Does the civil service need to
change?
101. A number of witnesses suggested to us that
a centralist civil service mindset was a key obstacle to rebalancing
power in favour of local government. Professor George Jones commented
that:
Increasingly, I have come to the conclusion that
the fault for much of the centralisation [
] lies with the
Civil Service [
] it is civil servants who are involved in
drawing up this legislation; it is civil servants who put in all
the details and the over-prescription [
] they of course
feel that they are superior to local government officials; they
think they are more competent but in fact I doubt that because
the local government officials are there on the ground close to
where the problems are happening, close to the people.[138]
Professor John Stewart argued further that "I
believe that anybody who has any dealings with local government
should have some experience of working in it."[139]
This observation was supported by other witnesses, such as Baroness
Hamwee.[140] Lancashire
County Council made a similar point in its written evidence, decrying
"London-centric" policy making, and recommending that
"civil servants go beyond the south east to experience local
policy in action".[141]
102. By contrast, former and current government
Ministers asserted that much had already changed in this area.
Nick Raynsford MP reckoned that:
in the course of the period that I was in government
we brought in some very, very senior civil servants. The civil
servant who headed the department dealing with local government
matters in what is now CLG [
] came from the LGA, where he
had been working for the previous seven or eight years on secondment.
We brought in others directly from local government; it was a
deliberate policy.[142]
Similarly, the Secretary of State told us that "I
think many of us have now tried to get secondments, exchanges,
have tried to get some of our civil servants working in local
government and in local delivery organisations, and I think there
is a much better understanding of what local government can do."[143]
103. There are encouraging signs that the Government
is prepared to take this process further. The Minister for Local
Government, writing on the website Civil Service Network in March
2009, observed that "towards the end of last year, I kicked
off a debate about the benefits of getting more civil servants
out of their departments and into the frontline", noted that
"my suggestion seems to have tapped into a mood of sorts"
and affirmed "I want to push the subject further".
In particular, he proposed that "we need to make a long spell
outside Whitehallat least 18 monthsa requirement
for anyone who wants to enter the senior civil service" and
that "at the same time we would implement a "one in,
one out" policy, meaning that every civil servant that CLG
sent to a local authority would be replaced with a seconded local
government officer." [144]
104. Avowed Ministerial intent
is for a more partnership-based approach to relations with local
authorities. However, as we noted in the previous chapter with
regard to the Local Area Agreement (LAAs) process, during detailed
negotiations with local authorities some central departments have
continued to seek to impose top-down direction. We assess that
further and more thorough cultural change within Whitehall is
still required. Ultimately, Ministers set the overall tone of
a department, and a cultural change in the civil service is dependent
upon a cultural change at the top of the department. We are therefore
encouraged by the mood-music from CLG's senior Ministers, and
look forward to seeing progress replicated among senior Ministers
in other departments. Meanwhile, we acknowledge the increasing
efforts being made to cross-fertilise between local and central
government at official level, and recommend that these efforts
be expanded. We look forward, in particular, to receiving reports
of the progress within CLG of the Minister for Local Government's
'back to the coalface' initiative. Further, we recommend that
CLG or the Cabinet Office monitor and publish other government
departments' efforts in this regard, to ensure that they are following
CLG's example. The new partnership working of the LAA process,
upon which much of the success of local government's place-shaping
mission depends, will only work if both local government and central
government officials appreciate that their roles have changed,
and that they are engaging in a dialogue of equals.
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