Queen’s Speech

Baroness Donaghy Excerpts

Thursday 29th June 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab)]

My Lords, I want to speak up for public servants. I question whether we have the capacity in public services to sustain the enormous workload that is ahead of them and to carry out the heavy responsibility that is expected of them. The gracious Speech makes it clear that public servants are also-rans in the battle to balance the books. They have already had seven years of job cuts and pay cuts and it is clear that it will be more of the same in the next five years unless the Government change course. We need a sustained programme of public infrastructure investment and essential capacity-building for public servants and not just to throw money at emergencies.

It is interesting that a key point in our general election match, which resulted in a painful no-score draw, was the adverse publicity faced by the throwaway Prime Minister over the 20,000 police cuts and 5,000 armed police cuts at a time when the public wanted reassurance. It is interesting because, when Theresa May was Home Secretary, she took pride in taking on the Police Federation and cutting it down to size. These actions have consequences. If I were in the police force right now, I would be less concerned with being called a hero and more concerned that there would be someone to replace me at the end of my shift, that I could stick to the family leave I had planned, with no worry that it would be cancelled, and that I would be properly equipped in uniform and career development.

The background briefing to the gracious Speech states that the Government,

“values the important work that public sector workers do in delivering essential public services”.

However, there is not a single policy proposal as to how the Government intend to support that important work.

One of my areas of interest is health and safety. I worked closely with the Health and Safety Executive when I produced my report on construction fatalities. I have watched with astonishment as the HSE budget has been cut and cut again, with a 25% reduction in the number of HSE inspectors. By the end of this Parliament, the total HSE budget will have been halved. The cuts are still coming. At the same time, the Conservative Government have attacked health and safety legislation, nibbling away at the edges in a series of Bills. It is shameful.

I turn to the Civil Service. Although numbers have increased since December 2016, mainly as a result of leaving the EU, there has been an overall reduction of 20% since 2009. The Department of Health has lost 49% of its workforce since 2010 and the DCLG has lost 42%. Another five departments have lost over a quarter of their staff. Of course, the Cabinet Office, which supports the Executive rather than the country, has increased by 23%.

The workload around leaving the EU and making a minority Government work cries out for increased resources. The brightest and best will be seconded to the exit department, even if some remain within their departments. The numbers are woefully thin. Perhaps the Minister can tell us what will happen to the day-to-day work of government. The DWP has to run universal credit, which requires a heavy and ongoing administrative burden and has not yet been completely rolled out because of its complexities.

Most worrying to me is the capacity of HMRC. The Public Accounts Committee talks of a “catastrophic collapse” in customer service if more operations move online. The PAC was not convinced that HMRC had a credible plan to prevent a “disastrous decline” in service. It also questioned whether HMRC might be,

“painting too rosy a picture”,

of its success in reducing the gap between the amount of tax due and the total collected.

Time does not allow me to mention other services. I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Kennedy, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Southwark and the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, for their comments in Tuesday’s debate, and my noble friends Lady Sherlock and Lord Whitty for their comments in today’s debate. They encapsulated what I would have liked to say about those services.

In the past seven years, the Government have attacked the jobs, pay and pensions of public servants and have tried to separate them from their trade unions. The country will not run itself. I do not believe that this Government are capable of delivering strong public services. I am concerned about the inevitable collapse in some of our services that will happen in the next five years, and about the cost to the country of such neglect.