Question: When is a minister like a sculpture?

Barnett Newman once said sculptures were things you bump into when backing up to look at pictures. Ministers get in the way by daring to interfere when you're trying to get your work done.

Perhaps, then, ministers need regulating. Nottingham MP Graham Allen thinks so, and in December 2002 wrote satirically to every MP suggesting a body called Ofmin to scrutinise the performance of ministers.

He also proposed the idea of "beacon ministers" - high jumping ministers set free to take major decisions alone.

But should such creatures be encouraged? Watchdogs are already breeding.

Originally there was Ofgas, which became Ofgem. Ofgem begat Oftel, which begat Ofwat. Etc.

One is reminded of the line about fleas that have fleas on them, and so on ad infinitum. Ofcom was the latest watchdog.

God knows how many there are now - even the Cabinet Office doesn't know.

Each March they publish a list of all the public bodies, except that this year's hasn't appeared yet and it's May already.

2003's edition omits Ofgem - and probably quite a few more, out of embarrassment no doubt.

Perhaps the Cabinet needs an Ofcab to keep it up to scratch.

Watchdogs are like genetically engineered organisms. Once let loose into the environment they proliferate and interfere with natural bureaucratic processes.

Down the dark alleyways of public administration they prowl, preying on unsuspecting committees, quangos and boards, these running watchdogs of neo-imperialism.

A call from one of their inspectors is a close encounter of the third way kind. Sometimes they are seen on hilltops at midnight howling at ministers.

Research is needed by social anthropologists - David Attenboroughs of political ecology - to find out their mating rituals, feeding habits and natural predators.

This information should only be used to exterminate such vermin.

We do not need a body to watch the watchdogs - Ofoff. We just need to eradicate the feeling that, in the "perpetual revolution" that is now public service, someone is breathing down everyone's necks to report them if they fail to meet their performance targets.

Now Graham Allen is also a supporter of the presidential system of government. After all, he says, it's presidential now, in everything except name.

Our President is of course the ultimate "beacon minister" and does take major - very major - decisions alone.

The only thing that's needed to watch over him is us - the public - Ofpub.

Talking of which, I'm off to the pub.

savvides@cyberium.co.uk | First published in Public Servant issue 2

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