An Export Nobody Wants

Tony Blair has a problem that should be familiar to all Americans:

Britain is in danger from needless panic over issues ranging from food safety to mobile phones, Prime Minister Tony Blair said in an interview published today.

Calling for a “real debate about risk”, Mr Blair said he was concerned about an over-cautious approach to life which had left teachers, health workers and nursery assistants in fear of litigation for any accident....

Speaking amid a flurry of personal appearances, TV interviews and speeches in Labour’s frenetic pre-election campaign, Mr Blair said he had been struck as he travelled the country by the numbers of people raising concerns about the “compensation culture”.

And he said he was concerned about the country wasting disproportionate amounts of money dealing with relatively insignificant problems, simply because a scare has been whipped up around them.

And further in the article...

“We are in danger of – depending on whatever is the media campaign of the day – ending up spending literally hundreds, sometimes millions of pounds meeting quite a small risk, when actually that money would be far better used in other ways....

Mr Blair said that the fears of public service workers over the potential for a US-style litigation culture had made a deep impact on him.

Tort reform is a big issue for President Bush as well. If I'm not mistaken, Britain has a "loser pays" tort system which means you can file all the suits you want, but if you lose, you pay all the fees, including the defendant's costs. I've long been a proponent of such a system for the U.S.

Tony also warns Britains about panicking every time the media drums up a new scare. Good advice for Americans, too.