4 The state of the Civil Service
53. Some witnesses argued that the conflict between
ministers and officials was overstated. Lord Hennessy suggested
that, while the "governing marriage" between ministers
and civil servants was "in trouble", it was typical
for ministers, halfway through a Parliament, to blame the Civil
Service.[75] Former Cabinet
Secretary and Head of the Civil Service, Lord O'Donnell, told
us that, based on his conversation with "a number of ministers
[...] there are a lot of ministers who are happy" with their
officials, and that the frustrations of some other ministers are
not entirely attributable to the Civil Service.[76]
Others argued that major failures in the Civil Service had not
increased in frequency, but were more prominent due to greater
transparency. Professor Hood argued that the frequency of "major
errors" in Whitehall had not, in his view, increased.[77]
Jonathan Powell, former civil servant and chief of staff to Tony
Blair as Prime Minister, concurred, suggesting that "there
is more transparency about the failures that happen, rather than
their being covered up".[78]
54. Lord O'Donnell also cited the employee engagement
index in the Civil Service People Survey, which showed a slight
increase in 2012, compared to 2011 and 2010.[79]
The Civil Service average engagement score in 2012 was 58%, with
wide variation across departments and agencies. In the now-defunct
UK Border Agency engagement was only 36%, compared to 81% in the
Attorney General's office. In the main departments, engagement
was as low as 43% in the Department for Communities and Local
Government and 45% in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport,
and reached 71% in the Department for International Development.[80]
The polling company Gallup have described "world class"
levels of employee engagement as 67%.[81]
55. Professor Andrew Kakabadse cited evidence from
his global study of why it is so challenging for the leadership
of the organisation to win engagement with staff, management and
other critical stakeholders. In his written evidence, he stated:
Engagement or the lack of it is emerging as a
deep concern for private and public sector organisations alike
[...] Research highlights that over 66% of the world's private
and public sector organisations have a leadership where infighting,
lack of shared vision/mission and fear to speak and raise known
concerns are the norm. The Civil Service in the UK is no exception
[...] the signs of disengagement are evident in the Civil Service:
a transactional mindset as opposed to focusing on delivering value,
low trust in the leadership to find sustainable ways forward,
silo mentality, a lack of innovation and an eroding culture of
service delivery. To combat such a deep seated malaise research
does offer particular steps to take so as to break with the past
and nurture a performance oriented culture and a mindset of diversity
of thinking.[82]
56. We very much welcome the fact that the Civil
Service conducts an annual engagement survey, and that, at 58%
in 2012, the average engagement score across departments was encouraging,
given the world-class level of 67%. We are most disappointed,
however, that this data does not provoke more concern and debate
about how to share best practice with the parts of the Civil Service
where engagement is so much lower. This demonstrates the need
for more independent assessment of this data, and of what actions
are required to address it, than the internal Civil Service leadership
can provide.
Trust between ministers and officials
57. Media reports at the start of 2013 depicted a
"Whitehall at War", stressing tensions between ministers
and officials.[83] Media
reports focused in part on the statement by the Minister for the
Cabinet Office in October 2012 that civil servants had blocked
decisions made by ministers, both in the current and previous
Governments. The Minister repeated these allegations in evidence
to us, stating:
it has not been contested that that has happened—deliberate
obstruction. I am not saying it is a routine daily event, but
the discovery that on particular occasions officials had blocked
clear ministerial decisions, failed to implement them or instructed
that, in some cases, what Ministers had decided should not be
implemented, has not been subject to any contest.[84]
58. The Minister highlighted an example of a decision
of his being "countermanded" by "a very senior
figure", who had failed to speak up to express any concerns
or objections to the decision when they met, but later reneged
on the commitment to implement the decision.[85]
There was, Mr Maude suggested, an attitude among civil servants
that "ministers come and ministers go. We are the permanent
Civil Service. We have been here, and our forebears have been
here, for 150 years, and the system will exist after ministers
go".[86]
59. Sean Worth, a former special adviser in the Coalition
Government, reported that, while he had not personally experienced
civil servants blocking requests, he had faced civil servants
employing delaying tactics. He told us:
You ask for something to happen and it sort of
disappears into a blancmange, and then a paper comes back that
is slightly different from what you asked for, because it is very
clear that they do not want to actually address the question.[87]
60. The Head of the Civil Service, Sir Bob Kerslake,
said that there had been only "up to five" examples
of decisions blocked in the 16 months he had been in post and
where it had happened he had "sought to tackle them in a
very robust way".[88]
Sir Bob added that, while ministers felt their decisions were
being blocked, the situations were a mixture of misunderstandings
and insufficient enthusiasm from officials.[89]
Sir Bob's predecessor, Lord O'Donnell, suggested that some instances
of civil servants allegedly blocking ministerial decisions were
in fact instances of ministers disagreeing with each other, but
choosing not to say it to each other directly.[90]
61. The level of trust between ministers and officials
had also been affected, we heard, by public criticism of the Civil
Service. Former Cabinet Secretary, Lord Wilson of Dinton, suggested
that ministers had "undermine[d] trust" by publicly
blaming officials for government failures, which he viewed as
"unnecessary" and "very demoralising to the Civil
Service".[91] This
view was shared by former Cabinet Minister the Rt Hon Jack Straw
MP, who told us that "it is weak ministers who blame officials".[92]
Former Permanent Secretary Sir John Elvidge warned that it was
"unrealistic to expect citizens to sustain their respect
and trust in government if it is evident that respect and trust
are lacking within government, between ministers and civil servants".[93]
Historian Lord Hennessy argued that, while ministers
might have found criticising the Civil Service to be cathartic,
to do so "snaps the bonds of loyalty" between officials
and ministers, and broke one of the "essential deals"
of the Northcote-Trevelyan arrangement "that you carry the
can in public for your Department if you are a Secretary of State,
even if things have gone wrong that you did not have much control
over in the first place".[94]
62. In response, the Minister stated:
To try to pretend that everything is fine when
it is not is as demoralising to civil servants, who can see that
things are not right, as to hear the criticisms. What they do
not want to hear is criticism for the sake of criticism: criticism
without solutions.[95]
63. The Head of the Civil Service, Sir Bob Kerslake,
argued that "much" of the media coverage of problems
between ministers and officials was "overstated. Taken as
a whole, there is a high level of trust between ministers and
their civil servants".[96]
64. Professor Kakabadse's written evidence cited
his research that demonstrated that:
Most people in a failing organisation know it
is failing, but they do not know how to talk about it with their
work colleagues in order to address it. In failing organisations,
many people attend meetings and agree to things in that meeting,
but then leave the meeting and express something different. It
tends to be good people who leave a failing organisation, and
the less good who remain and stay quiet. In failing organisations,
the leadership are the last to admit the seriousness of the challenges
they face. [97]
65. There is no question that any blocking of
ministerial decisions by civil servants would be unacceptable.
The perception that ministerial decisions are being deliberately
blocked or frustrated points to deeper failures in our system
of government. Professor Kakabadse's research has highlighted
how failing organisations demonstrate common characteristics,
and while these may not be evident in all parts of Whitehall,
they are certainly evident in some departments and agencies. In
our deliberations with ministers and civil servants, most recognise
a prevalence of these behaviours. We remain unconvinced that the
Government has developed the policies and leadership to address
these problems. We have found that both ministers and senior civil
servants are still somewhat in denial about their respective accountabilities
in respect of the problems of the Civil Service.
Culture
66. In his Policy Exchange speech, the Minister for
the Cabinet Office said:
Most of all civil servants themselves are impatient
for change. I recently spoke at a gathering of newly-entered members
of the Senior Civil Service. They were fabulous. Able, bright,
energetic, ambitious to change the world. But to a man and woman
- frustrated. Frustrated by a culture that weighs them down. A
culture that is overly bureaucratic, risk averse, hierarchical
and focused on process rather than outcomes. That makes the whole
somehow less than the sum of the parts.[98]
He added that "hierarchy is not just about structure
and organisation; it is about behaviour."[99]
We return to the wider consequence of this in the next section.
67. The allegations of "blocked" ministerial
decisions are linked to wider questions about culture in the Civil
Service. Francis Maude depicted the Civil Service as having "a
bias towards inertia".[100]
Former Cabinet Minister Lord Adonis, while not experiencing "ideological
objections", found that within the Civil Service there were
"plenty of brakes [on ministerial requests] in the sense
of just inadequate energy and drive".[101]
He added:
Whitehall is often at its best in a crisis, because
then things have to be done, and they have to be done that day.
Where you are not dealing with a crisis, it can always wait until
tomorrow, and often not just tomorrow but next week or next month.[102]
68. Jonathan Powell described the Civil Service as
"a bit like a monastic order. People still join at 21 and
leave when they retire at 60 [...] they all think the same way".[103]
Former civil servant and special adviser Damian McBride suggested
that some civil servants would prevent ministers from considering
some policy options because of an "attitude that there are
some technical and administrative things that are nothing to do
with Ministers".[104]
Mr McBride also commented that civil servants sometimes needed
to be made aware that they were, inadvertently, regulating in
a way that could block enterprise.[105]
Lord Browne has argued that "the biggest single obstacle
to progress in government" could be a cultural issue: a failure
to learn from failure and a tendency to turn "everything
into some sort of achievement [...] people say not that something
went badly, but that it went 'less well' than they had hoped".[106]
Lord Browne added:
An obsession with successes is not the fault
of individuals; it is the result of an organisation's induced
behaviour. To tell stories of failure, you need to record
them. But why would a civil servant want to do that? The only
consequence would be discovery through a Freedom of Information
request, followed by a hue and cry to search for those to blame.[107]
69. We agree with Lord Browne's analysis that
the failure to learn from failure is a major obstacle to more
effective government, arising from leadership that does not affirm
the value of learning. This is something which the Civil Service
has yet to learn from successful organisations. The present culture
promotes the filtering of honest and complete assessments to ministers
and is the antithesis of 'truth to power'. It is a denial of responsibility
and accountability.
Lack of support for ministers
70. Nick Herbert MP told us that ministers' private
offices were not "sufficiently strong" for ministers
to achieve their policy programmes. Mr Herbert added that he felt
as if he had less support as a minister than he had had in opposition.[108]
We have found this to be a typical view amongst current and former
ministers. He felt that this lack of support is at odds with the
requirement for a minister to be held accountable to Parliament
for the performance of his brief. He said the system is "no
longer fit for purpose".[109]
Mr Herbert told us that he would have benefited from having
policy advisers working directly for him to help him "interrogate
the system" more effectively.[110]
Former Cabinet Minister Rt Hon Jack Straw MP recommended the introduction
of "central policy units in Departments made up of career
officials, some people brought in on contracts, and political
appointments" to improve "the interface between the
political leadership and the Civil Service".[111]
71. Francis Maude spoke of ministers experiencing
"a lack of firepower to get things done: people to do progress
chasing, people whose overwhelming loyalty is to the Minister".[112]
He made a related point following his Policy Exchange speech,
entitled "Ministers and Mandarins: speaking truth to power",
when he commented:
[Do] the people you appoint only tell you what
you want to hear?... Ask any minister! You are much more likely
to get that candid and often brutal advice from your special advisers
who have no tenure at all except at your will - they want the
minister to succeed.[113]
72. The IPPR concluded in favour of a Cabinet
in all but name:
There is a compelling case for strengthening
the level of support given to Secretaries of State (and other
Ministers who run departments). This, we argue, should form part
of a wider reform of the key functions in Government that need
to be performed 'close' to Ministers. The objective should be
to ensure that Secretaries of State have an extended office of
people who work directly on their behalf in the department, in
whom they have complete trust.[114]
73. Academic Patrick Diamond warned, however, that
for thirty to forty years ministers had tried to bring in new
officials, in the form of consultants, academics and special advisers,
but that experience had shown it to be "often a very unsatisfactory
solution, because what you are doing is creating pockets around
a Minister that are not properly linked into the rest of the Civil
Service and not properly worked into the rest of the system of
public administration".[115]
Professor Kakabadse also warns about the effects of "the
separation of policy input from implementation at the departmental
level."[116] Sir
John Elvidge commented that strategy units, delivery units, and
the introduction of non-executive directors were "all attempts
to make organisational solutions to something that is not fundamentally
an organisational problem [...] it is a problem about trust, respect
and the quality of relationships, not about the mechanisms that
you use to put particular people in particular places".[117]
74. The Civil Service Reform Plan does not address
the fact that effective organisations depend on the relationships
between ministers and officials, which in turn depend on the "subtle
understandings" between individuals. Instead the Reform Plan
is based too much on the notion that it is possible to solve confusions
in working relationships simply through structures and ministerial
direction. We are therefore concerned that the proposal for increasing
the staffing of lead ministers, in the One Year On document,
is not made on the basis of any evidence except that ministers,
like Nick Herbert, feel accountable but feel unable to rely on
their officials to achieve their objectives. The fundamental issue
is why some civil servants feel resistant to what ministers want,
and this question has not been considered in any systematic way.
If lead departmental ministers require additional support, what
about the challenges faced by junior ministers, for it is they
who express this lack of support more vehemently than secretaries
of state? Such an increase in ministerial support should, however,
obviate the need for so many junior ministers, in accordance with
the recommendations made in our 2011 Report, Smaller Government:
What do ministers do?, in which we pointed out that, at that
time, the UK Government contained many more ministers (95) than
in France (31) or Germany (46). The same question could apply
to the number of departments.
75. Concerns about the support offered to ministers
poses fundamental questions about the nature of leadership and
management in Whitehall and about what it means for individuals,
institutions and societies when people are expected and permitted
to use discretion. This in turn rests on the embedded culture
of Whitehall and the Civil Service. In answer to questions following
his Policy Exchange speech, the Minister referred to the way in
which some Armed Forces operate— "the culture there"
—and said:
It is about huge empowerment of often very young
soldiers who don't have the massive kind of hierarchical structure
above them. They have two things. They are entrusted with quite
a lot of decision taking and required to exercise it. That's the
kind of freedom and empowerment part. Second is an acute sense
of responsibility —that they can't pass that on to anybody
else. And the danger with an organisation that behaves in a hierarchical
way is that people don't take responsibility for what they do
[...] The Civil Service is much less good at defining the space
that an individual civil servant has to take decisions, and the
good organisations mark out your ground—this is what you
are expected to deliver; these are the outcomes or outputs that
we are expecting from you. And actually that's the space within
which you can operate. That's a very liberating and empowering
thing [...] Setting out the space within which people have the
scope to make decisions and then are expected to take responsibility
for it: that's a strong organisation. But we are not good at that
in the Civil Service.[118]
76. We fully concur with the Minister about the
need to empower civil servants to take decisions and take responsibility
for those decisions. The fact that he cites the Armed Forces which
have to operate in a very agile manner demonstrates a key point:
that the more uncertain and volatile the environment of politics
and government becomes, the greater the need for the exercise
of discretion and judgment at all levels, not just at the top.
This is well understood by our own Armed Forces by the concept
of "delegated mission command". This latter concept
does, however, depend on a coherent intent—shared understanding
of purpose. Good leadership provides a framework within which
people feel they are trusted to use their judgment. The Minister's
need for "progress chasing" and "loyalty"
suggests that the more uncertain and volatile the environment
becomes, the more anxious that ministers and senior officials
are to maintain a culture of control.
77. This in turn begs the question: to whom should
officials be expected to owe their loyalty? Haldane established
that ministers and officials should be "indivisible",
but the reality is that this has more and more created an implicit
but artificial division between "policy" and "implementation",
when in reality policy conceived without equal attention given
to implementation is bound to fail. This separation increases
as Parliament gives greater attention to the direct accountability
of permanent secretaries to Parliament in their role as accounting
officers. There is a growing expectation that other officials
will give evidence to select committees about matters other than
policy or advice to ministers. Now, Senior Responsible Officers
for major projects are also to be made directly accountable. The
direct accountability of civil servants to Parliament is not a
novel doctrine and was anticipated in the Haldane Report, when
it foreshadowed the formation of "departmental" (i.e.
select) committees and said:
Any such Committees would require to be furnished
with full information as to the course of administration pursued
by the Departments with which they were concerned; and for this
purpose it would be requisite that ministers, as well as the officers
of Departments, should appear before them to explain and defend
the acts for which they were responsible.[119]
78. This implied that the innovation envisaged would
be that ministers rather than only officials would appear to give
evidence before them. Today, this somewhat artificial division
of roles has been further amplified by an increasing tendency
for policy to be driven from No 10 and the Treasury, while implementation
is left to departments or even more remote agencies and private
contractors. This undermines the Minister's view that civil servant
actions should be accountable to their ministers and through their
ministers to Parliament.[120]
79. Departmental civil servants are in an invidious
position with conflicting loyalties. The already delicate leadership
role of the combination of the secretary of state and his or her
permanent secretary makes it extremely difficult for subordinate
officials to understand what may be the "shared vision"
for the department. The well-documented tensions in that relationship
also reflect confusion of messages from the top that may be perceived
as contradictory, which leaves the official wondering, "Which
should I please: the minister or the permanent secretary? Whose
vision do I follow?" This conflict is further compounded
by the complexity of relationships between departments, No 10
(the Cabinet Secretary) and the Cabinet Office (the Head of the
Civil Service). Ministers have for some years been relying on
Special Advisers, specialist temporary civil servants or outside
consultants. Even policy-making is now being "outsourced"
to think tanks. We find it unsurprising that many officials find
resistance is perhaps the only rational response. Adding more
"personalised" ministerial appointments to this confusion
will not address the fundamental problem, and could add to the
chaos.
80. We are far from persuaded that the creation
of separate enclaves of ministerial appointees, who would owe
their first loyalty to minsters, will address the concerns for
"increased accountability" expressed by the Minister
for the Cabinet Office. This is likely to increase the dissonance
between ministers and officials in what should be mutually dependent
relationships. We sense many ministers aspire to this mutual dependence
(Haldane's indivisibility) and are all too aware of what has been
lost but do not know how to restore it. As they stand, these proposals
are at odds with the aspiration to trust, to empower and to delegate
to lower tiers of departments where officials have the discretion
to exercise their judgment and will be supported by those above
when they do so.
81. We recognise that progress-chasing is a necessity
in any system, but it is a counsel of despair to justify increased
ministerial appointees on this basis. It is treating symptoms
rather than causes. We find it hard to imagine an effective system
of government in which ministers could or should be micro-managing
their departments as many feel they must.
Skills
82. As we have highlighted in our Reports Government
and IT - "a recipe for rip-offs": time for a new approach (July
2011) and Government Procurement (July 2013), there are
critical skills gaps within the Civil Service.[121]
Witnesses in this inquiry were united in arguing that Whitehall
did not have the commercial and procurement skills it required.
Lord Adonis commented that, while civil servants were able, "they
[were] very poorly trained and their experience of the sectors
in which they work [was] very poor".[122]
Damian McBride spoke of "a tendency to throw people in at
the deep end and expect them to swim straight away".[123]
Former Cabinet Secretary Lord Wilson suggested that "incompetence"
rather than "malice" was usually the cause of failings
in the Civil Service.[124]
Andrew Haldenby, Director of the think tank Reform, reported that
"the issue of competence does go quite deeply".[125]
83. One example of the skills gap was revealed in
the collapse of the tendering process for the West Coast Main
Line in October 2012. This followed a review of the franchise
decision conducted by the Cabinet Secretary Sir Jeremy Heywood,
at the request of the Prime Minister, which failed to identify
fundamental flaws in the assessment of the franchise bid. The
collapse of this decision provoked an outbreak of blame and recrimination,
and the failure was publicly blamed on the key civil servants
conducting the process. The subsequent review of the collapse,
conducted by Sam Laidlaw, the lead non-executive director at the
Department for Transport, and the Secretary of State for Transport,
attributed it to "completely unacceptable mistakes"
by Department for Transport officials working on the franchise
process.[126] In this
specific example, former Transport Minister, Lord Adonis, referred
to the retirement, after the 2010 general election, of a key senior
civil servant with experience running a train company, which he
said left the Department for Transport "essentially flying
blind in dealing with the West Coast Mainline".[127]
Many took this episode to be symptomatic of a wider malaise in
the Civil Service.
84. Witnesses doubted whether the Government's reform
plans would be sufficient to address the skills deficit. Lord
Norton of Louth argued that the Civil Service Reform Plan paid
insufficient focus to "subject-specific knowledge",
with an alternative objective of "a Civil Service that is
more fit for purpose from a managerial point of view, so they
can do the job, but not necessarily know that much about the substance
of the sector they are working in".[128]
The National Audit Office recommended that the Head of the Civil
Service and permanent secretaries should "encourage senior
civil servants to be active members of a specialist profession
and to keep their profession-specific skills and networks up to
date".[129] This
supports the recommendation in our previous Report on Government
Procurement, that "consideration be given to regenerating
the professional civil service".[130]
85. We regard the collapse of the West Coast Main
Line franchise as symptomatic of many wider questions concerning
governance and leadership within the Civil Service, which have
not been addressed in the rush to scapegoat a few officials. Why
was the blanket ban on outside financial consultants made to apply
in this case, when previously the process had always depended
upon it? Why was the process of departmental downsizing not conducted
in a more selective manner to avoid the departure of key skills?
Why was the consequence of this departure not recognised by line
management? What support did line management give to this relatively
inexperienced team of officials, which in turn was led by a new
official recruited from outside the Civil Service? Why was line
management not held as responsible for the outcome as the officials
themselves? What effect did the frequent change of ministers and
of personnel have on all these questions? We are concerned that
this episode demonstrates the tendency of Whitehall to locate
blame for failure on a few individuals, rather than to use the
lessons of failure, as Lord Browne recommended, to address wider
shortcomings in systems and culture.
86. As we have made clear in our Government
IT and Government Procurement Reports, the inability
of the Civil Service to develop, recruit, and retain key skills
is a fundamental failure of today's Civil Service, which successive
Governments and the leadership of the Civil Service have failed
to address. The fact that so many with key skills just leave the
service also underlines how counterproductive it is to maintain
the existing restrictions on salaries and conditions for leading
professionals in a modern Civil Service. No other Civil Service
in a comparable country operates on the basis that the Prime Minister's
salary should be a maximum. Such a myopic policy makes the UK
Civil Service internationally uncompetitive.
Turnover
87. Only one of the sixteen Whitehall departments
(HM Treasury) has not experienced a change of lead permanent secretary
since the 2010 general election. This rapid rate of turnover at
permanent secretary level extends throughout departments and their
agencies at senior level. On average, the secretary of state has
more experience in post than the permanent secretary: the Department
for Transport, Home Office, Ministry of Defence and Cabinet Office
have each had three different permanent secretaries in the last
three years. Dr Chris Gibson-Smith, then Chairman of the London
Stock Exchange, told us that this level of turnover was "completely
incompatible with the objectives of good government".[131]
88. Professors Flinders and Skelcher, and Doctors
Tonkiss and Dommett, commented that "intra-civil service
churn and turnover" was an even more fundamental issue than
the turnover of permanent secretaries, as it undermined "any
notion of institutional memory".[132]
The Association for Project Management cited 2009 research by
the Office of Government Commerce which revealed the "average
duration for Senior Responsible Owners (SROs) on major government
projects was only 18 months, while the projects themselves lasted
between three and ten years".[133]
TheNAO's
June 2013 report on the Senior Civil Service stated that accountability
had been "weakened by turnover in key posts".[134]
89. Lord Adonis told us that there had been eight
directors of the academy programme in ten years, with the best
directors leaving the post before they had even served a year,
in order to be promoted. The appointment of civil servants, in
his experience, was related to the promotion prospects and management
of careers by the civil servants, rather than by the needs of
the Civil Service. Lord Adonis reported his efforts with the Cabinet
Secretary, Sir Gus [now Lord]O'Donnell, to keep a talented official
in post:
I was fighting to keep the civil servant who
was being promoted into another Department in order to become
a Director General, and was told by him that there was nothing
he could do. As he put it to me, "My dear Andrew, I am only
Head of the Civil Service; I do not manage it."[135]
90. He added "it is quite a misnomer to describe
what we have as a permanent Civil Service".[136]
Jack Straw shared a similar experience:
If you are a Minister, you can develop a really
good relationship with an official or set of officials, and suddenly,
without being told, there is a meeting the following week. You
look round the room, and the senior official you have been dealing
with—or it might have been a middle-ranking one who was
really good—has gone. You say, "Where's so and so?"
"They've been promoted," or "They've moved on.
It's all career development, Secretary of State." "Thank
you very much." [137]
91. Professor King argued that, while the Civil Service
Reform Plan acknowledged the need for key officials to stay in
post for longer, it also emphasised "the desirability of
moving people around so that they acquire a wide variety of different
skills", which would maintain high levels of churn.[138]
92. The rapid turnover of senior civil servants
and in particular, of lead departmental permanent secretaries,
at a faster rate than Secretaries of State, begs the question:
why do we still use the term, "Permanent Civil Service"?
Weak departmental leadership contributes to the risk of poor decisions,
as demonstrated by the West Coast Main Line franchising debacle,
where the department was on its third permanent secretary since
the election. We find that this can only reflect a failure of
the senior leadership of the Civil Service over a number of years,
and a lack of concern about this failure from senior ministers,
including recent prime ministers.
The Whitehall structure
93. As the Minister for the Cabinet Office emphasised,
the Civil Service "is not a single entity":
There are 17 principal Government Departments,
which are separate entities, headed by Secretaries of State, who
collectively form the Cabinet [...]. They run their own Departments,
so of course there is going to be inconsistency across the piece.[139]
94. The trade union Prospect commented that no Civil
Service reform programme "has successfully joined up the
rigid departmental silos, [which are] often jealously guarded
by senior civil servants".[140]
Jonathan Powell argued that permanent secretaries "regard
themselves as feudal barons, dependent on their secretaries of
state and their budgets, and not answerable to the Cabinet Secretary
or anyone else".[141]
It was, he said, "the guilty secret of our system" that
"No. 10 Downing Street and the Prime Minister are remarkably
unpowerful in our system [...]It is very hard for the Prime Minister
to get Departments to do things".[142]
95. Nick Herbert, who served as a joint minister
in the Home Office and Ministry of Justice, reported that the
whole federal department structure was "set up for conflict",
ensuring a "dislocation [that was] one of the big obstacles
to getting things done".[143]
He added that when his agenda required both departments to work
together, "there was a competition and a lack of desire to
work together that made it very difficult to get the process moving
at all".[144]
Mr Herbert said that this "inbuilt" resistance was only
broken down following the 2011 riots, as a result of the impetus
brought by the Prime Minister's interest in the area.[145]
Sir Jeremy Heywood, the Cabinet Secretary, told us that the Cabinet
Office had set up its "own SWAT team"—the 30 person
Implementation Unit— that went into departments "to
understand what the delivery blockages are getting in the way".[146]
96. On the retirement of Sir Gus O'Donnell (now Lord
O'Donnell) at the end of 2011, his role was split into three separate
posts: Cabinet Secretary; Head of the Civil Service; and Permanent
Secretary, Cabinet Office. In our January 2012 Report Leadership
of change: new arrangements for the roles of the Head of the Civil
Service and the Cabinet Secretary, we warned that splitting
of the role, and in particular the decision to combine the role
of Head of the Civil Service with that of permanent secretary
at another department, would weaken the leadership of the Civil
Service and undermine the independence of the Cabinet Secretary.[147]
We asked Lord O'Donnell if the new arrangement was working better
than previously. He answered that it was "impossible to say".[148]
97. Former Cabinet Secretary, Lord Wilson, suggested
that it was more difficult for the Cabinet Secretary to address
ministerial concerns about the Civil Service when the roles of
Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Civil Service were held by separate
people.[149] Sir David
Normington told us he believed that it was "always better
to have a single line of authority from the Prime Minister through
the Head of the Civil Service and the Cabinet Secretary".[150]
The June 2012 IPPR report called for the Head of the Civil Service
to be "a full-time post, taking on all responsibilities for
managing permanent secretaries". This would, the report argued,
strengthen the role of the Head of the Civil Service "in
respect of holding permanent secretaries accountable", and
be a similar role to that performed by the New Zealand State Service
Commissioner.[151]
We know of no former Cabinet Secretary who supports the present
split arrangement.
98. The Minister responded that, while the system
was "very siloed" and "overly hierarchical",
the problems in the Civil Service were not simply a result of
the structure.[152]
He argued that the centre of Government needed to be strong, rather
than large, and able to assess the progress of policy implementation
across departments.[153]
The Minister added that there was no evidence for the suggestion
that departments had been emasculated and that policy was being
driven by the centre, a suggestion which he said recurred periodically.[154]
99. The split of the Head of the Civil Service
and Cabinet Secretary roles have contributed to weak leadership
and confusion over the division of roles, responsibilities and
tasks between the centre and the departments. The two roles purport
to be equal in status, but the division between "policy"
departments responsible to the Cabinet Secretary, and "implementation"
departments responsible to the Head of the Civil Service, not
only reinforces an artificial separation of policy from implementation
but the disparity in status between the roles.
100. The complexity of government structures contributes
to the confusion between the centre and departments. Yet there
has been no serious consideration of what the relationship between
the centre and the departments of state should be, beyond the
Minister for the Cabinet Office's suggestion that a single operating
system for Whitehall should be considered. This is again a crucial
aspect of government that lacks strategic coherence and clear
lines of accountability so that people in the organisation know
where they stand, and again underlines the lack of clear analysis
and clear strategy in the Government's approach to civil service
reform.
Role of non-executive directors
(NEDs)
101. The Coalition Government reformed the Civil
Service departmental boards in June 2010, with the aim of making
departments more effective and business-like. These reforms included:
making secretaries of state chairs of their departmental boards;
altering the composition of boards to enable junior ministers
to sit on them; reducing the number of officials on boards; and
creating the position of Lead Non-Executive Director on each board.[155]
102. Lord Browne, the Government's Lead Non-Executive
Director, has reported limited progress in the use of non-executive
directors (NEDs) by departments. In evidence in July 2012, Lord
Browne said that on a scale of one to ten, he would put his satisfaction
with the contribution made so far by non-executive directors to
departmental boards at "about two".[156]
He elevated this score to "four to five" in his evidence
in February 2013, and added that NEDs "cannot be the magic
bullet that makes everything perfect" but could help improve
relationships between ministers and officials.[157].
103. Lord Heseltine, in evidence in December 2012,
argued that the new NEDs were not being given sufficient support
to carry out their role.[158]
Professor Andrew Kakabadse, our former specialist adviser, expressed
"deep scepticism" about the reformed Whitehall boards
and lead NEDs, which he viewed as "people's mates being appointed"
in these roles.[159]
He added:
There should be an independent investigation
conducted about how these people were appointed, why they were
appointed, for what roles they were appointed, what the reality
of the chairmanship skills that apply are and how those boards
work. Do many of those non-executives even understand what is
happening in some of those Departments, except for those who have
been civil servants beforehand? Of the ones I have spoken to,
their greatest concern when they talk to me is, "I don't
know what my role is, I don't know what I'm doing here and I don't
know if I'm providing any value".[160]
104. Non-Executive Directors (NEDs) within Whitehall
departments have no defined role, no fiduciary duties, and it
is not clear who can hold them to account. They are more like
advisers or mentors than company directors. Their value depends
entirely upon how ministers and senior officials seek to use them.
Their experience has been mixed, with many departments failing
to use the expertise of their NEDS, and a lack of clarity over
their roles and responsibilities. NEDs play a key role in some
departments in supporting both ministers and officials to work
more effectively and efficiently, but this is a very different
role from the role of an NED in the private sector. A review of
their value and effectiveness should be part of any comprehensive
review of the civil service.
Permanent secretary appointments
105. The Civil Service Reform Plan proposed that
"to reflect Ministers' accountability to Parliament for the
performance of their departments" there would be a strengthening
of the role of Ministers in departmental and Permanent Secretary
appointments". At present, the Prime Minister may veto the
choice of the independent selection panel, but not select an alternative
candidate. Providing ministers with the final say over the appointment
process, would, the Plan stated, increase the chance of a successful
relationship between a Secretary of State and his or her permanent
secretary and as a result, increase the likelihood of the department
operating effectively.[161]
The Plan committed the Government to consulting with the Civil
Service Commission on its proposals.[162]
106. The First Civil Service Commissioner, Sir David
Normington, argued that giving ministers the final say in permanent
secretary appointments would "not change the whole system
overnight, but it [was] a step in the wrong direction" and
"could lead to more personal favouritism and patronage".[163]
Sir David set out the difference between the Prime Minister's
veto, as in the law at present, and ministerial choice which he
argued "risk[ed] a political choice being made".[164]
Sir David added that the judgment of the Civil Service Commission
was that it "should not concede this point because it is
fundamental to the way in which the Commission was set up and
to the way the Civil Service was developed".[165]
107. The Civil Service Commission instead set out
revised guidance for permanent secretary appointments which set
out a limited increase in the Secretary of State's role in the
appointment process. The Secretary of State would be consulted
at the outset on the nature of the job, the skills required, and
the best way of attracting a strong field; would agree the final
job description and person specification, and the terms of the
advertisement; would agree the composition of the selection panel,
in particular to ensure that there was sufficient external challenge;
would meet each of the shortlisted candidates to discuss his or
her priorities and feed back to the panel on any strengths and
weaknesses to probe at final interview; and would have the option
of further consultation before the panel made its recommendation.[166]
108. Under sections 10 and 11 of the Constitutional
Reform and Governance Act 2010, appointments to the Civil Service
are required to be carried out in line with the recruitment principles
established (under the same statute) by the Civil Service Commission.
If the Civil Service Commission did not change its position on
this issue, the Minister would therefore require primary legislation
to give the Secretary of State the final choice in the appointment
of permanent secretaries.[167]
109. Sir David Normington stated that the Government
was "disappointed" with the Commission's proposals,
but ministers had agreed to trial the Civil Service Commission's
revised appointment principles over the course of a year.
[168] Francis
Maude stated that the Civil Service Commission's objections were
"mistaken", but confirmed that the Government would
allow time to test out the new appointment system, before proposing
further involvement for ministers.[169]
The Minister stated that he was not being kept "awake at
night" by the prospect of the Civil Service Commission "absolutely
[holding] fast to its current position", requiring the Government
to introduce primary legislation to give ministers the final say
over permanent secretary appointments.[170]
110. There was support for the Government's proposals
from some academics. Professor Flinders and the "Shrinking
the state project" academics argued that giving ministers
a choice from a shortlist of candidates "would not amount
to the politicisation of the Civil Service as candidates would
have been selected through an independent and merit-based appointments
procedure".[171]
111. Former ministers also supported the Minister's
proposal. Former Labour Cabinet Minister Jack Straw argued that
the Civil Service Commission's objections to the Government's
proposals were "narrow, self-defeating, and will not work",
adding that senior civil servants would not accept their own powers
of appointment to be limited in the same way as ministers.[172]
Nick Herbert argued that "if accountability is to rest with
the politicians, the politicians are entitled to a greater degree
of control about who works for them".[173]
Caroline Spelman reported that when her departmental permanent
secretary left, just a few months after she was appointed as Secretary
of State, she was told that she was not allowed to interview the
shortlisted candidates, although they could ask questions of her.
(Her understanding has subsequently been contested.) She told
us that as she was accountable for the department it felt "very
strange" that she did not have more say in the appointment
of her permanent secretary, on whom, she viewed, her "political
life depend[ed]".[174]
Mrs Spelman added:
It is actually a very tough experience to face
the bullets flying at you [at a select committee hearing], especially
over a difficult decision or something that has not gone well.
That is why it is so important the Secretary of State has a say
in who the permanent secretary will be, because when you go into
bat together, you have got to be able to rely on each other in
that situation.[175]
This underlines the pressure on ministers who are
answerable to Parliament for the performance of their departments
which they do not feel they adequately control.
112. Former civil servants expressed serious concerns
over the Government's proposal, however, with former Cabinet Secretary,
Lord Wilson of Dinton, describing it as the "slippery slope"
to "reintroducing patronage".[176]
Lord Wilson added that he was "absolutely convinced"
that ministers' frustrations with the Civil Service could be addressed
without "going across the red lines" and giving ministers
the final say in the appointment of their permanent secretary.[177]
113. Former First Civil Service Commissioner, Dame
Janet Paraskeva, expressed a concern that giving ministers the
final say in the appointment of their permanent secretary would
mean a higher turnover among permanent secretaries, as the appointed
candidate would be seen as closely aligned with their minister,
and thus potentially unable to serve a new minister in the post,
particularly after a change of government.[178]
Lord Wilson agreed that such a proposal would increase churn among
permanent secretaries, rather than reduce it.[179]
114. Sir John Elvidge, former permanent secretary
at the Scottish Government, suggested that while ministers should
have a veto on appointments, if they were able to pick the individual
for a particular role, it could "narrow the base on which
public confidence in Government rests".[180]
Sir John added that introducing the Minister's proposal would
be incompatible with the accountability to Parliament by the permanent
secretary as the department's accounting officer:
you cannot really maintain our accounting officer
concept if you move to this system, because if your Permanent
Secretary is directly appointed by your Minister, the perceived
credibility of that role as an independent servant of Parliament
as well as of the Minister is very difficult to sustain. So you
have to find a different mechanism for providing that kind of
before-the-event check on the propriety of the use of public funds.[181]
115. The Civil Service trade unions also expressed
caution about giving ministers the final say over the appointment
of their permanent secretary. Hugh Lanning of PCS suggested that
giving ministers the final say over permanent secretary appointments
would "increase compartmentalism" in Whitehall, as ministerial-chosen
permanent secretaries would not, he argued, "take the wider
view of the Civil Service or the country as a whole".[182]
Dave Penman of the FDA suggested that permanent secretaries chosen
by ministers would be political appointments "either in reality
or perception". He added, "many ministers come with
absolutely no management experience" to aid them in choosing
the right permanent secretary to manage a large Civil Service
department.[183]
116. Lord Norton of Louth shared similar concerns
about ministerial abilities to choose their permanent secretaries,
suggesting that fears of politicisation "rather miss[ed]
the wider point, namely that ministers usually have no training
or qualifications in making managerial appointments".[184]
Historian Lord Hennessy argued that giving ministers greater involvement
in the appointment of their permanent secretaries would entail
a risk that "ministers will go for people who, by and large,
share their ideological charge. You will have people there because
they believe things, not because they know things".[185]
117. In local government, chief executives are appointed
by a panel of councillors. This system created, in the view of
Carolyn Downs of the Local Government Association, "a very
strong ownership on both sides of the relationship between politicians
and officials".[186]
Ms Downs added, however, that the cross-party nature of the appointment
panel was "fundamentally important".[187]
The current First Civil Service Commissioner, Sir David Normington,
told us that this is "a safeguard" in local authority
appointments.[188]
Sir David added that some local government chief executives are
"identified very closely with the party in power", requiring
a change of chief executive when a different party takes control
of the authority.[189]
118. Some witnesses argued that the Government's
proposals denoted "constitutional change".[190]
Dame Janet Paraskeva, who was First Civil Service Commissioner
when the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act was passed in
2010, told us that there was all-party support" for the principle
that "the final decision should be not of the Minister but
of the appointments panel [and] the appointment should be made
on merit, after fair and open competition".[191]
Dame Janet's successor, Sir David Normington, told us he was "very
surprised and extremely disappointed" that ministers were
seeking to change the settlement agreed in 2010.[192]
The Minister, however, suggested that, at the time the Act was
passed, both he, and the Minister responsible for the Act, the
Rt Hon Jack Straw MP, "believed there was nothing in that
Act that prevented Ministers from having a choice of candidates
for Permanent Secretary".[193]
119. The IPPR's report on accountability recommended
that the Prime Minister, rather than the Secretary of State, should
choose permanent secretaries from a shortlist (as in Canada and
Australia) chosen on merit, from a recruitment process overseen
by the Civil Service Commission. The IPPR argued that, as head
of government and Minister for the Civil Service, the Prime Minister
would be better placed than the Secretary of State to make the
final decision; would be better-placed to choose a permanent secretary
who complemented the Minister's skills and personality; and would
be a further "bulwark against potential politicisation",
as the Prime Minister would want to select the most able and competent
candidate.[194]
120. The Prime Minister exercised his existing right
to veto permanent secretary appointments in December 2012, during
the recruitment process for a new Permanent Secretary at the Department
of Energy and Climate Change.[195]
The rejected candidate, David Kennedy, currently Chief Executive
of the Committee on Climate Change, was recommended by a panel
which was chaired by Sir David Normington, and also included Sir
Bob Kerslake, Paul Walsh, Lead Non-Executive Director for DECC
and CEO of Diageo Plc; Professor Nicholas Stern, Director, LSE;
and Bronwyn Hill, Permanent Secretary at DEFRA.[196]
It was reported by The Financial Times that the appointment
was supported by Ed Davey, the Liberal Democrat Secretary of State
at DECC.[197] The Prime
Minister's intervention was confirmed by his spokesman who said:
"as Minister for the Civil Service, the Prime Minister oversees
Senior Civil Service appointments".[198]
When questioned on this issue by the House of Commons Liaison
Committee, the Prime Minister said that while "it would be
wrong to talk about specific individuals and specific cases [...]
the most important thing we need now at the Department of Energy
and Climate Change is commercial experience and the ability to
do deals".[199]
A second candidate, Stephen Lovegrove, was appointed in January
2013.
121. We welcome the compromise between the Government
and the Civil Service Commission on the appointment of departmental
permanent secretaries, which allows for increased involvement
for departmental ministers but leaves the recommendation with
the Commission's interview panel and the final decision with the
Prime Minister. This should avoid any misunderstanding that the
decision should bypass a Secretary of State altogether. We recognise
the unique demands placed on ministers who do not control the
appointment of their most senior official in their department,
particularly as this previously almost secret relationship is
today more than ever exposed to public scrutiny and to the glare
of publicity. Tensions are bound to arise between politicians
and their officials who seek to remain impartial, but we are sceptical
about whether increased political influence over their appointment
would resolve these tensions. Effective working relationships
at the top of Whitehall departments depend on openness and trust,
and it is far from clear how the Government's original proposal
would promote this. We remain concerned that the Government's
original proposal is only "on hold" and that the Minister
still seems intent on pursuing it without the wider and deeper
consideration of the future of the Civil Service which would be
needed before taking more radical steps. We wish to make it clear
that the Civil Service Commission has our fullest support.
Permanent secretary contracts
122. The IPPR report, published by the Cabinet Office
in June 2013, recommended the introduction of four-year, renewable
fixed-term contracts for new permanent secretaries, with the Prime
Minister responsible for the renewal of contracts. The IPPR cited
the experience of New Zealand where, the report stated, the introduction
of such contracts was "widely considered to have sharpened
the accountability of Chief Executives".[200]
123. Patrick Diamond suggested that there would be
a risk if the New Zealand model, which had been "created
for a particular system in a particularly small country, with
a set of particular parliamentary arrangements" was imposed
onto the UK Civil Service, in which "our parliamentary arrangements
are quite different".[201]
His written evidence expanded on this point, noting that the New
Zealand model had the potential to "entrench the artificial
distinction between 'policy-making' and 'implementation'".[202]
124. The Minister stated that he was unsure whether
employment law permitted the Government to introduce fixed-term
contracts for permanent secretaries.[203]
He also noted the potential cost of terminating a fixed-term contract
as a possible reason not to move to such a system.[204]
He added, however, that fixed-tenure contracts could be introduced,
and that they might have the effect of lengthening the average
time spent in post by a permanent secretary.[205]
125. The current levels of turnover of lead permanent
secretaries is incompatible with good government. We are sceptical
of the Minister's suggestion that fixed-tenure for permanent secretaries
will increase the average time spent in post. On the contrary,
fixed-term contracts are a means of removing an incumbent, unless
safeguards are included, similar to those in New Zealand, where
the State Services Commissioner appoints and employs "Chief
Executives" and it is he or she who recommends whether the
permanent secretary should be reappointed. As the IPPR report
points out, the New Zealand system is viewed as the least politicised
of the Westminster systems. The Government has cherry-picked the
fixed-tenure contracts while looking to enhance the ministerial
role in appointments. The danger is that the personalisation of
the appointments of permanent secretaries is that they will leave
as the renewal point approaches, particularly if the minister
who appointed them is no longer around. Our evidence does not
suggest that fixed-tenure contracts will address the serious structural
and cultural problems in the Civil Service.
75 Q 3 Back
76
Q 329 Back
77
Q 19 Back
78
Q 19 Back
79
Q 323, Civil Service, Civil Service People Survey 2012 Benchmark
Results, www.civilservice.gov.uk Back
80
Civil Service, Civil Service People Survey 2012 Benchmark
Results, www.civilservice.gov.uk Back
81
Gallup, Employee engagement overview brochure, gallup.com
Back
82
CSR 36 Back
83
"No, Minister: Whitehall in 'worst' crisis", The
Times, 14 January 2013, p 1 Back
84
Oral evidence taken before the Public Administration Select Committee,
28 November 2012, HC (2012-13) 663-iii, q 171 Back
85
Qq 1044, 1045 Back
86
Q 1048 Back
87
Q 66 Back
88
Qq 829, 833 Back
89
Q 835 Back
90
Q 343 Back
91
Q 164 Back
92
Q 679 Back
93
CSR 13 Back
94
Q 34 Back
95
Q 1176 Back
96
Q 837 Back
97
CSR 36 Back
98
"Ministers and Mandarins: speaking truth unto power",
Cabinet Office, 4 June 2013, www.gov.uk Back
99
"Video of Q&A following Ministers and Mandarins: speaking
truth unto power", Policy Exchange, 4 June 2013 Back
100
Q 1027 Back
101
Q 205 Back
102
Q 220 Back
103
Q 720 Back
104
Q 548 Back
105
Q 562 Back
106
"Business and Government: Lessons Learned - in conversation
with Lord Browne", Institute for Government, 6 June
2013, instituteforgovernment.org.uk Back
107
"Business and Government: Lessons Learned - in conversation
with Lord Browne", Institute for Government, 6 June
2013, instituteforgovernment.org.uk Back
108
Q 202 Back
109
Q 221 Back
110
Q 222 Back
111
Q 702 Back
112
Q 1171 Back
113
"Ministers and Mandarins: speaking truth unto power",
Cabinet Office, 4 June 2013, www.gov.uk Back
114
Cabinet Office, Accountability and responsiveness in the senior
Civil Service: Lessons from Overseas: A Report by the IPPR,
June 2013, p 112 Back
115
Q 37 Back
116
CSR 36 Back
117
Q 125 Back
118
"Video of Q&A following Ministers and Mandarins: speaking
truth unto power", Policy Exchange, 4 June 2013 Back
119
Ministry of Reconstruction, Report of the Machinery of Government
Committee, Cm 9230, 1918 Back
120
Public Administration Select Committee, Fifth Report of Session
2010-12, Smaller Government: Shrinking the quango state,
HC 6537, Q 50 Back
121
Public Administration Select Committee, Twelfth Report of Session
2010-12. Government and IT - "a recipe for rip-offs":
time for a new approach, HC 715-I, Public Administration Select
Committee, Sixth Report of Session 2013-14, Government Procurement,
HC 123 Back
122
Q 204 Back
123
Q 565 Back
124
Q 180 Back
125
Q 61 Back
126
HC Deb, 15 October 2012, c46 Back
127
Q 224 Back
128
Q 624 Back
129
NAO, Building capability in the Senior Civil Service
to meet today's challenges, HC 129,19 June 2013 Back
130
Public Administration Select Committee, Sixth Report of Session
2013-14, Government Procurement, HC 123, para 71 Back
131
Q 120 Back
132
CSR 25, Q 62 Back
133
CSR 21, NAO, Identifying and Meeting Central Government's
Skills Requirements, July 2011, p31 Back
134
NAO, Building capability in the Senior Civil Service
to meet today's challenges, HC 129,19 June 2013 Back
135
Q 204 Back
136
Q 199 Back
137
Q 690 Back
138
Q 666 Back
139
Oral evidence taken before the Public Administration Select Committee,
12 October 2011 HC 902-vi, Q 530 Back
140
CSR 3 Back
141
Q 797 Back
142
Q 741, 742 Back
143
Q 205 Back
144
Q 218 Back
145
Q 218 Back
146
Q 849 Back
147
Public Administration Select Committee, Nineteenth Report of
Session 2010-12, Leadership of Change: new arrangements for
the roles of Head of the Civil Service and the Cabinet Secretary,
HC 1582, para 91 Back
148
Q 414 Back
149
Q 169 Back
150
Q 463 Back
151
Cabinet Office, Accountability and responsiveness in the senior
Civil Service: Lessons from Overseas: A Report by the IPPR,
June 2013, p 112, Q 110 Back
152
Q 1027, Oral evidence taken before the Public Administration
Select Committee, 13 May 2013, HC 123-I, q 549 Back
153
Q 1083 Back
154
Q 1087 Back
155
Cabinet Office, Enhanced departmental boards protocol, December
2010, www.gov.uk Back
156
Oral evidence taken by the Public Administration Select Committee
on 10 July 2012, HC 405-I, q 2 Back
157
Qq 260, 289 Back
158
Oral evidence taken by the Public Administration Select Committee
on 2 December 2012, HC 756-I, q 48 Back
159
Q 114 Back
160
Q 114 Back
161
HM Government, Civil Service Reform Plan, June 2012, p21 Back
162
HM Government, Civil Service Reform Plan, June 2012, p21 Back
163
Q 431 Back
164
Q 443 Back
165
Q 439 Back
166
CSR 24 Back
167
Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010, sections 10, 11 Back
168
Q 428 Back
169
Q 1162 Back
170
Q 1215 Back
171
CSR 25 Back
172
Q 686 Back
173
Q 193 Back
174
Q 192 Back
175
Q 254 Back
176
Q 136 Back
177
Q 159 Back
178
Q 138 Back
179
Q 141 Back
180
Q 111 Back
181
Q 124 Back
182
Q 512 Back
183
Q 511 Back
184
CSR 26 Back
185
Q 39 Back
186
Q 617 Back
187
Q 617 Back
188
Q 436 Back
189
Q 436 Back
190
Q 136 [Lord Wilson] Back
191
Q 134 Back
192
Q 451 Back
193
Q 1216 Back
194
Cabinet Office, Accountability and responsiveness in the senior
Civil Service: Lessons from Overseas: A Report by the IPPR,
June 2013, p 112, Q 110 Back
195
Oral evidence taken before the Liaison Committee on 11 December
2012, HC (2012-13), 484-ii, Q 34 Back
196
HC Deb, 9 January 2013, c373W Back
197
"PM rejects climate expert for top job", Financial
Times, 29 November 2012 Back
198
Ibid. Back
199
Oral evidence taken before the Liaison Committee on 11 December
2012, HC (2012-13), 484-ii, Q 34 Back
200
Cabinet Office, Accountability and responsiveness in the senior
Civil Service: Lessons from Overseas: A Report by the IPPR,
June 2013, p 112 Back
201
Q 24 Back
202
CSR 11 Back
203
Q 1156 Back
204
Q 1167 Back
205
Q 1166 Back
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