Respect and Trust

This morning there is obviously a lot of reflection upon the riots in Tottenham last night.

One comment on Twitter caught my attention - it suggested that a lack of respect for the police meant that violence was a more likely outcome of any protest. As I reflected upon this I wondered if this lack of respect also applies to other public services such as health and education. I know that there are many dedicated professionals working in theses services, but when I think of these organisations as a whole my view sadly is not one of dedication to those they serve. Is this due to the media's focus on the scandals that arise in these services? Not entirely, my view is more influenced by personal experiences and those of others I know of.

Why is this? Many of my recent personal experiences of public services; and I don't have that many; leave me feeling frustrated and annoyed. And bizarrely not because of what they do or don't do but in how I feel after engaging with them. I rarely feel that as a member of the public that they want to serve me. More often I feel that I should be grateful for anything they deign to provide for me. Now don't get me wrong I do think that a lot of our public services do a very good job and we probably don't appreciate them enough. But I don't want to feel like I have inconvenienced them with my inquiry or request. I'm wondering if this is because the providers of these services no longer trust us; the general public. Could this be because these services are so concerned about the negative implications of providing their services to the small minority who don't deserve them that their focus is on them, which is reflected in their attitude to all of us.

I do accept that there are people who abuse our public services and those who work in them. But I do think these people are in the minority and I am beginning to question whether preventing that abuse is worth the cost to the majority. Is the public sectors focus on fraud meaning that we are all presumed guilty until we can prove ourselves innocent? And if so is that the price we are prepared to pay? Because if we don't trust them and they don't trust us then we are probably all going to be increasingly frustrated.

If I'm right about this then what would should we do? It seems to me that we need a process to redefine our public services and align them to what we the public want from them. And may be this needs to be by way of a continual process of engagement. This leads me to wonder whether some of our current governance models are flawed. Do I really want:

• to be represented by someone who I may never even see or speak to?
• the opportunity to go through the expenditure of various organisations?
• go along to public meetings?

No, not really. But would I like more say in how the services I use allocate their scarce resources. Yes, I would. So for me the ability to engage with these services either as and when I use them or via convenient methods of communication about their future plans and options would be appreciated.

And perhaps if more people feel like me we could help to redefine public services and rebuild the mutual trust and respect we may have lost.