Andrew Haldenby

The government has been the author of its troubles

The government has been the author of its troubles
Text settings
Comments

In his Spectator column this week, James Forsyth painted a picture of a government taken by surprise by enemies who have, in effect, ambushed them - the civil service, the civil service's lawyers and the European Union in particular. Clearly the government is frustrated by the “forces of conservatism” and the “enemies of enterprise”, but the difficult truth is that a lot the government's problems are of its own making, and in its own hands to put right.

When it comes to the civil service, the government hasn't simply inherited an uncooperative Whitehall. It has strengthened its position, as a conscious policy decision. Francis Maude said it in terms at one of Reform’s post-election conferences. He said that he was worried that civil servants had become “marginalised” by the use of special advisers. He said that he wanted to reduce the use of consultants so that civil servants could have a bigger role. Last week, questioned by Robert Halfon MP at the Public Administration Select Committee last week, he rejected Reform’s ideas about giving Ministers influence over civil service appointments (transcript here, see Q209).  

 

There is no ambush here. Whitehall is a bigger problem because the government has given it a bigger hand.  ministers have decided to put the idea of independence ahead of that of competence. The evidence against them is twofold. Most countries allow ministers to influence civil service appointments as a matter of course. The civil service’s own Capability Reviews revealed that Whitehall is not a Rolls Royce machine, to say the least.  

 

Then consider the consistency of policy. Even in the current set up, ministers would get a lot more out of Whitehall if civil servants understood the direction of policy.  In fact it is all over the place.  Until this week, Department of Health civil servants were under the impression that they were supposed to create an open NHS market including the private sector. They would have been confused by Nick Clegg’s statement on Sunday that he would prevent NHS “privatisation”. The confusion deepened on Wednesday when David Cameron mounted a furious (and entirely inaccurate) attack on private sector companies in the last Parliament cherry-picking NHS patients, using exactly the language that the BMA has always used. Anyone would think that the government is retreating at full speed from its commitment to the private sector (just as it has in schools). Equally the decision to ban price competition makes a nonsense of the idea of getting “value”.

 

In a recent report, Reform argued that consistency between the reform policies across Government would strengthen the whole programme. Equally, inconsistency creates uncertainty. I hear more and more that people in the public sector are not pushing forward with reform because they are yet to be convinced that the government really means it. You can’t blame them.

 

One of the most important issues in public service reform is a more flexible workforce. Last week, Tom Winsor set a clear direction of greater flexibility in the police service including pay by performance. This week, Will Hutton proposed new targets that would, in practice, set a limit on top pay regardless of performance. Militants in public sector unions will take great heart from this.

 

It’s also important that four weeks ago the government promised a public service reform White Paper within a fortnight. We’re still waiting. The point isn’t that any one White Paper will put everything straight.  It’s that a credible commitment to reform matters a great deal to its likelihood of success.

 

Some have suggested that the Budget is the moment to put this right. I wonder if the new coalition agreement is also important. MPs have told me this week that the current agreement won’t last for more than a couple of years, and that both sides of the coalition are already drawing up their opening positions for a new set of negotiations. If this is true, it would give an opportunity to set a clearer course.

 

Andrew Haldenby is Director of Reform.