_Wisconsin/status/1673904240102703106
If nothing else, it’s been a bad month for the ‘Pride’ industry. Next year will be war: there will be big organised boycotts and protests against the rainbow perverts and the perverts will similarly be more violent and more determined to go after our children.
I suppose I ought really to start a campaign to reclaim the word “rainbow” (which for us is a reminder of God’s covenant after the great flood) from these people…
Agreed. My Dad’s favourite song as a child was ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’ and his favourite film was The Wizard of Oz, which played in cinemas during WWII. He was almost three when the bombs started dropping on our home town, flattening much of it. Now, that song has been turned into a Pride anthem – in his mind, it’s a perversion of his childhood, taking something good and innocent and twisting it. I also hate it when activists take something good and turn it into a tool of propaganda.
https://open.substack.com/pub/boriquagato/p/kitten-corner-affirmative-action?r=p2ks4&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post
What is the future for Afro-Americans? What is the future for America? And the same questions can be asked of the UK. The Afro-American experience is completely different from that of non-Afro-Americans. You only have to watch Last Chance U on Netflix to realise just how different. Though a TV series, and though all sorts of other things, it really is an eye-opener. I’ll say no more.
Slightly tangentially, here are a couple of excellent articles on how Affirmative Action, and more generally how the replacement of competency by diversity as a primary goal in talent selection, is eroding the reliability of the complex systems we rely upon … with a suggestion that this may have been a factor in the recent Titan submersible disaster.
https://www.palladiummag.com/2023/06/01/complex-systems-wont-survive-the-competence-crisis/
https://darkfutura.substack.com/p/abyss-for-the-titans
Both are well worth reading.
Just another example of how affirmative action penalises & harms those who may be most in need of what they’ve applied for. This is from Dshlopes
My Affirmative Action Story
Back in college I went to go get a job near my campus during the summer, before my next football season started. Just so you know my background, I had absolutely NO MONEY as I grew up unbelievably poor and my single Mom never had the ability to even send me a dollar. Then, as I was looking for work, I saw that Lowe’s was hiring and this looked like a perfect opportunity for me because I had worked at a hardware store myself throughout high school. I quickly applied for a job.
Later, my teammates and I were in the locker room after one of our workouts and started talking about finding work during the summer. I let them know that Lowe’s was hiring and that I had applied myself. Then JJ, one of my friends/teammates started complaining that his parents were trying to make him work for the first time. For context, JJ was black and his parents were both extremely wealthy lawyers. They actually wanted him to work purely to teach him responsibility, work ethic, etc. but he was 100% against this and pissed off about it. Then, as he was thinking about this out loud, he said “you know what, as long as they THINK I’m looking for work they will stay off my back.” So he decided to also apply to Lowe’s himself with plans of “intentionally bombing” his interview, if he went at all.
Fast-forward a few days and I had my job interview. I owned literally one shirt and pair of pants that could even be considered “dressy” and that is a stretch… they were very old clothes that were from Goodwill. Anyways, I put them on and gave my very best in the interview: Eye contact the whole time, said “yes sir” and “no sir” always, answered questions well and did as good as I possibly could. Also, it turned out that the most urgent job they needed to fill was in plumbing, which was the exact department that I had previously worked in during high school. I left there feeling very good about everything.
A few days later JJ had his interview. He said that he was going to just skip it but knew his parents would find out so he went, planning on intentionally bombing. The interview went as follows, according to JJ himself: First off, he had a bunch of really nice clothes but intentionally decide to wear a beater, backwards hat and athletic shorts. During the interview he was as disrespectful to the manager as he possibly could be, on purpose. He slouched back in the chair, no eye contact, no saying “sir” at all, while loudly chewing gum with his mouth open. He even told them that he has never worked and didn’t want to work but his parents made him apply for the job. JJ was actually bragging about doing this before our afternoon football workout later the same day. Also, just so you all know, he actually was normally not like this… he was very respectful towards coaches and a pretty good, dependable teammate as well. He just REALLY did not want to work a job…
Fast forward a week and I hear JJ cussing and pissed off outside of our dorms. I walk over to him and find out that he just got called from Lowe’s. They had offered him the job he didn’t want and that is why he was so angry. Then I go inside, call Lowe’s myself and they let me know that they had “already filled the position unfortunately.” JJ had literally got the job in plumbing that I had applied for. I later came to find out that this particular Lowe’s was having trouble employing “enough African Americans” and meeting certain “requirements”… they needed a hire based solely on a specific race.
This is just one example of why Affirmative Action should not exist. A rich black young adult with no job experience that TRIED to not get hired got picked over a dirt poor white young adult with direct job experience… someone that actually NEEDED the job.
So what happened in the end? JJ went in to work for three days, was hours late each day and then abruptly quit. Lowe’s didn’t care… they made the AA diversity hire they needed.
https://twitter.com/dschlopesisback/status/1674603363848036352?s=46&t=G8osZoHuXTQhHbGFJD4WZg
What if preferential treatment was applied in sport? or airline pilots, or doctors?