IT leaders – your country needs you

Martin Veitch

Most men lead lives of quiet desperation, wrote the American thinker Henry David Thoreau. “Not helped by the interventions of knuckle-headed politicians,” it is tempting to add.

The recent Budget was a dreadful mish-mash that shows just how keen Gordon Brown was to keep his rusty government tanker on a plodding course, as he opens arms to embrace his personal apotheosis of the premiership.

What did we get? The usual hypocritical guff of pennies on cigs and booze, plus a derisory tax on drivers of 4x4 vehicles. The noise in the background, ladies and gentlemen, is Atlee and Bevan turning in their graves to sob soft and long.

Even Harold Wilson did better. Despite a regrettable tendency for awarding gongs for backhanders and doing that dreadful half-of-bitter and football-scarf thing to appeal to the salt of the earth, Wilson at least recognised that the world was changing and technology was at the heart of that change. The Open University, a leading light of remote learning as far back as 1971, will surely be a preferable legacy to any left behind by this government.

What do Blair and Brown offer to turn the heads of believers in technology? Tax credits for modest-sized businesses that invest in research and development.

A modest gain, certainly, but one absolutely at odds with the heinous climbdown over the Home Computing Initiative that was designed to encourage PC skills through an easy-terms, tax-exempt scheme for employers and staff.

More importantly, where were the bold statements that confront commuter misery, general transport collapse and the perceived shortage of homes near the capital? Surprise, surprise but, even having thrown the genius of John Prescott at the problems, these overwhelming issues remain.

A bold strategy would have been to have awarded perks to companies that encourage teleworking but once again the government showed its thirst for power to be stronger than its appetite for change.

Nobody in their right minds should be surprised that those who govern do not understand the issues or the possibilities of using technology to reshape the way we work and live – politicians today have rarely worked in business, much less managed one. But that needn’t be an excuse. In the absence of internal experts, the government should look outwards to the abundance of people who could guide it.

Take forward-looking leaders of international businesses and give them real power to manage change. Ian Smith at Oracle, Brian McBride at Amazon.com, Ben Verwaayen at BT, Alistair Baker at Microsoft, Trudy Norris-Grey at Sun, Graham Palmer at Intel, John Browne at BP.

These people operate in the thick of business and know what’s working and what isn’t. Give them a remit to come up with something fresh that will attack the underlying infrastructure problems. It might amount to nothing but it might also create radical ideas that help Labour remember its own roots.

If Labour is to be a party of change again then technology can help but it needs to act soon because, in many ways at least, Labour isn’t working.