Firstly, thanks to those absolute daaahlings at PSF for passing the info along to me and allowing me to repeat some of the things they’ve already said. I suspect there’s quite a large cross-over between their audience and mine, given that they provide content for public sector workers in the UK, and it appears that many of the people who comment on my blog fit into that category. But, for those of you who’ve not already heard about it, let me tell you the story of Environment Secretary David Miliband and the free-to-edit Wiki brought to you by DEFRA.

DEFRA’s Wiki

In what was potentially a very innovative idea, the department Wiki was set up so that anyone could contribute to the discussion of what an “environmental contract should look like”. Unfortunately, the obvious drawback of this was that pretty much everyone decided to contribute to what an environmental contract should look like, and there was some evidence to suggest they were taking it slightly less seriously than DEFRA had hoped…

Please note – the Wiki has been “locked” for the time being to prevent editing. Thanks to everyone for their interest so far – do visit again and continue the discussion. In the meantime, you’re welcome to read the comments and materials submitted.DEFRA Wiki

It seems that a lot of this was inspired by a right-wing blogger known as Guido Fawkes and while I don’t have to agree with his political opinion (I wouldn’t expect him to agree with mine), I think it’s certainly been interesting. Whether or not the motive was vandalism is irrelevant; the Wiki has probably received more publicity due to this than it would have ever done otherwise, and when it’s presumably relaunched with registered users, people will remember it. There’s certainly an anti-Labour and anti-European sentiment which comes across in a number of the edits, and to me the problem with these is they’re only funny if you share those views. And I don’t; but there’s still plenty of other stuff on there to amuse and entertain…

Personally I believe the success of some sites such as Wikipedia are because they are seen as independent, rather than being a puff-piece for a Government or Government Department. If it is to be a success, I think they’ll need to allow critical opinions too…

On the whole, I think it’s a good idea and I think it’s an interesting way to promote the whole e-government thing, but, like everything else about life, it needs to be able to take a good custard pie in the face — I disagree with Simon Collister when he says:

I suppose I feel personally aggreived by Guido’s puerile and petty actionSimon Collister

…because while it was petty and puerile, it was also bloody funny in parts. Anyway, on to that custard pie…

Version 100 of the Environmental Contract

An environmental contract should be based on the following principles:

[…

1. Equity: costs and benefits should be allocated fairly. Polluters should pay; environmental stewards should be rewarded; those who have made a bigger historical contribution to pollution have a correspondingly greater obligation to respond to it. The likes of Jeremy Clarkson, in promoting pollution, should be penalised thrice over. Once for driving vehicles above and beyond the speed limit, causing both noise and exhaust pollution. Twice for writing for the dead-tree press, contributing to deforestation (a glossy magazine won’t print so well on recycled paper). Thrice for leading naive post-pubescent teenagers astray from environmentally friendly commuting (stay at home with Mother – and yet Mother is so fearsome! I weep).

Environmental Contract v100

In some cases, as in this one, I can’t see what form this supposed “vandalism” actually takes. This particular part of the contract seems entirely reasonable, particularly the whole Jeremy Clarkson bit, seems like a sound and well-thought out policy to me.

Then we had:

Tools that create the right incentive frameworks include:

• Environmental taxes and charges
• Grant schemes for working towards environmental targets
• Emissions trading schemes and other market based incentive schemes
• Product standard regulations — and a clear forward path
• Voluntary and negotiated agreements
• removal of subsidies to environmentally unfriendly behaviour
• Owl magnet

Environmental Contract v100

Now in this case it’s easy to spot the changes made: what’s all this nonsense about emissions trading schemes? Although apparently it did provoke a debate at PSF over what an owl magnet actually was. Was it a magnet shaped like an owl, or was it a device for drawing owls towards it? Ian Dunmore (of PSF) and myself (of here) seemed to be the only ones who thought the second option likely, as frankly who could possibly want a normal ferrous-metals magnet that was shaped like an owl? No, don’t ask the obvious question.

But that’s not all the Government will be doing for us under the Environmental Contract, oh no:

…in return, government will:

• …
• collect your rubbish and clean streets individually, while smiling and laughing
• give simple advice to customers on what they can recycle
• offer composting products to citizens on a cost recovery basis
• send you photographs of Tony Blair in his pants

Environmental Contract v100

I don’t know however whether this specifically relates to Tony Blair or whoever the serving Prime Minister is — given the fact he’s said he’ll quit within a year. Because this would maybe bring a swimsuit element to the next General Election, which despite the jaw-dropping awfulness of the images I’m getting in my head now, would probably still be a better idea than the normal Party Political Broadcasts.

There’s also a bit of a Blue Peter feel about the whole thing, with the question “What tools can be used to deliver the environmental contract?” being answered with “Spade, Organic Yoghurt Stirrer, Old washing up liquid bottle, Sticky Back Plastic”. This theory of course fails to take note of the fact that you’ve got an environmental contract just ready and waiting — “here’s one I prepared earlier” — which frankly misses the whole point of the Blue Peter thing, in my opinion.

Other than these, the rest of the changes aren’t much to write home about, with “What would an environmental contract for energy look like? Will look like my face? My beautiful face?” being about as good as anything else.

Well done, everybody

Well done to those responsible for giving me a bloody good laugh, and well done to DEFRA for having the balls to go with the Wiki idea — even if it wasn’t quite right first time — and also well done to DEFRA for what, in my view, in the current version of the Environment Contract (and presumably a relatively un-hacked version) are a number of good ideas for the environment and so on. I still think they should bring back that Jeremy Clarkson one, though …