Speeches by Cane.

“However, as you say, you have a part in the process, even though not the ultimate decision. Whereas with the political one, you have no part at all. Then a more personal question. You are Master of Emmanuel College, a full-time job. Are you really confident that you have the time to devote to the EIC to make sure that …”

“You said that you are hoping to get the independent commissioners in place soon. Do you have an idea of a rough date for that?”

“Effectively, you take what you are given.”

“There is always going to be a balance with any organisation, with having enough people to have them on each of the inquiries, but not having too big a group to actually work together collectively. How have you satisfied yourself that you have that balance right?”

“Good morning. I am going to be looking at resources. Starting with what level of staffing and funding do you need in order to carry out the full scope of your remit?”

“Are you confident that you are going to get a positive answer?”

“What about the process for appointing the vacancy—it is the parties who do it?”

“The political commissioners, how are you getting on with those?”

“One of the things that shocked me most when I was elected was how much we are failing children with special educational needs. We all get those emails in our inbox, and they are heartrending. When we meet those parents, we can see the stress and the strain etched in their faces, and we can only imagine what it is like …”

“I agree; we must not set things up in competition. I would like to ask the Minister three questions. First, what is she going to do to make sure that every school in every area has the specialist resources it needs to deliver for its children? How is she going to make sure that rural areas such as mine in Ely and East …”

“Are you also measuring how many calls are dropped?”

“They are speaking to a person and then the call gets cut off.”

“It would be interesting to see that, and to see the trend. The suspicious person in me thinks that, when you have a KPI, there is a temptation to drop calls so that you can answer calls within the required time.”

““Until we sort this out.” Why are you not just offering it to them and making it, as it were, their right, because they are owed that money?”

“Thank you for letting me guest today. I need to declare an interest; I am also a civil service pensioner, a retired member of the FDA, and indeed, a member of the Civil Service Pensioners Alliance. My first group of questions is about the telephone answering service. We have heard of the problems that people are having…”

“Yes, I do. We heard at the beginning about the gentleman who is terminally ill and not yet receiving regular payments, and about some widows who are not receiving them. Why are they having to come up with the magic words to ask for a loan? Why don’t you automatically offer them a loan?”

“Once somebody is answered, are any of those calls dropped partway through—do you measure that?”

“I am not suggesting there would be a policy, but it is a behaviour that has been found on lots of other KPIs.”

“I hear that, but you are not able to do it in those three cases we heard about, so why don’t you simply say: “We are sorry that it is taking us so long to resolve this properly. We are working as fast as we can. In the meantime, we would like to offer you a loan”—”

“You said that the average wait time for people with a general query, not one of your priorities, is less than 100 seconds.”