AND ANOTHER THING
How to make bad citizens better and good citizens contented
PAUL JOHNSON
Christmas ought to be a time of good cheer. We certainly have many things to be cheerful about in this blessed country of ours. Nevertheless, it is a fact that people are also disgruntled, and for a variety of reasons: taxes too high, welfare waste, far too much crime, public services below par etc. To put it bluntly, a lot of people in this country behave badly and not enough set a good example. How can we change this unfavourable ratio? How can we increase the number of exemplary citizens and decrease the number of bad ones? The solution to this, as to many other problems of conduct, is incentives.
Incentives operate throughout our eco- nomic life, especially since Thatcher, but they are virtually non-existent in our social life. There is, for instance, absolutely no incentive to behave as a good citizen, other than the natural satisfaction we all derive from an easy conscience and a sense of duty done. The State offers no rewards, as such, unless you count the Honours Sys- tem, which operates in such a haphazard, eccentric and indeed corrupt fashion as to be virtually useless. Equally, there are few disincentives to bad behaviour. It is true that at the criminal end of the spectrum the State sends people to prison or fines them. But many bad citizens do not actually break the law; on the contrary, they exploit it. I heard not long ago of a woman with eight children by different fathers who has lived on welfare since her mid-teens; all her chil- dren are now in care or attending one of the special boarding schools for 'disturbed' children whose fees are far higher than Eton's. That woman's behaviour has cost the State well over £1 million so far, and she is by no means finished yet, as she is still nubile and unconscionable.
We in Britain are not the only ones to be exploited by the immoral. At a party last week, Shirley Conran told me a hair-raising story about how a woman she knew and her Algerian boyfriend had been milking the French welfare system over the past two years, making use of opportunities and finessing methods unheard of even over here. The ransacking of French welfare by the unscrupulous and ingenious is indeed one of the reasons why France is now going through a crisis which could well turn into a revolution.
These parasites behave badly because the State offers them no incentive to behave well and inflicts no punishment on their laziness and greed. The worst it ever does is to cut off funds. The absence of rewards and punishments is a major weakness in the modern democracy, a weakness so severe that it could undermine freedom itself. Welfare exploitation (taken in conjunction with ubiquitous crime) is one reason why much of Europe is sliding towards authori- tarianism. After a certain point, angry tax- payers, feeling they are being made uses of by layabouts who exploit the system, start calling for a Man on Horseback. It is already happening in Austria and Belgium. France might travel along a similar road, as it has done before; and if French democra- cy collapses, it will not be long before Ger- many too turns back to the rule of the strong.
What I would like to see is an examina- tion of a system I call 'merit democracy'. All modern democracies guarantee citizens access to a whole range of benefits, which can be presented as rights but can also be seen as privileges: parliamentary and local government votes, welfare provisions of all kinds, education, legal aid, housing, free health care, a passport, the right to judge fellow-citizens through jury service and so forth. Many public buildings, ranging from art galleries to historic castles — and including Parliament and town halls where the nation's business is done — are open to us free or on payment of small sums. National parks, public parks, beaches — all these things cost money to maintain which the taxpayer provides, and are offered for 72.7 per cent of the staff wish you a Merry Christmas, sir ' the use of all without restriction or charge. In short, there are a vast number of things we take for granted simply because we live in Britain, but which our mediaeval fore- bears never enjoyed at all.
Ought we not to consider thinking the unthinkable and ask, why should this be? Is it right, is it necessary, is it politic that all the inhabitants of our country — good, bad and indifferent — should have equal access to these desirables, and be treated exactly alike on principle? Modern computers per- mit us to draw minute distinctions, if we choose. Everyone who lives in Britain, for example, could be given an index number, constantly readjusted, according to behaviour which takes into account taxes paid or not paid; police records or their absence; quantified benefits received; pub- lic service or lack of it; and all other actions or non-actions which have financial conse- quences for society. The varying index number would tell you not only whether you stood in credit or debit at any time, but the magnitude of the credit and debit. Rights, or rather, as I would put it, privi- leges would be available accordingly. Everyone would have citizenship of a kind, but not everyone would, for instance, have the right to vote or the right to take advan- tage of the countless goodies the State cur- rently provides for all irrespective of merit.
I am not talking of a meritocracy, or rule by the able and industrious — we ought to have that anyway. What I mean by merit democracy is the allocation of public privi- leges in accordance with effort and perfor- mance. In other words, I would change the old Marxist adage, 'From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs' — which is the fundamentally immoral axiom underlying modern welfare corrup- tion — to a new principle: 'From each his duty, to each what is due.' No quarrel with that, eh? Or, if there is, let us argue the point, not just dismiss the principle out of hand. All human societies are bound to be imperfect. Some are more just than others, some happier than others. I have often thought that the institution which combines justice and happiness best is a really well- run boarding school, and such establish- ments depend to a high degree on moral incentives supplied by codes of merits and demerits. At present we have no such prac- tical aids to good citizenship — and what better time than the Christmas season to think about creating them?
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