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Iain Mackinnon

Iain Mackinnon

29 Jul 2010 | 09:43

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Against a backdrop of a real anxiety that anything at all positive in the public sector has to be postponed indefinitely because the money’s run out, it was good to be reminded at the weekend of what can be done when times are hard.

I was reading a review of a new biography of Attlee, who came to power in 1945 when the country really was broke. By February 1947, in the depths of a particularly bad winter, Britain very nearly ran out of fuel. Yet the following summer the government launched the NHS, unquestionably the greatest achievement of modern British politics.

So I was interested to see recently that, among all the doom and gloom, we have a new university! Universities minister David Willetts has awarded university college status to BPP, the private college well-known for its law, accountancy and other professional courses.

This is good news. It shows that we need not stop the clock until the public sector has some spending money again. It shows the great scope available for private-sector companies to innovate in the training and education field. And it shows (again) that goals traditionally regarded as public-sector goals do not always require public-sector funding. I’m all for that: if the private sector can be persuaded to put its own hand its pocket, that’s one less problem for the public sector to address. After all, there are plenty left.
 
 

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