Civil Service Impartiality

Lord Davies of Stamford Excerpts

Monday 5th February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I am not sure I want to open up a fresh front from the Dispatch Box, but I hope President Trump will read what my noble friend has just said.

[Lord Davies of Stamford (Lab)]

My Lords, is it not the case that every sane business carries out an investment appraisal before it embarks on an investment, that every sensible person will always produce a business plan before starting a business, that responsible and sensible Governments must engage in cost-benefit analyses and policy analyses and that, if we gave up those habits, it would be deeply damaging to the future of the country? That is the logic that some of these people are trying to drive us to: that we should not have any experts, we should not have any studies and we should not have any analysis at all.