As the UK’s political parties prepare for electoral battles, the aspirations of would-be leaders are racing ahead of the inspirational leadership needed for their delivery.  ‘Advanced Wishful Thinking’, a river that rarely runs dry, is set to burst its banks during the next two months.

In no area is this more apparent in the recurring theme of ‘localism’ where all the main parties are trying to articulate policy reform.   Until after the election, when we can be sure that ‘circumstances’ will extend the delivery horizons for localism, central control is not something that a disgraced Westminster system finds promotionally comfortable.

A General Election is always a time for pundits and politicos alike to update their policy prescriptions and refashion their old ideas to suit the current mood.  But underneath the lip-gloss, the lips and the words they speak remain much the same.

The public waits to hear something really different.  They hear furious rows over nuanced nonsense and perverse misinterpretations.  The only news will be that either Oxford or Cambridge wins the boat race next weekend.   Few will see much difference between different shades of blue.

The ‘localism’ debate will, if past experience is a guide, be argued to death safe in the comforting knowledge that, once the votes are cast, the Westminster Village (and the media) will return to its normal ignorance of peasant life.

There was a moment in this fast-fading parliament, just after Gordon Brown stepped into his PM shoes, that the localism dreams looked close to becoming reality.

Alongside the 2007 Comprehensive Spending Review, when the objectives of Whitehall Departments were set out more clearly than ever before, when the inter-departmental processes for cross-cutting issues were handed down to the mandarins, Gordon’s former command issued their definitive review of ‘Sub-National Economic Development and Regeneration’.

It was, briefly, a moment to savour; full of devolution of responsibilities and resources.  It came  with the intent of a slim-line Whitehall focused on strategy more than micro-management and less growth-dependence on the City of London.  It promised much except in one hugely vital area at the heart of economic development and regeneration.

Sadly, not only did the fine minds of The Treasury miss the vital core component, the entire policy, as with so many brave efforts before, gradually withered in the chill winds of economic expediency.  By the time the policy was reviewed (‘Prosperous Places’) the moment for action had passed.

Sixteen times in that classic report of 2007 it mentioned the word ‘networks’.  Not one single occurrence of that word referred to digital networks.  We had transport and rail and road networks and networks of schools, of professionals, of cities and energy, but, despite the localism theory exactly matching the localism need, not one single mention of local digital Access Networks.  In all the fine words about infrastructure not one mention of telecommunications.

Put simply, the authors had long forgotten that the access lines that (in Obama’s words) “feed our economy and bind us together” are a basic utility.  Pipes do not need to know what they transport.  Pipes, like roads, do not need to be owned or managed by the purveyors of the services for which they are used.  Better pipes mean better business.  Better pipes deliver vastly more and more-relevant local services.  Better pipes mean more competition and diversity in services.  Better pipes are best not left to recumbent incumbents who care for ‘their’ copper.

Now, 3 years on, after the Caio Report and Lord Carter’s Digital Britain report and yet more consultations and reviews, and after lofty policy declarations, lowly uninspiring targets and Ofcom’s declaration that we are (honest guv) ‘an advanced digital nation’, we can look again to Sweden or The Netherlands or Latvia or umpteen other European countries to see just how near we came but how far we missed the opportunities (before the current recession) to trigger locally-led investment in the foundations for ‘Sub-National Economic Development and Regeneration’.

To stay the course, to see innovative lights at the end of the fibre, we need determined navigators.  To expect to find this breed amongst the current crop of candidates seems like advanced wishful thinking – or maybe, goaded enough like poll-tax objectors, the would-be-digital citizens will revolt.

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Notes:

Sub-national Economic Development and Regeneration - HM Treasury, July 2007 (PDF)

'Prosperous Places' - review of the 2007 paper - HM Treasury/BERR, March 2008 (PDF)

Broadband Quality Study - Oxford Said Business School - Autumn 2009

See also:'The Hang On, Hang Up Dilemma', January 2009