6.3.3.2 Competence

(This is an archived extract from the book Patterns of Power: Edition 2)

The population is entitled to expect that politicians are competent:

· Politicians should ensure that public services are competently run.

· A government is responsible for setting the levels of government spend and taxation, to provide the services and benefits it has promised (3.3.8.1). A competent team meets its forecasts and avoids creating economic problems.

Politicians don’t require deeply specialised skills – they can call upon those who do – but they need more knowledge than the average ‘man in the street' so that they can competently perform their role as intermediaries between the population and the specialists.