Accountability need not involve red tape

摘要

Your article 'Questions of accountability' written by Hugh Doherty, a former public relations officer (The MJ, 17 November) criticising the 'bean-counters' and the burden of the 'accountability industry' on local government professionals revealed a fundamental misunderstanding of what accountability really is. Robust, effective public accountability does not require lots of bureaucratic procedures. It is not achieved through complying with national requirements to collate and publish performance data. Arguably, we have had too much of the latter, but it is not the same as accountability.