I’ll start the week with something that requires no effort on my part; an email from a reader, one I have heard from only once before. On 24th October I mentioned Bexley council’s new budget consultation and how difficult it was to discover what cuts were proposed. I had no time to actually take part in the survey but somebody did and this is how he describes the experience…
Just attempting to complete the council's survey on budget saving of ten million
quid or so for the next year and I was diverted to survey monkey to complete it. Two points:
The survey (amongst many things) asks 23 questions about various elements of the
budget in the most confusing and misleading way possible by asking me to agree,
strongly or otherwise, and variants of like or hate on the most confusing
questions possible. It also deliberately misleads as to where funding currently
comes from. It makes out that the council funds many things where funding may
actually come from central government, the NHS or education services not
provided by the council.
Secondly, and what renders the entire exercise useless, is that I could not
complete the survey at all when it asked if I worked for the council. I used a
Kindle Fire HD and was able to complete every question which had a radio button option except the question which asked do I work for the council.
The options being yes, no and I don't know.
Anyway a totally pointless exercise!!
How many council employees do you think there might be who don’t know if they work for Bexley or not?
Incidentally, after my complaint about the number of pages that had to be read
the council provided a complete list,
available here. Much better.