Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts

Wednesday 7th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con)]

1. What progress he has made in implementing the civil service reform plan.

[The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)]

In June, we published a plan with specific actions to tackle long-standing weaknesses in the civil service, to build on strengths and to address frustrations expressed by civil servants themselves. If effectively implemented, the actions will lead to real change, which is urgently needed. The pace of change now needs to increase. Yesterday, we published the digital strategy, which sets outs how we can save money while improving the delivery of public services. That is an example of civil servants enthusiastically embracing and driving radical reform.

[Craig Whittaker]

Over the past decade, public sector productivity remained static while private sector productivity improved by a third. What steps is my right hon. Friend taking to ensure that the civil service learns best practice from business?

[Mr Maude]

After the coalition Government formed, we put in place the efficiency and reform group, which is driving a much more business-like approach to those areas of activity that run across government: the procurement of common goods and services; property; the management and oversight of major projects; and information and communications technology infrastructure, which was wholly unco-ordinated. All this is driving savings in the cost of government, but we need to do much more. The key to that is developing much more interchange between the private sector and the civil service, which the head of the civil service is committed to driving forward energetically.

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

Will the Minister confirm that “reform” is not just code for privatisation, outsourcing and politicising the senior civil service? Will the civil service be retained as a neutral service to government, with proper ministerial responsibility?

[Mr Maude]

There is no plan to change the basic rules of accountability, in the sense that there is a permanent, politically impartial civil service. However, there is a view, which I believe is shared right across the House, particularly by those who were Ministers in the previous Government, that responsiveness and effectiveness need to increase. That view is shared by the leadership of the civil service. One thing we are trying to do, through the civil service reform plan, is to respond to some of the frustrations expressed by civil servants themselves. They get very frustrated with the bureaucracy and the hierarchical nature of the service, as it is currently run.

[Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con)]

13. I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his bold and imaginative reforms of the civil service, particularly the mutualisation of the civil service pension scheme. May I press him to look at other areas of the civil service where that successful approach may be adopted?

[Mr Maude]

The movement towards mutualisation of public services is very powerful and is being looked at by other Governments, as well as our own. It is powerful because it enables entrepreneurial leaders in the public sector, of whom there are many, to take control of the services, innovate, do things differently and drive out cost. It is a powerful means of driving efficiency, for the taxpayer and for the user.

[Jon Trickett (Hemsworth) (Lab)]

Today’s Institute for Government report reveals what it calls “fragile leadership” of the civil service reform programme. It is clear that the chaotic and expensive redundancy programme and the culture of blaming the service for blunders while Ministers get away scot-free is damaging morale. Even the right hon. Gentleman’s friends in the TaxPayers Alliance acknowledge that he is engaging in the costly practice of laying off staff while paying to recruit replacements. For all his bluster about savings, the Cabinet Office now has more staff than it had last year. When will he get a grip?

[Mr Maude]

Coming from the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the previous Prime Minister, who presided over a massive explosion in the size of the state and the growth of inefficiency—who presided over the decade in which public sector productivity was flat while private sector productivity grew by 30%—that is pretty rich. The hon. Gentleman refers to the expensive voluntary redundancy programme that has taken place. Under the position that his Government left—until we reformed the redundancy scheme—it would have been impossible to pursue that at all. The civil service today is considerably smaller. There are plans in Departments to reduce the size further, but productivity is already improving considerably. I just wish it had started under the previous Government.

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

2. Whether his Department has issued guidance to other Departments on the likely implementation date of a statutory register of lobbyists.

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[Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)]

7. What recent assessment he has made of steps to improve transparency throughout Government.

[The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)]

The Government have a world-leading transparency programme, as is widely acknowledged. Open data sharpen accountability, inform choice over public services and offer raw material for a fast-growing industry of developers and entrepreneurs. As lead co-chair of the open government partnership, we are working with Governments the world over to embed transparency through stretching action plans.

[Dan Jarvis]

Does the Minister share my concern about the Government’s failure to extend freedom of information to private companies that deliver public services? Does that not make a mockery of the Government’s transparency agenda? If he does share my concern, what will his Department do about it?

[Mr Maude]

First, FOI is the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice, not my Department. Secondly, the Justice Committee recently undertook a wide-ranging post-legislative study of the Freedom of Information Act 2000—the Government will respond before too long—and, as I recollect, recommended no such change.

[Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)]

My responsibilities as Minister for the Cabinet Office are for the public sector efficiency and reform group, civil service issues, industrial relations in the public sector, Government transparency, civil contingency, civil society and cyber-security.

[Craig Whittaker]

My local authority currently gives teaching unions £8,000 a year out of the schools budget, as well as giving Unison £27,000 in cash and paying for its offices. In the light of the differences between the private and public sectors in this area, may I ask my right hon. Friend what is being done to bring this into line across the civil service?

[Mr Maude]

Anyone who has responsibility for spending public money needs to ensure that it is spent on the front-line services on which citizens depend. In the civil service, we discovered that 248 civil servants were doing nothing but trade union work at the taxpayers’ expense. Following our consultation, we have introduced tough new controls that will more than halve the cost of trade union activity to the taxpayer.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. There are far too many noisy private conversations taking place in the Chamber. Let us have a bit of order so that Members may actually be heard—it is something to do with manners.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

T2. As the Minister seems to love contracting out work to the cosy cartel of G4S, A4e, Serco and Capita, does he not think that transparency should extend to those companies as much as it does to the public sector?

[Mr Maude]

We can, of course, build appropriate levels of transparency into contracts when services are contracted out. That process was taken a lot further by the previous Government, so it is not a feature of the coalition Government. I will pass on the hon. Gentleman’s concern to my right and hon. Friends in the Ministry of Justice.

[Simon Kirby (Brighton, Kemptown) (Con)]

T3. Will the Minister update the House on the launch of gov.uk and the savings he expects to make?

[Mr Maude]

We published our digital strategy yesterday and launched gov.uk recently. We will make significant savings—gov.uk will save £36 million and, ultimately, when all the Departments migrate over to it, between £50 million and £70 million a year, and that is just to provide a much better service for citizens. As more and more of the transactions that people undertake with Government are moved online, we expect to save nearly £2 billion a year, and that is for a better service for the consumer.

[Simon Danczuk (Rochdale) (Lab)]

T5. The National Audit Office report into Whitehall’s budget management showed that just 0.2% of Government spending is in the form of departmental joint submissions. There are opportunities for greater joint working and to save more money; what are Ministers doing to improve this?

[Mr Maude]

I think that every Minister in every Government I have ever known or observed would say that there is scope for much better joined-up activity between Departments. As a result of the civil service reform plan that we are now pushing through, with the strong support of the leadership of the civil service, we should have much greater interchange between Departments to break down the silos that partly cause the problem to which the hon. Gentleman rightly refers.

[Karl MᶜCartney (Lincoln) (Con)]

T4. Will my right hon. Friend update the House on the progress of the efficiency and reform group in driving savings across Government Departments?

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

The civil service has traditionally been a good employer of women, black and minority ethnic staff and disabled staff. What equality measures are the Government taking to ensure that a 23% cut in staff by 2015 will have no adverse impact?

[Mr Maude]

I am grateful for the hon. Lady’s confirmation that the civil service is a good and diverse employer. I expect that to continue.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

T6. Government spending on advertising and consultants of all kinds is nearly always wasteful, profligate and—[Interruption.]

[Mr Gray]

Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Government spending on advertising and consultants is nearly always wasteful, extravagant and profligate. What was the annual spend of the previous Government, how much has my right hon. Friend managed to cut it by, and what further plans does he have to squeeze this kind of waste out of Government spending?

[Mr Maude]

We saved nearly £400 million a year by restricting the spend on advertising and marketing, which was wholly incontinent under the previous Government. There are sometimes good cases for using consultants, but we have cut the spend on them by nearly 70%. These disciplines will continue for the future.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

The Minister boasts about the Government’s transparency. The Cabinet Office still holds a large cache of e-mails from Andy Coulson to Rebekah Brooks. When will the Minister publish them?

[Mr Maude]

I think that the hon. Gentleman needs to change the record.

The Prime Minister was asked—