3. Memorandum from the Government Equalities
Office
LESSONS ARISING
FROM THE
ESTABLISHMENT OF
THE EQUALITY
& HUMAN RIGHTS
COMMISSION (EHRC)
The Comptroller and Auditor General's Supplementary
Memorandum on the EHRC, being prepared for the PAC hearing now
scheduled for 2 December, mentions that the Government Equalities
Office and the EHRC jointly commissioned an independent "lessons
learned" review into the setting up of the EHRC.
As discussed with Amyas Morse, I enclose a summary
of the report of the review for your information. I am not presenting
the report formally as evidence for the hearing although I would
of course be happy to send copies formally to your Committee once
the hearing has taken place if you think the Committee would find
that helpful. I think the review (by Jo Durning, a former senior
civil servant) helpfully brings out some key lessons applicable
to the setting up of new Non Departmental Public Bodies (and mergers
of existing ones). They include the importance of:
— realistic timetables and a willingness
to consider delaying start dates when faced with major risks to
successful set-up, such as machinery of government changes;
— early recruitment of leaders to give
them time to shape the organisation and recruit the right staff;
— effective interim governance arrangements,
especially whilst a new Chair/Board is working with an interim
executive team; and
— both transition teams and sponsor departments
having the right mix of skills (including knowledge of Government
and, ideally, experience of setting up an NDPB).
I hope this is of interest.
As the purpose of the review was to identify
lessons for NDPB mergers and start-ups, including where machinery
of government changes affect the sponsoring arrangements within
Government, I have sent a copy of the report to Cabinet Office
and Whitehall Principal Accounting Officers to encourage inter-departmental
consideration of the issues it raises.
4 November 2009
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