Vaughan asks "Why? And if not, why not?"
Which I think is a very good question. One that we should ask ourselves each time we embark on a significant action. By significant I don't mean brushing my teeth, but I do mean anything that may impact upon my life. We do it quickly and instinctively, without articulation, before crossing the road.
Even as I sat down to write this, I wondered whether I should. The answer to 'why' is because I want to. The answer to why not is because there are dishes waiting to be washed.
Even so, the dilemma of 'to blog' or 'to dishwash' is trivia beside the great moral issues. Very few moral decisions are clear-cut, so every action we take - or don't take - should be supported by a questioning of "Why? And if not, why not?"
I will confess to a little naiveté abut the 'rules' regarding whether Civil Servants should talk to the Press. The written rules are clear - no, not unless you are from Press Office or otherwise authorised.
A few months back an article appeared in the Times regarding the culling of Senior Civil Service from my Department. A dozen or so cullees had, in their disgruntlement, leaked to the Press. Only reading commentary recently has it become clear to me that it is routine for Senior Civil Servants to talk unattributably, or 'off the record' to journos. If I did it I would be ritually slaughtered.
I have often wondered what would happen if I came across something in my work that was going wrong, yet people senior to me were determined to carry on regardless. Going to the Press is a very last resort. In retrospect, there were times, over BSE and Flood Defence, where I thought "Funny, that makes no sense". My inexperience made me think that it was just me that hadn't got it. Years later, I was proved right not to have 'got it'. I should have raised the alert with my immediate management. Unfortunately, I think their incapacity to think laterally would have led them to shoo me away - a trainee questioning fundamental issues is inconvenient to a smooth audit.
I should then have escalated it to Senior Management. That is easier nowadays with the introduction of formal whistleblowing policies. I have never used those whistleblowing channels - it's easier to shrug, moan about incompetence and hope we'll muddle through. At every turn the question is "Where's your evidence?"
Another outlet is one's Constituency MP, or the chair, or a member of the Select Committee for the policy area. If you approach them, you are absolved of responsibility and you have taken it to an appropriate source. They may decide to talk to the Press. Not my problem, not my responsibility.
But if they choose to ignore it, what then? If your immediate management, their management, the organisation's senior management, your constituency MP, the Chair of the Select Committee, all dismiss your concerns, what are you supposed to think? Are they all involved in a conspiracy to cover up? Or have they all used their judgement, borne out of more experience than you, that it really is a big fuss about nothing. Perhaps I would get paranoid. At the very least I would question my own judgement. Maybe I'm the obsessive with green ink. Maybe I'm missing the point that this is normal. But if it's normal, is it acceptable? Suppose I am actually the expert on that subject, that my job is to provide quality advice to ministers on that subject. I provide the advice, but they ignore me.
Surely I then have a moral duty to speak to the Press. Even though, if found out, I'm sacked.
