Dyke's pipe dream to raise the programme standard: not content with squandering our hard-earned cash on crap programmes, Dyke is employing the masters of role-play to put the money down the drain.

Marketing Week, May, 2003 by Iain Murray

Not content with squandering our hard-earned cash on crap programmes, Dyke is employing the masters of role-play to put the money down the drain, says lain Murray

A law of economics, often overlooked, is that the value of money is proportionate to the effort and discomfort experienced in obtaining it. So, for example, each pound earned from being in the company, or even the proximity, of, say, Ruby Wax, Edwina Currie or Graham Norton, would have a real value of at least [pounds sterling]5.

It follows that the harder it is to obtain money, the more it is valued and the more thoughtfully it is spent. This relative value of money explains why government, both national and local, is so careless and profligate in its spending. Public money illustrates the...