THE
EFFICIENCY UNIT
62. In addition to reforming
non-departmental public bodies, Mrs. Thatcher was keen
to reform the Civil Service itself. In 1979 she appointed Sir
Derek Rayner (now Lord Rayner) as her personal adviser on improving
efficiency and eliminating waste in Government. Rayner, who was
the joint managing director of Marks and Spencer Ltd, immediately
set up the Efficiency Unit.
63. The Efficiency Unit
undertook intensive, time-limited, studies of specific areas of
Government work, and then proposed solutions to problems, and
ways to achieve savings and increase efficiency and effectiveness
in Government. These "scrutinies" (as the studies were
known) replaced the system of Programme Analysis and Review (see
paragraph 38), set up in 1970 following the Fulton Report. In
the first six years of the Unit's existence, 266 scrutinies were
completed, identifying annual savings of £600 million, and
additional one-off savings totalling £67 million.
64. One early scrutiny
took place within the Department of the Environment, where Michael
Heseltine was Secretary of State. Following the scrutiny, and
in accordance with Mr Heseltine's wishes, a new administrative
system, called MINIS (management information system for Ministers)
was set up. The system was designed to keep Ministers better informed
about the work of their departments, and to stimulate officials
to review their activities in order to improve efficiency. It
had three stages: (i) the preparation by each section head of
a statement about the section's activities and achievements; (ii)
the consideration of these statements by Ministers and senior
officials, leading to the formulation of decisions about the work
of the section; and (iii) the implementation of those decisions
within the section. The process is conducted annually, so that
performance can be analysed against plans, and so that the information
can be kept updated.