Nota Bene:
(PR NewsChannel) / May 16, 2012 / BIRMINGHAM, England / In "Beware the Mandarins" (ISBN 1470068737), Jane M. Hogg reveals the intrigue and corruption that prevailed during her decades of service in the British Civil Service. From the 1960s onward, Hogg worked, first,at the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research's Fire Research Station and then, at the Home Office as an Operational Research Scientist for the fire service, the police and on civil defense.
Her job should have been steeped in fascinating research to find optimal solutions to problems. Instead, from her first days at the Fire Research Station, she and her superior officers found their idealism rebuked by what the author calls the covert agenda of the Mandarins at the Home Office. A project on the Fire Research's Program aimed to demonstrate how future fire stations should be sited optimally. The move would save money, property, consequential losses and above all, human lives. Nonetheless, the Mandarins sent a "secret" letter to the director demanding that the report on "The Siting of Fire Stations in Bristol" be shelved. With the connivance of her superior officers, Hogg posted the report to everyone on the circulation list, which included all chief fire officers.
That bold move was not without consequences. The research on fire cover was moved from the Fire Research Station to the Home Office. Thereafter as a series of frustrating, disturbing, dangerous and sometimes murderous, events occur, Hogg realizes that not being amenable to "The System" comes with its own consequences. In the unsentimental style of a researcher, her memoir honestly and dispassionately spells out just how the British government really works.
In his paper "Emergency Services Research inGreatBritain" dated August 1975, Edward H. Blum of IASA,USA, observed: Jane Hogg established her group, against much opposition from administrators in the line Fire Department part of the Home Office, in 1968. It quickly received the blessings of several top-level commissions thatexamined British Fire Services between 1968 and 1972, and is always noted favourably in the Annual Report of the Chief Fire Inspector, yet a third part of the Home Office concerned with fire protection.
Hogg's experiences suggest there is a serious need to reform the British bureaucracy. "Beware the Mandarins" is a gripping story of corruption in high places that will be essential reading for anyone who cares about honesty and transparency in government.
"Beware the Mandarins" is available for sale online at Amazon.com and other channels.
About the Author: Jane M. Hogg was born in Madura, South India and raised in the Madras Presidency until 1947 when she left for schooling at Bedford High School in England. She graduated from the London School of Economics and was a sprinter for London University. A scientific civil servant for several decades, she was a featured speaker at the National Academy of Sciences' Symposium on "The Needs of the Fire Services"at Washington D.C. in October 1968.
MEDIA CONTACT
Jane M. Hogg
E-mail: jane.j.m.collier@btinternet.com
Phone: 0121 420 2919
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