Will the UK government really save money by axing quangos?
The UK government has announced the reorganisation of 192 publicly funded quangos which will disappear or merge with existing organisations. This has been the largest ever reorganisation of the quango sector which is something of a grey area in the UK being funded by the UK public yet unelected. While there have been many headlines over the years regarding the remuneration packages afforded to some of these quangos there is no doubt that they do have a part to play in the UK economy.
There is concern that the UK government has taken the axe to the sector as a whole and may well have closed down, or is on the verge of closing down, a number of quangos which do actually pay for themselves. Only time will tell whether this reorganisation has been cost efficient and productivity efficient because these two elements are very different. The UK taxpayer has in many ways been kept in the dark regarding quangos in the past and maybe we only heard the relatively negative press comment and much of the good work went unreported?
However, it has to be said that with a £158 billion budget deficit there are few areas of public life and public services which will remain the same.
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