Certainly, there is little evidence that Britain's obsession with performance assessment, which pre-dated the Labour government of the past eight years, has done much for its public services compared with other countries.
It will discharge a pre-election deal between Labour and the Lib Dems.
In December's pre-Budget report, Labour announced belt-tightening measures including a 1% cap on public sector pay rises and an increase in National Insurance from 2011.
It could well turn out to be the most significant speech of Labour's pre election campaign, and certainly the most significant of Gordon Brown's political career.
Sources believe the change would not be implemented quickly, but could be in place by 2014, suggesting it is being eyed as pre-election challenge to Labour and the Lib Dems.
The Autumn Statement replaces what was called the pre-Budget report during the Labour government's time in office.
He compared the idea with measures introduced by the Labour government - such as longer periods of pre-charge detention - which he said were justified at the time on security grounds but had proved to be damaging.
Although Labour already has a "parliamentary panel" of pre-vetted candidates, constituency parties are not currently forced to choose only from the list.
This hearing will be pretty much the final act of pre-legislative scrutiny by the committee, under the senior Labour peer, Lord Richard - and I suspect that it will really be the opening skirmish in what promises to be a long and intricate battle to enact Lords reform.
In a pre-recorded BBC interview, Mr Blair dismissed any suggestion that Labour had to choose between targeting the party's core supporters or Middle England's floating voters.
Several MPs are known to be mulling a mayoral run - last year Peter Soulsby left the Commons to run as labour candidate for Mayor of Leicester, (Leicester decided to pre-empt the Localism Act and move straight to a mayoral system without passing "go").
Ms Cooper said the Labour government had made some mistakes - efforts to introduce 90-day pre-trial detention for terror suspects was "never justified by the evidence".
In his recent Keir Hardie lecture (named after Labour's first leader) David Miliband evoked his party's pre-war tradition of mutual guilds and moral seriousness, rather than the mix of Fabian statism and cultural relativism that has prevailed since.
Mr Kennedy says he expects Labour to honour its pledge but he strenuously denies any suggestion of a pre-election pact between himself and the prime minister to introduce the lesser form of proportional representation - the Alternative Vote system.
"It is a pre-application consultation with the local community so we can't comment, " a spokesman for the Labour-run borough council said.
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