The Notional Anthem

Some have said the Scotland effect has infected England. This, they say, has propelled Jeremy Corbyn to win the Labour leadership. Now, though, the media monstering has begun. Corbyn isn’t establishment material and, unlike Scots and the Yes movement, he can’t be written off in media diatribes as a cultural aberration. He must be written off some other way. So, here comes his ‘security threat’,  the 'national anthem disgrace' and a shabby re-run of the Michael Foot 1981 donkey jacket.

The only examination of Corbyn’s policy portfolio will be in the extreme spins with which it'll be savaged. Few in politics (politics-as-usual) or the media will look particularly carefully at it and every opportunity to brief against, exaggerate and blatantly mis-represent will come cascading out.

But, perhaps the biggest danger is from the party itself. Enemies within are usually behind you, stalking an opportunity to take you down. The PLP have plenty dissenters and conniving mis-calling is a practiced art.

And this in itself is a continuing sadness. Labour, in its twisted wisdom, has shied away from standing on its progressive record (minimum wage, winter fuel payments, 500,000 children lifted out of poverty, free nursery places, apprentices doubled, free bus travel for the elderly, the repeal of Section 28*). 

Labour has tried too hard to cast its record in terms of Tory comparisons. It fears making much of anything that would appear too leftish. Little wonder the Red Tory tag has been hung on them.

Corbyn has several circles to square. He must give a voice to left-leaning aspiration, forge a different political style, all in the face of a hostile media and a strident socio-political elite, importantly those in the Labour Party who bought into the establishment dream and refuse to let principle get in the way.

So the calumny. The latest. Corbyn's silence during the national anthem at the Battle of Britain commemoration. His disgrace was widely trumpeted in the media with no mention of his praise for the fallen heroes; no concession of  respect for him, a republican, following his conscience and keeping silent so as not to cause offence.

In the establishment arena of public life, convention is made sacrosanct to the point of absurdity. You can’t be a political dignitary and a republican, it seems. Difference is only permitted within strict bounds.

I’d have been inclined to let all this go for the minor pomposity it is but the accompanying outrage caused me outrage in reverse. This is the suit and tie business. Apparently Corbyn’s suit didn’t quite match and his collar was a bit undone - jaw dropping nonsense at a time when the media comes under fire for commenting on female politicians' dress sense (mostly bad), weight (usually excess) and the like. Interesting that, when it’s a man and one not approved of, such a thing is OK. But then, it's the way the great and the good belittle any deemed unworthy of favour (like mad socialists and women).

It all harks back to Foot’s donkey jacket (which was actually a coat). He was described at the time, by a fellow Labour MP, as looking like ‘an out-of-work navvy’. So now, 34 years later, nothing learned, we’re hearing Corbyn criticised in a similar way. It reveals so much, not the least, how unacceptable it still is to look like a poor or unemployed person. Corbyn, looking too much like an ordinary man, is pilloried because he’s ‘not really one of us’. Pompous twaddle.

And in Scotland, almost Labour-Party-less, what of it? While those of us in the continuing YES movement have issues with Corbyn on the Union and Scottish independence, his position on social justice, austerity and Trident is refreshingly progressive. Of course, we would want to argue with his views on Scotland but I’m firmly with those who feel we must show solidarity. All the better that it would come laced with our difference.

The Corbyn show is about to be mauled by an unrelenting UK media. We’ve ridden that particular tiger already but I hae ma doots if Corbyn and the wider Labour Party left are prepared for it. The MSM onslaught will be devastating. Only a strong alternative and social media in opposition can help maintain the progressive perspective. It might, at the same time, be a forum to educate Corbynists in the niceties  of Scottish politics. Paradoxically, it could be an opportunity to put a new meaning to ‘Better Together’ and show that solidarity and togetherness needn’t exclude independence and civic nationalism.

*List cribbed from Derek Bateman

Another Take on Room 101

Welcome to Bobbies-R-Us

I don’t know for sure but I speculate there’s another factor behind the M9 crash last week and Police Scotland’s handling of it. It relates to a point Lesley Riddoch touched on in the Scotsman today: centralising the Scottish force and, more importantly, the resources it uses to manage operations.

I’m prepared to go along for now with the idea that an overarching body has its place in modern policing. What concerns me though is that the processes it relies on in practice haven’t been fully thought through.

Like Lesley, I’m concerned about the national control centres, effectively call-centres, their structure and procedures. I fear the shift from local control centres brought with it underlying aspects of call-centre operations. Simply grafting on existing call-handling technologies to meet police requirements leaves ample scope for communication failures like the tragedy we’ve just witnessed.

I work in the call-handling business and, in its early days, had some involvement with its development. I understand the principles call-centres are based on. I also understand, first hand, how far from them actual practice has drifted. In the case of Police Scotland, of course, it’s in all our interests to be as close to the ideal and as far from anything that compromises best practice.

In the call-centre world, the basic tools are technological. Computer equipment and infrastructure are vitally important. On top of that, software tools are used to actually deal with calls and process them into other active systems.

In commerce, software links customers, their histories buying goods and services with data about goods or services themselves and with detailed case management. In my experience, even when development costs hundreds of millions of pounds, software solutions will be adaptations of existing solutions, modified and integrated with each other and what is already there.

For the police service, I worry their call-handling has been adapted like this and plugged into older control centre resources, leaving operational gaps. If, as I’ve found, system capabilities can be underused because of such gaps then communication becomes an inefficient mix of old methods and new, far worse, in the end, than the inadequacies of either used alone.

For example, a core call-handling system I’ve used has a method of linking all contacts and call handlers with each other so information can be electronically transferred to individuals and groups. It doesn’t interface with other resources (because they were never originally designed to). The result is some information transfers are still done on paper, passed up and down management lines depending on circumstances. Some resources permit notation or flagging but not in a way that transfers it to others where it would be useful. Cross-notation is a matter for the call-handler actively transferring or copying information. Every step like this adds a corresponding risk of information being copied inaccurately or not being copied at all.

Systems like this usually provide coding lists to categorise queries so they are completed quickly and automatically routed. This, though, relies on well thought out categories. In my experience, this is a challenge rarely risen to and codes are inadequate. They seldom describe reality and are too often entered for the closest fit. Vital information is lost through never being identified as vital from the start.

Finally, the call-centre ethos is one which plays up ideas of good communication, effectiveness and accuracy. Sadly, that renders down to an underlying target culture crippled by a need for speed and volume in handling calls. For the police service, it’s vital to effectively clear incoming calls so no-one is left in a potentially disastrous situation but if the pace of clearing calls interferes with clarity the same disastrous situation (as we’ve seen) can be misunderstood or ignored until it’s too late.

In my view, the technology we have is more than adequate for local control centres to operate close to their own operations and provide a seamless connection into the nationwide network. What it takes is a rethink of the worst aspects of centralised thinking most call-centres use. The original concept and some of those who were at its heart back in the nineties was one based on notions of self-regulating teams with the technology and software developed to facilitate their actions and keep them securely connected to the whole.

For me that speaks of localised call centres working with a real knowledge of their patch, organising and developing in that context with the technology to work together and with other parts of the wider network. It then becomes an intelligent and responsive system rather than one driven by an impetus to clear calls in hope that nothing goes missing along the way.