Calamity May should resign

The G4S Olympics fiasco has hopefully put paid to the theory that private companies are sleek, dynamic and frugal compared to bloated, wasteful and inefficient public services.

G4S has been under close scrutiny from the Home Office. Leaked documents show that even in April, Government officials had grave doubts that G4S would be able to recruit sufficient numbers of competent staff. Against this background, it is hard to take seriously the claims of the Home Secretary that all was thought to be well until Wednesday. The Defence Secretary said today that the ‘notice to move’ given to troops was shortened at the weekend, meaning that the actual decision was taken prior to that.

Mrs May is either incompetent, or has mislead Parliament with repeated assurances that all was on plan, when her department knew that the reality was nothing of the kind. If she didn’t know, she should have done. This follows her infamous Human Rights Act cat story, the Abu Hamza farce, and she has also become the second Home Secretary in history to be convicted of Contempt of Court. In the last few weeks she has also appointed a new Chief of HMIC as a deliberate affront to the Police Federation. She has lost the confidence of the police & public alike, and should if she had any honour she would resign. She has been, head & shoulders, the most calamitous Home Secretary in living memory. She even has her own hashtag on Twitter - #NoConfidenceInTheresaMay.

It’s particularly galling for the armed forces, when in the last two weeks thousands have been told that they will be made redundant. Within a short period of time, they’re told they’re not wanted, now they’re mopping up after G4S. Had the security operation been kept within the public sector, the primary objective would have been getting the personnel trained and in place in time. The primary objective of G4S is profit. Policing functions should never be outsourced, especially never to G4S who have proven time and time again that they cannot be trusted. They have already been caught falsifying reports in order not to incur contractual penalties.

Public service is about exactly that – service. Private companies exist to make profit for their shareholders, and any service that they provide is incidental.