Civil Service Reform
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Jenkin
I am grateful for the hon. Lady’s intervention, and I can in fact inform the House that the Public Administration Select Committee is doing something very specifically on the impartiality of the civil service—and we still only have one civil service in the United Kingdom—in respect of the conduct of referendums. I am going to avoid being distracted by that topic, however.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
On a pure point of fact, since 1922 the civil service in Northern Ireland has been separate.
Mr Jenkin
Touché, as they say. I am most grateful for that information. I am sure it would have been in the Government’s evidence to our Committee.
Before I continue, I draw the House’s attention to the names on motion 36 under “Remaining orders and notices” in today’s Order Book. Motion 36 would set a more limited remit than we originally proposed and determine the Commons membership of the commission on the civil service. The other place indicated last week that it would reciprocate and I can inform the House that the former Lord Justice General of Scotland and the former Deputy President of the Supreme Court, Lord Hope of Craighead, has indicated that he would chair this commission if invited to do so. The names of former Secretaries of State, former Ministers and the clear majority of chairs of Select Committees on our motion, along with the support of the other place, represent a real and powerful cross-party consensus that would give civil service reform the impetus and urgency it needs.
As we consider accountability, trust and leadership at the top of Government, it is important to understand what extraordinary demands we place on Ministers and senior officials. Ministers are accountable to Parliament for the performance of their Departments, like directors to their shareholders, but unlike in almost any other walk of life they have to rely on people they do not appoint and cannot easily remove. In addition, today’s Ministers feel accountable for a system that has become somewhat unaccountable.
PASC has watched the Government’s policy on the civil service evolve. To start with there was much talk about change in Government but no plan for how change would be led and implemented. In our 2011 report “Change in Government: the agenda for leadership”, PASC recommended that the Government should formulate a comprehensive change programme articulating what the civil service is for. The civil service reform plan of 2012 indicates that the experience of Ministers in Government has had an impact on their thinking about the civil service, but it does not meet our recommendation.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
First, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin) on securing this debate. It has been a really good debate, conducted with a lot of intelligent, thoughtful comments and insights. It has been particularly marked by a very bipartisan, consensual approach, with a high degree of agreement from those in all parts of the House. I am particularly grateful for the remarks made by the right hon. Member for Barking (Margaret Hodge) and I wish to pick up on a couple of points she made. She is absolutely right to say that we need to work on the ability of the civil service to accommodate and assimilate people coming in from outside. I also completely agree with her on the issues about women succeeding in the higher realms of the civil service, which is why I have just commissioned some work on examining exactly where and why the problems arise, so that we can address this in a substantive way. She is right to draw attention to it.
I start by saying that there are many absolutely brilliant civil servants. I have no doubt that we have some of the best civil servants in the world. Just this morning, I was with a number of civil servants in Birmingham. One example stood out, and it involved part of the Department for Communities and Local Government. The national planning casework unit, half of which is based in Birmingham, told me that its casework has risen over the past four years by 24%. The speed with which it is delivering the outcomes has improved markedly, and it is doing that with less than half the staff it had to begin with. That is a remarkable improvement in productivity.
As has been pointed out, there has been a significant reduction in headcount across the civil service. It is already down by some 16% or 17% with more reductions to come, and yet no one would say that the civil service is delivering less. There is a significant improvement in productivity. The downsizing has taken place through the recruitment freeze and through reforms to the civil service compensation scheme—the scheme was so generous as to be broadly unaffordable for the Government—for sensible voluntary redundancies to reduce the size and to reflect the need for things to be done differently. Some Departments, such as the DCLG and the Department for Education, have halved in size.
There have been significant improvements, with some brilliant civil servants doing terrific and important work, but we need continuing and significant further improvement. No one argues otherwise, and no one in this Chamber today has said anything else. It does not matter whether we call it change, reform or improvement. We need to recognise what is great. We talk about the British civil service being the envy of the world, but what is the envy of the world is the essence of the Northcote-Trevelyan settlement. Northcote was a politician and Trevelyan a civil servant—an early example of collective leadership. What that said was not primarily about impartiality, but about permanence, and appointment and recruitment on merit. The principle of a permanent civil service capable of serving the Government of the day, regardless of their composition, is crucial. The values of impartiality, honesty and integrity are really important, but they are passive values and to them need to be added the dynamic values.
The Northcote-Trevelyan settlement is a bargain, which says that a new Government cannot replace existing civil servants with their own appointees, because the other side of the coin of impartiality and permanence is the ability to deliver the priorities of the democratically elected and accountable Government of the day. That means that the civil service must be able to deliver it. If it falls down for too long on that side of the bargain, the case to allow the Government to bring in their own appointees and thus to disrupt the settlement, which none of us wants to see, will mount.
The truth is that in the public sector productivity flatlined for too long. That happened across the public sector as a whole, and the civil service represents only a part of that work force, but none the less it was a concern. Things have improved markedly over the past four years.
When people talk about the British civil service being the best in the world, as they often do, we should just reflect on the fact that in the World Bank’s Government effectiveness index, we ranked 15th, behind countries with systems similar to ours, such as Canada, Australia and New Zealand. We need to deal with the constant concerns that are expressed about the leadership and management of change. Those concerns are also expressed by civil servants themselves in people surveys, which is an excellent institution that will continue. The capability deficit in commercial and digital project management is repeatedly flagged up by the Public Accounts Committee, the Public Administration Committee, the Liaison Committee and the Institute for Government and we are on the case, as we have been for the past four years. Some of the problems that have arisen with contracts have come to light precisely because of the improvement in contract management. They went unnoticed for far too long and came to the surface in an alarming and distressing way, and we are working hard to deal with them, including by setting up the Crown Commercial Service, the Major Projects Leadership Academy and the Major Projects Authority, to which the right hon. Member for Barking referred. We have strengthened the hand of senior responsible owners by making them directly accountable. The Government Digital Service is almost, but not quite, what the hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins) was proposing—that is, a public corporation for Government IT. None the less, it is an agency within government that has massively improved capability. I rather agree with him about the need to insource some of the capability, as too much IT capability was outsourced.
Much work has already been done and the problems are well understood and are being addressed, but we need to do that much more quickly because too much public money—taxpayers’ money—is at risk.
Impartiality is, of course, important. That does not mean and has never meant being impartial to the Government of the day. The civil service must be very partial towards the Government’s getting their programme implemented; otherwise, the bargain starts to fall apart. The essence of impartiality is not indifference to the Government of the day but the ability to be equally passionate and committed to implementing a future Government’s priorities and programme. It is important that this impartiality does not turn into a cold indifference. It must be a passionate commitment to delivering the Government of the day’s priorities. That is hugely important.
There is much that has been done and much that needs to be done. Let me now come on to the proposal for a commission made by my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex. Differing views have been expressed on both sides of the House and a huge amount of work and analysis is already going on. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert) on setting up another institute to study the issue and make proposals. That is very important.
As it would run alongside an active reform programme commanding very widespread support—it has slightly surprised me how little controversy has attended the civil service reform programme—one must ask what a commission would add at this stage. There would be scope-creep: the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr Raynsford) would like to add localism, the hon. Member for Luton North would like to add the size of the state, the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg) would like to add the Scottish civil service, and the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Andrew Miller) would like to consider a wider joining-up across government than that which relates to the civil service.
I am afraid that my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex has slightly added to my concern about whether a commission would delay the implementation of the existing reform programme. His Committee’s last report suggested that the Government’s modest proposal that the Prime Minister should be able to choose between two appointable candidates should not be implemented until a commission had considered it, thus lending support to exactly the concerns we have expressed for some time. If relatively modest proposals that command such widespread support can be successfully implemented, the current system will have been reinforced. If they cannot be implemented in the way we are proposing, I suggest that that would be the time for root-and-branch examination through a commission.
Oral Answers to Questions
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Ian Murray (Edinburgh South) (Lab)
1. What his policy is on the deduction of trade union subscriptions from payroll in the civil service.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The deduction of trade union subscriptions from payroll through check-off is a matter delegated to Departments in the civil service.
Ian Murray
The civil service has used check-off for the last 30 years. Indeed, large companies such as BAE Systems and Rolls-Royce use it as a very efficient way to deduct trade union subscriptions from salary. Is this not just another ideological attack? Removing check-off from the civil service payroll will cost many times more than running the current system for hundreds of years.
Priti Patel (Witham) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend think that it is fair on hard-working British taxpayers that their money is used to subsidise the administration of trade unions rather than going to front-line services?
Mr Maude
My hon. Friend has been a doughty campaigner for the use of facility time to be much better regulated. We inherited from Labour a position in which very large amounts of public money were being spent on subsidising 250 full-time officials in the civil service alone, let alone in the wider public sector. I am happy to tell her that we have got that under control.
Michael Dugher (Barnsley East) (Lab)
The Minister says that this is a matter for individual Departments, but the private secretary in his Department has written to every Department in Whitehall asking them to review check-off. We know that the Government, for political reasons, want to scrap check-off, and I have seen a copy of an official letter from the Department for Work and Pensions, which was subsequently withheld by Ministers, that states:
“The department has concluded that the figure for the financial implications of ending check-off should be disclosed…The information held states: ‘We estimate that implementation costs could exceed one million pounds’.”
In the light of that revelation, will he agree, in the interests of transparency, to publish the full financial implications of this misguided policy?
Mr Maude
Well, with respect, I have seen more recent correspondence than the hon. Gentleman has seen. The truth is that Ministers—as he will recall from his time in government—are sometimes given figures for the cost of making a change that turn out not to be true. This is such a case.
Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con)
2. What progress he has made on his programme of quango and public body reform.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The Government have reduced the number of public bodies by more than 250. By 2015, there will be a third fewer public bodies than in 2010, ensuring increased accountability and efficiency, with continuing efficiency savings of £900 million a year.
Nadine Dorries
Many quangos are unaccountable, unelected and have great power over people’s everyday lives. They are incredibly expensive to run, with questionable outcomes. Will the Minister please consider another round of the bonfire of the quangos to continue our march towards a leaner and more efficient Government?
Mr Maude
I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s encouragement. Our quest for a leaner and more efficient Government has already yielded savings of more than £10 billion in the last financial year. Labour did nothing on that whatever, which is part of the reason why we inherited the biggest budget deficit in the developed world. We have more to do, and for the first time we have instituted a round of triennial reviews so that every three years we look at the status of every public body to decide whether it still needs to exist or whether it can be trimmed back. We find that there is scope for much more progress yet.
Mr Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (Lab)
Will the Minister confirm that the abolition of the UK Film Council and its amalgamation with the British Film Institute will ensure that we continue to make the most of British talent, in that wonderful creative industry?
Mr Maude
I am confident that that will be the case. My colleagues in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport examined this question very carefully before making the decisions they did. I agree with the right hon. Gentleman about the importance of the film industry in this country: it is a very bright star indeed, and we should certainly ensure that we do nothing that jeopardises that.
Mr David Amess (Southend West) (Con)
13. Sadly, one of Tony Blair’s lasting legacies was the creation of a huge number of unelected, unaccountable, highly paid quangos, which has ruined this place and taken power from it. Will my right hon. Friend reassure me by telling me what efforts he is making to return power and accountability to the House of Commons?
Mr Maude
A major part of the programme of public bodies reform has been bringing policy functions back to the Government in a way that provides direct accountability to Parliament through Ministers. That is a big part of increasing accountability, but the secondary purpose of the reform of public bodies has been to save money, and I am glad to say that it looks as though the savings will, if anything, exceed our expectations.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
The Minister has told us about the reduction in the number of quangos. Will he now tell us what progress is being made in increasing the cost-effectiveness of those that remain?
Mr Maude
That is a continuing process. There is much more to be done to increase efficiency. As I have said, we saved more than £10 billion across central Government last year, and we expect the saving to exceed £13 billion in the current financial year, which will end this month. There is much more to be done on quango reform, but as I have said, we expect to save £900 million a year, and have already saved about £1.6 billion.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
In the course of his ongoing work on public body and quango reform, will the Minister consider adjusting the responsibilities of the Major Projects Authority? Among its options, the authority has the responsibility to
“require publication of project information consistent with the Coalition’s transparency agenda”.
That is not happening. The Government have suppressed the MPA’s detailed report on HS2, hiding behind a summary. Is it not about time that we were given an accurate description of public bodies, or that the Government published the report?
Mr Maude
As my right hon. Friend knows, we are publishing much more detail about the Government’s major projects than has ever been published before. The role of the Major Projects Authority has ensured that, for the first time, consistent oversight and assurance are being applied to the Government’s major projects portfolio, and as a result, having inherited a position in which only about a third of major Government projects were delivered on time and on budget, we now find that the proportion is more like 70%. We are making a great deal of progress, but I hear what my right hon. Friend says.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
Speaking about public body reform in 2012, the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee said that
“the Cabinet Office must get to grips with the programme’s overall costs, benefits and key risks”.
However, a recent National Audit Office report showed that those failings were still in place. When will the Minister get a grip?
Mr Maude
It is a bit surprising that the hon. Gentleman should raise that point, given that the last Government did absolutely nothing on this front. We inherited a position in which the Government did not even know how many public bodies there were, but by the time of the next election, we will have reduced the number by a third and cut the costs significantly: we will have cut the cost of quangos by £2.6 billion. I hope that, at some stage, the hon. Gentleman will reflect on the poor record of his own Government. We would be willing, at that stage, to accept his congratulations on what we have done.
Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)
3. What the level of charitable giving was in the last year for which figures are available.
Mr Nicholas Brown (Newcastle upon Tyne East) (Lab)
4. What his policy is on the inclusion of people with different political points of view on public bodies.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
Ministerial appointments to public bodies are made on merit.
Mr Brown
The Minister will recall that when in the 1980s the then Conservative Government abolished the metropolitan county authorities, the Government were scrupulous in making arrangements for the successor joint boards to recognise the rights of minority groups on the local authorities as well as the majority groups. Such arrangements do not pertain to the new combined authorities that I see from today’s Order Paper we are bringing in. Why is that?
Mr Maude
I will look at the point that the right hon. Gentleman raises. The truth is that in the last year for which the commissioner for public appointments has published figures on public appointments, actually slightly more appointees declared a Labour party affiliation than a Conservative party affiliation, but for appointments generally we seek people with some commercial experience of running large organisations who can bring to bear the same desire for efficiency and eradicating waste as we are showing in central Government.
Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend join me in welcoming the fact that the rather artificial and silly row about Conservatives being appointed to public bodies has now thankfully come to an end? Also, I inform him and the House that the Public Administration Select Committee is going to have a look at the relationship between public bodies and their sponsoring Departments, to see how they perform in bad times as well as good, how they deal with crises and how accountability should be improved.
Mr Maude
I of course welcome that inquiry. This is an important issue that should be kept under considerable review. Where the Executive and Parliament forgo the ability for a public activity to be directly accountable to Parliament, we need to understand very clearly how that responsibility is being executed.
Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab)
I am not sure that the row has come to an end, because in recent weeks we have learned that a Tory donor has been made chair of Natural England, that a former Tory Member of this House has been made chair of the Care Quality Commission, and indeed in the Cabinet Office an impartial civil service post, heading up the appointments unit, has gone to a former member of Conservative central office. So can the Minister, who is of course a former Tory party chairman, explain why an exemption was agreed to give Laura Wyld that Cabinet Office post?
Mr Maude
One has to admire the gall of the hon. Gentleman, given that the Government of whom he was a supporter relentlessly stuffed public bodies full of Labour donors and Labour lickspittles. It was the most appalling abuse of power. We are running things in a substantially better way, as the statistic I have just disclosed illustrates. Further, I can inform the hon. Gentleman that the number of women appointed to public appointments is now up to 45% for the last period, which is significantly better than anything his Government ever even began to achieve.
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)
5. What assessment he has made of the level of savings resulting from procurement and commercial reform across central Government since May 2010; and if he will make a statement.
Mr David Davis (Haltemprice and Howden) (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 are for the public sector Efficiency and Reform Group, civil service issues, industrial relations strategy in the public sector, government transparency, civil contingencies, civil society and cyber-security.
Mr Davis
The Wilson doctrine is a convention whereby Government agencies do not intercept communications with Members of Parliament without explicit approval from the Prime Minister. In a letter to my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield North (Nick de Bois) in 2012, the Minister told him that the Wilson doctrine did not apply to metadata, thereby exposing whistleblowers to risks from which parliamentary privilege should protect them. Will he review this policy, discuss it with the Prime Minister and report to the House?
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
T4. The Minister has a bit of a reputation as a pyromaniac, trying to have bonfires of regulations, quangos and much else. If that is the case, why is he allowing the Financial Conduct Authority to introduce a new code that will inhibit crowdfunding and local people in their communities in raising money through social media? Why do we have this new regulation?
Mr Maude
I accept the compliment that the hon. Gentleman pays me—gracefully, I hope—but the issue he raises is not one with which I am familiar. I am sure that my right hon. Friends in the Treasury will want to look at it. It is a great pleasure to have representation from the Opposition about excessive regulation. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. Far too many excessively noisy private conversations are taking place. Let us have a bit of order for Mr Mel Stride.
Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con)
T2. My right hon. Friend will know that the Public and Commercial Services Union, which stood up with such militancy against his pension reforms, has discovered that it has a £65 million black hole in its own pension scheme. Does he agree that the union should spend more time looking after its members and less time politicising Government reforms?
Mr Maude
All organisations that run a pension scheme have to live in the real world. I am sure that the leadership of the PCS will take pleasure in the fact that its members in the civil service continue to enjoy a pension scheme that is significantly better than the one that the PCS offers to its own staff.
Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)
T6. There is huge concern about the Government’s proposals to sell or part-privatise the Land Registry, putting 400 civil service jobs in Durham at risk. It works and even turns a profit for the Treasury. Why fix what is not broken? Has the Minister discussed this with his Department for Business, Innovation and Skills colleagues, and if not, why not?
Mr Maude
I have indeed discussed this with my colleagues in BIS. I do not take the gloomy view that the hon. Lady takes, that any involvement of the private sector means that the Land Registry will be less effective or have less opportunity to grow. A lot of what the Land Registry does is excellent, and there is a real opportunity for it to grow. If that involves bringing in a private sector partner, or private sector capital of one form or another, I hope that she would support that.
Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)
T3. May I welcome the Minister’s plans to improve accountability for senior civil service appointments? To ensure transparency and the scrutiny of appointments, may I also urge him to consider making the shortlists for appointments for the heads of quangos, Whitehall Departments and international courts the subject of prior scrutiny by Select Committees?
Mr Maude
My hon. Friend’s latter point is constantly reviewed, and it will come as no surprise to him that his urging is supported by many Select Committees. On his first point, for the first time all permanent secretary appointments are for a fixed tenure of five years. We publish the objectives of permanent secretaries, and all this is beginning to be more accountable than it has ever been before.
Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)
T7. This week concerns were expressed in the media about the move to a shared network for emergency services. Why are the Government refusing to share the risk assessment, saying that it will prejudice the procurement process?
David T. C. Davies (Monmouth) (Con)
T5. What would be the administrative consequences for government if patients languishing on long waiting lists in Wales were given access to the far higher quality services delivered by the coalition NHS in England?
Graham Jones (Hyndburn) (Lab)
T8. Last weekend I was searching for a V14 form to return a tax disc, I did a search on Google, and a copycat website came up offering services that cost money. What efforts are being made by the Government to work with the advertising agencies to try to deal with copycat websites that are ripping people off?
Mr Maude
My colleagues in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and I had a meeting with Google and others last week to address exactly this issue. We are taking urgent steps, with Google and with the Advertising Standards Authority, to address it. It is a real concern, the hon. Gentleman is right to raise it and we are on the case.
Ministerial Pensions
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 2 months ago)
Written StatementsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
In the spending review 2010, the Government announced their intention to increase employee contributions in public service pension schemes. This followed on from Lord Hutton’s interim report on public service pensions which concluded that there was a clear rationale for public servants to make a greater contribution if their pensions were to remain fair to taxpayers and employees and affordable for the country.
The ministerial pension scheme was not covered by Lord Hutton’s recommendations, but I consider it appropriate that its members face similar changes.
In 2012-13 pension contributions were increased in a similar way as applied to other public service pension schemes, and increases for 2013-14 were also applied from 1 April 2013. Further increases from 1 April 2014 will mean that:
Secretaries of State, the Leader of the Opposition in the Commons and Speaker in the House of Lords will pay an additional 1.2 percentage points of pay, and a total of 6.0 percentage points higher than 2011-12;
Ministers of State, the Government Chief Whip, the Leader of the Opposition in the Lords, the Chairman of Committees of the House of Lords and the Deputy Chairman of Committees of the House of Lords will pay an additional 0.8 percentage points of pay and a total of 4.0 percentage points higher than 2011-12; and
Parliamentary Under-Secretaries, the Government Whips and Opposition Whips will pay an additional 0.5 percentage points of pay and a total of 2.5 percentage points higher than 2011-12.
Ministers in the House of Commons make separate contributions towards their pensions as Members of Parliament. Responsibility for the setting of pension provision for MPs is the responsibility of the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority.
The amendment scheme will also make provision that members who are part of a same sex marriage will be treated in the same way as members who are part of civil partnerships, in line with the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 and the arrangements for same sex marriage recognition in other public service pension schemes.
The amendments do not make any provision in relation to an accrued right which puts (or might put) a person in a worse position than the person would have been in apart from the provision.
The details of the new scheme have been laid in the Libraries of both Houses, along with a copy of the response to the consultation from the Chairman of the Parliamentary Contributory Pension Fund Trustees.
Senior Salaries Review Body (Triennial Review)
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 2 months ago)
Written StatementsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
I am today announcing the start of the triennial review of the Senior Salaries Review Body (SSRB). Triennial reviews of non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs) are part of the Government’s commitment to ensuring, and improving, the accountability and effectiveness of public bodies.
The SSRB provides independent advice to the Prime Minister, the Lord Chancellor, the Secretary of State for Defence, the Secretary of State for Health and the Home Secretary on the pay of senior civil servants, the judiciary, senior officers of the armed forces, very senior managers in the NHS and police and crime commissioners.
The review will be conducted in accordance with Government guidance for reviewing NDPBs, and will focus on the core questions of effectiveness and good governance. Interested parties will be invited to feed in their views.
I shall announce the findings of the review in due course.
Security Vetting Appeals Panel (Triennial Review)
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 3 months ago)
Written StatementsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
On 4 July 2013, I made a written statement to Parliament announcing the triennial review of the Security Vetting Appeals Panel—Official Report, column 59WS. I am now pleased to announce the completion of the review.
The Security Vetting Appeals Panel (SVAP) provides a final means of challenging a decision to refuse or withdraw security clearance as part of the Government’s policy on national security vetting.
The review concludes that the functions performed by the SVAP are still required and that it should be retained as a non-departmental public body (NDPB). The review also looked at the governance arrangements for the body in line with guidance on good corporate governance as set out by the Cabinet Office. The report makes some recommendations in this respect which will be implemented shortly.
I am very grateful to Sir Alex Allan for his work on this review and to all who contributed. The full report of the review of the SVAP panel can be found on the gov.uk website and copies have been placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
Markets for Government Services
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 3 months ago)
Written StatementsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The Government are determined to ensure there is a vibrant, competitive and diverse supply base for public services, with a range of providers delivering high-quality services.
Over the past few months Serco has engaged constructively with the Government following the emergence of material concerns relating to their contracts with the Ministry of Justice. Throughout this period the Government’s approach has been rigorous, and on 19 December 2013 my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Justice announced a settlement with Serco to recompense the taxpayer for £68.5 million, excluding VAT, for the overcharging found in an audit of Ministry of Justice contracts and to repay past profits of £2 million from the prisoner escorting contract.
Serco has now developed a thorough plan for corporate renewal. Following scrutiny by officials and a detailed review by the oversight group as well as our independent assurers, Grant Thornton, the Government have accepted this plan represents the right direction of travel to meet our expectations as a customer.
This does not affect any consideration by the Serious Fraud Office, which acts independently of Government, in relation to the material concerns previously identified.
However, the Government are reassured that Serco is committed to act expeditiously on any new information emerging from ongoing investigations.
The changes that Serco has already made and its commitment to go further over coming months are positive steps that the Government welcome. However, Serco’s corporate renewal is an ongoing process and the Government place a strong emphasis on the full and timely implementation of the agreed corporate renewal plan. The Crown representative, together with Grant Thornton, will continue to monitor progress as their plan is implemented, reporting to Government on a regular basis. I hope this will enable our confidence to continue to build.
Oral Answers to Questions
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
1. What his policy is on offshoring of services which have been contracted out by the Government.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
Our policy on offshoring is unchanged from that pursued by the previous Government. Our procurement policy is to award contracts on the basis of value for money, which means the optimum combination of costs and quality.
Mrs Glindon
Cabinet Office document ISSC2 states that back-office jobs and functions in the Departments for Work and Pensions and for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs will be privatised and offshored in a joint venture with the Government and Steria UK. Which functions and jobs will be offshored and to where? Does he agree that any threat to offshore jobs, particularly those handling sensitive personal data, should be given urgent attention by the Government?
Mr Maude
Concerns about data security are taken very seriously, and certainly inform our approach to offshoring. But as I say, the approach that we take to offshoring is exactly the same as that followed by the previous Government. The hon. Lady may know that the shared business services joint venture, also with Steria, which was set up by the last Government, has some elements that are offshored, and the same will be the case with this joint venture.
Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (LD)
Will my right hon. Friend encourage contractors to recognise that where there is a very cost-effective office in a rural community providing shared services, such as the DEFRA office in Alnwick, retaining jobs there makes sense?
Mr Maude
I know my right hon. Friend’s concern about that office and I know that Steria and the management of the shared services centre will be looking at that very carefully. They will want to make sure that the service is provided at an improved quality—the quality has not been optimal up to now—and at a much lower cost. There will be many different ways of doing that, but I know that they will want to look very carefully at the service provided by their colleagues at Alnwick.
David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con)
2. What steps he is taking to improve commercial skills in the civil service.
David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)
9. What steps he is taking to improve commercial skills in the civil service.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The Government have been working for the past three years to drive up the level of commercial skills across central Government. There is still a long way to go, given the shortcomings of where we started. The need to press ahead with redoubled speed was highlighted in our recent cross-Government review of contracts. We are creating the Crown Commercial Service, which will come online later this year.
David Rutley
I welcome the important steps that my right hon. Friend is taking to improve these skills. I believe that more needs to be done to continue to upgrade skills in commercial areas, particularly relating to project management and commissioning. Is he satisfied that sufficient civil servants will be going through the new commissioning agency really to make a difference to the skills base in Whitehall and beyond?
Mr Maude
I recently attended the one-year-on event of the new Commissioning Academy, which we set up a year ago. It has achieved a good deal. During the next 18 months, we want 1,500 senior public sector commissioners to have participated in the academy. It is part of a wider programme to improve commercial skills not only in Whitehall but right across the public sector.
Mark Menzies
What assessment has my right hon. Friend made of the work of the Crown representatives in driving value for money for taxpayers through procurement reform?
Mr Maude
Our Crown representatives, who come predominantly from the private sector with a huge amount of commercial experience, have helped us to generate significant efficiencies. We buy better if we act as a single customer in Government, to maximise our buying power and improve our performance as a customer. We are renegotiating contracts with a number of suppliers, and by centrally renegotiating we have saved the taxpayer £800 million in each of the financial years during this Parliament.
Andrew Selous
When does my right hon. Friend expect that all those in charge of major Government IT contracts will have gone through the programme at Oxford Said business school, and is he satisfied that that is the very best place to send these people?
Mr Maude
I am absolutely satisfied with the Major Projects Leadership Academy, which was set up to address what was identified by everybody as a major deficiency in Government and is now approaching its second anniversary. There is a requirement for all major project leaders to be alumni of the academy by the end of 2015, and all of them will have at least started training by the end of the current year. We started with a real deficiency of skills and experience, but we are building those with civil servants, which has been very much welcomed.
David Mowat
Just before Christmas, the cross-Government review of major projects identified a number of serious weaknesses in the way contracts with Serco and G4S had been administered. Will the Minister confirm that the review’s conclusions will be implemented in full? Will he also consider requiring senior civil servants to spend three years in a commercial environment before becoming permanent secretaries?
Mr Maude
I can confirm that we have accepted the recommendations, and Departments are producing their plans for implementing them imminently. With regard to the requirement for senior civil servants to get commercial and operational experience, we have already set out that someone looking to be appointed as permanent secretary of a delivery Department must be able to show at least two years of commercial or operational experience before being considered.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
May I push the Minister on that? Is it not a bit wishy-washy to refer to “commercial” skills? I am co-chair of the all-party management group. What we want across the civil service are pure management skills. Moreover, we want Ministers with some ability to manage a Department. The fact is that most of the Ministers who appeared before me when I chaired a Select Committee could not manage the proverbial in a brewery.
Mr Maude
The hon. Gentleman may have more experience of the latter activity than I do, but the truth is that Ministers are not actually required to manage Departments; that responsibility sits very clearly with the civil service leadership. I think that they would be the first to accept that he makes a valid point. We have a deficiency in leadership and management skills as well as in commercial skills, and we need to address that. Concerns about the quality of the leadership and management of change come up consistently in the civil service staff survey, and as great organisations are always changing, we need to rectify that deficiency.
Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab)
Of course we agree that we want greater commercial skills, and indeed management skills, in the civil service, but with the fiasco over the west coast main line, botched contracts over rural broadband roll-out and the lamentable implementation of the universal credit, with the Minister squabbling publicly with the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, when will Ministers, rather than blaming officials, take some responsibility for their own shambles?
Mr Maude
On that last point, the hon. Gentleman will know that it was my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State who spotted that things were not right with the implementation of the universal credit and commissioned the review that disclosed the problems to the Department for the first time, as the National Audit Office and Public Accounts Committee report makes absolutely clear. Far from evading responsibility, it was my right hon. Friend who spotted the problems and set to work solving them.
Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend acknowledge the widespread appreciation of his personal commitment to improving skills in the civil service, which is truly commendable? Will he also take this opportunity to welcome the fact that the Public Administration Committee has just announced a new inquiry into skills in the civil service, and will he encourage people to send us as much evidence as possible?
Mr Maude
I absolutely welcome the inquiry that my hon. Friend is leading and will certainly encourage a lot of evidence to be given. We have to be open about the problems that exist. Otherwise, there is no chance whatsoever of solving them. The first stage in finding solutions is being honest about the problems.
Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)
3. What steps he is taking to maintain the level of youth services provision.
Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)
5. What assessment he has made of the efficacy of privatised shared services across central Government Departments.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The Government’s first priority is to drive down costs for the taxpayer and cut the massive budget deficit that we inherited. There has been cross-party agreement on the need for shared services for the past decade, but very little had been achieved until over the past 12 months. That is why I am pleased that last year we launched a joint venture with Steria that will save taxpayers at least £400 million and create a new, dynamic UK business services company.
Jessica Morden
The announcement in December that the Ministry of Justice’s shared service centre in Newport could be privatised has caused huge fears and uncertainty among the work force, who fear that their jobs will be outsourced and potentially offshored, which could happen under this model. Given the Prime Minister’s commitment to onshoring jobs last week, will the Cabinet Office reassure the workers in Newport that the plans will be shelved?
Mr Maude
We will certainly not shelve any options that could bring improved services and cut the cost to the taxpayer. I am aware of the uncertainty. That will be resolved as soon as possible so that people know where the future lies. To give a bit of reassurance, I remind the hon. Lady that the first shared service centre in Swansea, which has been fully outsourced rather than being a joint venture, is taking on more staff.
Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)
8. What plans he has for the National Citizen Service in 2014.
Karen Lumley (Redditch) (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 are for the public sector Efficiency and Reform Group, civil service issues, the industrial relations strategy in the public sector, Government transparency, civil contingency, civil society and cyber-security. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. There is still rather a lot of noise in the House. What is required is an air of respectful expectation for Karen Lumley.
Karen Lumley
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
Does my right hon. Friend the Minister share my concern at the reports that a trade union is threatening to use so-called leverage tactics against our NHS staff? Can he confirm that those allegations fall within the scope of our review of trade union activities?
Mr Maude
I share my hon. Friend’s concerns at those suggestions. It is appalling that hard-working staff in our NHS should be subjected to the threat of such bullying and intimidation. I can confirm that the review that we are establishing will be fully empowered to investigate those suggestions.
Michael Dugher (Barnsley East) (Lab)
In light of the newly released Cabinet papers about the 1984 miners’ strike, and given the continued sense of injustice that prevails across the coalfields, will the Minister agree to publish all the documents and the communication between the then Government and the police at the time of the strike; to a full investigation into the events surrounding Orgreave ahead of the 30th anniversary; and to make a formal apology for the actions of the then Government? Does he agree that it is only through full transparency and reconciliation that we will finally see justice for the coalfields?
Mr Maude
The documents will be released in the usual way under the law that was passed under the last Government. I was representing a coal mining constituency during the miners’ strike and saw at first hand the violence, intimidation and divided communities in a dispute that took place without a proper national ballot being held. The hon. Gentleman asks for an apology—no.
Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)
T5. As well as reversing the previous Labour council’s cuts to youth services and taking trade union money and putting it into apprenticeships, North Lincolnshire’s Conservative council has adopted dynamic purchasing systems such as e-tendering to support local businesses. Are the Government evaluating the benefit of such systems to the wider public sector? If so, will the Minister look at the North Lincolnshire examples?
Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)
T2. Sunderland has a great record on technology start-ups, but these small companies still find it difficult to compete and bid for Government work. What more can the Minister do across Government to support this growing industry in the north-east?
Mr Maude
We can do more, and we are already doing much more than was previously the case. The amount of Government business going to small businesses, both directly and indirectly, has risen to nearly 20%. I am afraid that the last Government were not even measuring how much went to smaller businesses. There is much more that we can do. We have streamlined the procurement processes, which previously seemed almost deliberately to exclude small businesses from being able to bid. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
The Minister has ploughed on, to his credit, but it has been difficult for him to be heard. His words should be heard, and I hope that there will be some courtesy from Members.
Laura Sandys (South Thanet) (Con)
T6. I welcome the Minister’s offering IT procurement to small and medium-sized enterprises through the G-Cloud. Is he aware of a local constituency company called The Bunker secure hostings, which offers data for SMEs to access G-Gloud?
Mr Maude
I am glad that G-Cloud, which we set up, now has 800 suppliers on it, two thirds of which are SMEs, and that an increasing amount of business is being awarded through it. I hope that the business in my hon. Friend’s constituency will be successful in winning business through that innovative way of enabling the purchase of IT services.
Gemma Doyle (West Dunbartonshire) (Lab/ Co-op)
T3. Last week, the Information Commissioner said that there were “serious shortcomings” in the Cabinet Office’s handling of freedom of information requests and called the Department’s poor performance “particularly disappointing”. Why is the Minister setting such a bad example, given that his Department is supposed to lead on openness and transparency across Government?
Mr Maude
It will be clear to the hon. Lady that the Cabinet Office deals with some of the most complex and difficult freedom of information requests, a lot of them involving previous Government papers, for which a long consultation process has to be entered into before any decision can be made. The situation will be better in some quarters than others, but in general our record is good.
Mr Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)
T8. Given that a fifth of Government procurement spend now goes to SMEs, will the Minister redouble his efforts so that these engines of growth further boost our long-term economic plan?
Mr Maude
We have made massive progress. Under the previous Government there was no attempt even to measure how much business was going to SMEs, but we are now measuring that and improving it. We have cut out a lot of the bureaucratic nonsense that often prevented small businesses from even being able to bid for business, let alone win it. The result of that, as my hon. Friend says, is that nearly one fifth of Government business goes to SMEs one way or another. It is our ambition for that to rise to 25%, and I am optimistic we can achieve that.
Public Bodies 2013
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 5 months ago)
Written StatementsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The Cabinet Office is today publishing the “Public Bodies 2013” data directory on gov.uk. This provides a single source of top-level data including on all UK Government-sponsored non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs), now published wholly online in an improved data format.
Cross-Government Contract Management
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 5 months ago)
Written StatementsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
Outside providers deliver high-quality public services every day. Public services are too important to too many people to be allowed to be the monopoly of the public sector. We need a vibrant mix of the very best suppliers—a hybrid economy of diverse partners. But the key to ensuring taxpayer value and high-quality services is in improved supplier management.
On 11 July, the Justice Secretary made a statement to the House about significant anomalies in the billing practices under the Ministry of Justice’s electronic monitoring contracts with Serco and G4S. Since then the Government’s response have been rigorous. The Justice Secretary has led extensive work within the Ministry of Justice. At the same time I initiated a cross-Government review with PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), Moore Stephens and a highly experienced oversight group. This reviewed 28 of the largest contracts held by Serco and G4S worth £5.9 billion in total.
Today we publish those two reports. They provide clear evidence that contract management in Government requires improvement. There were examples of good practice and skilled work by officials across Whitehall. But in the majority of contracts reviewed across Government there are weaknesses in the way contracts are managed, some of which are significant.
The cross-Government review found no evidence of deliberate acts or omissions by either firm leading to errors or irregularities in the charging and billing arrangements on the 28 contracts investigated.
The review found that there were deficiencies in key controls being applied to the invoice and payment processes and there is therefore a risk that over-charging may have occurred. The review’s assessment of the deficiencies has determined that, in all but three cases, the impact is considered unlikely to be material (where ongoing work will establish with more confidence the significance and impact of the risks identified). Nevertheless, the issues found across Government are sufficiently important that senior management attention is recommended. The failings could, if left unchecked, lead to future erroneous charging for services delivered or opportunities missed to intervene at the right point in order to make necessary corrections.
These weaknesses fall into seven themes and the report makes eight specific recommendations to address them. Work is already under way to address problems with commercial capability and contract management as part of the civil service reform programme. Indeed for the past three years, the Government have been frank about our challenges in these areas.
The new recommendations from this review build on our ongoing work through the efficiency and reform group, including to establish a Crown commercial service and professionalise procurement under the leadership of the newly-created chief procurement officer in the Cabinet Office. The review underscores the urgent need to address these long-standing weaknesses and we will redouble our efforts to do so. I accept the report and its recommendations in full and I have placed a copy of the report in the Library of the House.
Today marks the conclusion of the reviews that the Cabinet Office and the Ministry of Justice have been conducting into Serco contracts. No further evidence of impropriety has been found beyond those on the electronic monitoring and prisoner escorting contracts.
Over the past few months Serco has engaged constructively with Government, setting out a corporate renewal plan that is now well advanced. We expect to provide a final opinion on the adequacy of the plan in January, following advice from the oversight group and independent advisers, who will also continue to monitor implementation. As set out by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Justice, we have agreed a settlement with Serco to recompense the taxpayer £68.5 million excluding VAT for the overcharging found in an audit of Ministry of Justice contracts.
This is a positive step forward for both parties and one that Government welcome.
Alongside the discussions with Serco, we have continued to engage G4S, and anticipate a further update in due course.
UK Cyber-security Strategy
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 5 months ago)
Written StatementsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
Last December, I placed the first of my annual reports before Parliament on progress on the UK Cyber-security Strategy. I am pleased to present a second report to both Houses today.
The “Cyber-Security Strategy”, published in November 2011, set out the Government’s vision of “a vibrant, resilient and secure cyberspace”, providing a framework to guide our actions to “enhance prosperity, national security and a strong society”. To support the strategy we put in place a national cyber-security programme (NCSP) backed by £650 million of funding to 2015. This year we increased that investment with a further £210 million in 2015-16. This funding will build on existing projects and also support new investment, enabling the UK to retain its emerging reputation as a leader in the field of cyber-security.
The strategy set out four clear objectives:
Making the UK one of the most secure places in the world to do business in cyberspace;
Making the UK more resilient to cyber-attack and better able to protect our interests in cyberspace;
Helping shape an open, vibrant and stable cyberspace that supports open societies;
Building the UK’s cyber-security knowledge, skills and capability.
These objectives continue to drive our work and are as relevant today as they were in 2011 even in the face of a rapidly changing technological and threat landscape. In this report, I will highlight significant areas of progress, new announcements and our forward plans.
Making cyberspace safer for UK business
Our partnership with industry continues to advance and bear fruit to mutual benefit. In March this year, I launched the Cyber Security Information-Sharing Partnership (CISP) which we funded through the NCSP. It provides a trusted platform in which the security services, law-enforcement authorities and industry exchange information on threats and mitigations in real time. The partnership already includes more than 250 companies. In November this year, the CISP supported the financial sector’s “Waking Shark II” exercise in conjunction with the Bank of England which tested the financial sector’s ability to respond to a cyber-attack. Going forward, we plan to expand its partnership by doubling the number of members to 500 by the end of 2014.
The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) has also worked with partners to deliver a “Cyber Governance Health Check” for FTSE350 companies and cyber-security guidance for small businesses, both of which help companies to identify and tackle cyber-risks. In addition, they have also been working closely with industry to develop an agreed “Organisational Standard”. Last month, the Minister for Universities and Science announced details of this new standard which will not only give companies a clear baseline to aim for in addressing cyber-security risks to their company but will enable them to advertise the fact that they meet a certain set of criteria on cyber-security. This provides them with an obvious competitive advantage in a marketplace that increasingly demands better cyber-security from suppliers. To reinforce this and give the standard a kick-start, we will be mandating its use in Government procurement. Its adoption will be subject to proportionality and relevance, particularly in relation to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), as this is not designed to impose costs on business but rather to boost cyber-security while improving the security of the Government’s supply chain.
In concert with this, BIS has developed a new cyber-security suppliers scheme as part of the work being done in conjunction with techUK and the cyber-security sector through the new Cyber Growth Partnership. The scheme provides UK companies with a means of demonstrating, via a public list, that they are a supplier of cyber-security products and services to the UK Government. We want to help UK companies capitalise on a growing market in cyber-security products and services, and we are setting a target for future export growth. The target, the first of its kind, has been set at £2 billion worth of annual cyber sales by 2016, a significant increase on the 2012 export sales figure of £850 million.
Tackling Cyber Crime
The launch of the National Crime Agency (NCA) in October saw the establishment of the new National Cyber Crime Unit (NCCU). The NCCU brings together the skills and expertise of its precursors, Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) Cyber and the Police Central e-Crime Unit, into a world-leading organisation dedicated to fighting the most serious cyber-criminals.
The NCCU has already had significant successes. Just in the past month, it issued an urgent alert to inform internet users of a risk of infection linked to a mass email spamming event aimed at millions of consumers. In addition, NCCU delivered a quick response to a threat to a bank that enabled security measures to be put in place and prevented approximately £14 million from potentially being extracted from accounts. Working closely with the Metropolitan police, six suspects were also sentenced to a total of 28.5 years after being convicted of stealing thousands of pounds from job hunters using fake online adverts for companies. The group defrauded UK financial institutions for many years and stole personal data from thousands of members of the public. We look forward to the NCA developing its capabilities further over the coming year to provide a relentless law-enforcement response to cybercrime.
Meanwhile Government Departments have also taken action to prevent cyber-fraud. A dedicated Cyber Crime Capability in Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customes (HMRC) has provided specialist advice to approximately 20 criminal cases, resulting in an overall revenue loss prevented of more than £40 million and more than 2,300 fraudulent websites have been shut down since January 2011.
Making the UK more resilient in cyberspace
Improving our resilience to and diminishing the impact of cyber-attacks is vital. Much of our national infrastructure is owned and operated by the private sector and over the past year, the Centre for the Protection of the National Infrastructure (CPNI) has further extended its range of guidance and products to help companies protect their networks from cyber-threats. CPNI’s Cyber Risk Advisory Service provides in-depth support to senior executives and boards of the UK’s most critical firms.
The safety of industrial control systems is an important element of infrastructure protection. Helping build our capability in this important area, in conjunction with the EPSRC, we are establishing a new Research Institute in Trustworthy Industrial Control Systems. This is the third such institute to be established with the aid of NCSP funding. Based at Imperial college, the institute will broaden our understanding of the threats to these control systems and find ways to enhance their security.
The MOD continues to mainstream cyber throughout our defence forces. In May this year, the MOD stood up Joint Forces Cyber Group to deliver defence’s cyber-capability. The group includes the Joint Cyber Units (JCUs) at Cheltenham and Corsham, with the new Joint Cyber Unit (Reserve) which we announced last year. Recruitment for the Joint Cyber Unit (Reserve) commenced in October 2013 with a high number of applications received following the Defence Secretary’s announcement in September 2013. The MOD continues to develop new tactics, techniques and plans to delivery military capabilities to confront high-end threats.
An open and secure cyberspace
Complementing these domestic efforts, we have been pursuing an international agenda for an open, stable and secure cyberspace, as set out by the Foreign Secretary at the London Cyber conference in 2011. This has been advanced through subsequent conferences in Budapest in 2012 and Seoul this October, where over 85 countries were represented. In Seoul, we succeeded in getting agreement on a clear statement of the importance of maintaining an open internet for economic progress.
We are working in partnership with a whole host of nations and organisations including the G8, the UN, NATO, and the EU to help shape norms of behaviour for cyberspace while promoting the UK as a leader in cyberspace technology and policy. And we are investing in capacity and co-operation internationally by establishing a Cyber Capacity Building Fund. Through this we have supported the creation of the Global Cyber Security Capacity Centre at Oxford university this year. The fund is already helping the UK to tackle cyber-threats at source, with the arrest in June 2013 of a major global e-fraud network following UK training of partners in south-east Asia.
Cyber-security is a long-term project, so we are investing for the future with a new engagement process in which Chevening, Commonwealth and Marshall scholars from Africa, Asia, and America by selecting a number of these students to attend the annual Academic Centres of Excellence in Cyber Research conference in December and to enrol in an international cyber policy course at Cranfield university. Through this initiative, we aim to help ensure that future cadres of global leaders will have a good understanding of cyber security issues.
Education and Skills
We know that our efforts to expand the UK’s cyber-security sector mean that we need more people with the right skills and education to support this. The national cyber-security programme is working with business, academia and the education sector to ensure we have a future workforce with cyber-skills and expertise, as well as a basic understanding and awareness of cyber-security among the public in general.
We are addressing skills at every level and have funded development of cyber-security learning and teaching materials at GCSE and A-level, with further materials to be released to schools in January 2014. We are also funding initiatives at university level for graduates and post-graduate students, as well as internship and apprenticeship initiatives, such as the one being run by GCHQ to attract technically minded people.
To promote research in cyber-security, we have: set up 11 universities as academic centres of excellence in cyber-security research; established three new research institutes in the science of cyber-security; and set up two cyber-security centres for doctoral training to ensure the UK gains the high-end cyber-security skills needed to tackle current and future cyber-challenges.
For the future, with NCSP funding, the Open university is developing a massive open online course (MOOC) in cyber-security, to be run for the first time in summer 2014. The course is free and has a potential reach of 200,000 students worldwide. Through this initiative, we have a unique opportunity to raise awareness of cyber-security to a mass audience of students, not just those in courses involving it, with an ultimate aim of bringing more students into the field.
Throughout 2012-13 we have continued to fund work by the Cyber Security Challenge across the UK which runs innovative competitions to seek out talented, young people and motivate them into entering the field of cyber-security. We have also funded a new schools programme for the CSC which enabled them to run a pilot for which 562 schools have already signed up. For the coming year, we will be giving them a further £100,000 to roll out this pilot nationally.
We are also investing in public sector skills. For example, the National Archives are ensuring that staff across the public sector are trained in protecting information and have worked with National Fraud Authority to produce the e-learning course “Responsible for Information”, which has been taken by nearly 70,000 central Government staff since July 2013. It is widely available across the public sector and we will be adapting it for an SME audience in early 2014.
However, we also need to cast our net wider to ensure that people across the UK have a better understanding of potential threats and are better equipped with the necessary protection to go about their business online with confidence. To this end, BIS has been working with the UK’s internet service providers (ISPs) on a set of “Guiding Principles” for ISPs to improve the online security of their customers. The principles, being launched today, set out that at a minimum, ISPs will provide cyber-security information to their customers, or signpost to information elsewhere. ISPs will assist and empower their customers to protect themselves by offering tools and security solutions, or indicate where solutions can be accessed. If their customer does experience a problem, ISPs will support them by providing clear information about how to report the incident. They will also inform them of a potential compromise, in line with company policy, and explore ways to bring potential issues to the attention of customers. This is an important step in not only protecting people online but in helping to minimise the number and impact of cyber-attacks in the UK.
Lastly, we are investing in a major campaign to increase awareness of cyber-security among both the general public and small businesses. The campaign, led by the Home Office and backed by £4 million of funding from the NCSP, is to be launched next month. It is being supported by a broad range of organisations, including Facebook, BT, a number of anti-virus companies such as Sophos, banks and financial organisations as well as community and trade organisations. These organisations are providing financial and in-kind benefits worth around £2.3 million, which will extend the breadth and reach of the campaign and help to improve our nation’s cyber-health.
Conclusion
We are in a much better place than two years ago when we launched the strategy. This reflects the collective effort of numerous Government Departments and agencies, and powerful partnerships with industry, academia and international counterparts.
Today, I have also placed before Parliament a list of achievements over the past year, as well as a document which outlines our forward plans, priorities and some key initiatives we will be taking forward over the next 12 months.
There is still much work to be done, but our progress to date has put us in a strong position for the future.