Is the whole of politics a charade, sham or fiasco?

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Prem Sikka, or Lord Sikka to give him his title, had this exchange in the House of Lords:

So, P&O fails to file accounts for considerable periods of time and apart from the automatically imposed penalties for late filing of accounts no action of any sort is taken against the directors of the company despite the enormous risk to which they are exposing the creditors of the company, including those who have pre-booled tickets for its ferries, and of course, the government with regard to tax due.

Why is that?

Why is the government so indifferent to the apparent abuse of limited liability implicit in the late filing of accounts for such lengthy periods?

When the government is so dedicated to regulating - and rightly so - why is it so indifferent to enforcing the regulation that is put in place, and most especially that which is intended to prevent us from being abused?

How can you want to regulate and ignore regulation at the same time?

What can explain this mindset?

Is it simply that neoliberal politics is now purely performative, and that actual consequences don't matter so long as politicians appear to be doing the right thing?

Or is this something else, which I have occasionally described as constructive non-compliance? In other words, systems that appear to deliver appropriate outcomes are put in place, but then there is a deliberate policy of not enforcing them, making the whole of politics a charade, sham or fiasco.

Is that what neoliberal politics is all about now?


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