Cross-Government Contract Management
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 10 months ago)
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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, 11 months ago)
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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.
Ministerial Responsibilities
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 11 months ago)
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The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The new list of ministerial responsibilities has been published today. Copies have been placed in the Vote Office and the Libraries of both Houses. Copies will also be sent to each hon. Member’s office in this House.
The list can also be accessed on the Cabinet Office website at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/government-ministers-and-responsibilities.
Oral Answers to Questions
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 11 months ago)
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Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)
10. What steps he is taking to control the amount of trade union facility time in the civil service.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
At the time of the last general election, there was no proper monitoring of trade union facility time in government. That has now changed, and paid time off for any trade union activities and full-time union officials now requires the specific consent of a senior Minister. We expect the cost to the taxpayer for paid time off for trade union duties to fall by 60% from the level we inherited.
Mr Maude
So far, by reducing significantly the number of full-time union officials who are paid by the taxpayer as civil servants, we have saved more than £2.3 million just from that element of the reforms. Overall, we are on course to meet our benchmark of spending no more than 0.1% of the civil service pay bill on facility time.
Karl MᶜCartney
Further to the kind answers that my right hon. Friend has given, will he tell the House how many civil servants were given paid time off to attend the Public and Commercial Services Union conference this year and last year?
Mr Maude
In May this year, 651 PCS reps had paid time off to attend the PCS conference—fewer than half the number of the previous year. Next year, paid time off to attend the conference will be entirely at the discretion of the Secretary of State or the Minister in charge of that civil servant’s Department.
Alun Cairns
This issue is a significant cost to the public purse. Will the Minister please advise the House how many taxpayer-funded trade union representatives there were in May 2010, and how many there are now?
Mr Maude
It has taken some time to establish the facts about that because there was no proper monitoring. We believe, however, that in May 2010 in the region of 250 civil servants were full-time officers of their trade union and doing no work on behalf of the taxpayer. Several of them had been promoted in post while doing no work as a civil servant—and one of them had been promoted twice, which seems remarkable.
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
It is clear that the Minister has planted these questions in order to union-bash again, which seems to be something he relishes. Is he man enough at this point to say how beneficial trade unions are in the workplace in terms of the economy, the taxpayer and the employer?
Mr Maude
I have always been at pains to say that there is benefit to the employer in having union representatives in the workplace. What is not acceptable, however, is having those representatives uncontrolled, unmonitored and growing like Topsy, to the extent that they were costing the taxpayer £36 million a year at a time of financial stringency caused by the grotesque budget deficit we inherited from the Labour party. That is completely unacceptable.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
The Minister knows that I have a lot of time for him, and I congratulate him on winning a famous design award for his Department recently. However, I am a proud trade unionist and member of Unite, and I am a proud Co-operator. In a democratic society in which unions have an important part to play—as does the co-operative movement—why is there a feeling coming from the Government Benches that they are out to get us?
Mr Maude
I am certainly not out to get the hon. Gentleman, for whom I have—if I may return the compliment—a great deal of respect. I have never said that there is no role for trade unions or for trade union representatives having paid time off in the workplace. I have always stressed that there is value for the employer in the ability to have disputes resolved quickly, effectively and at local level. What was going on in the civil service, however, was way out of line with any other workplace, even in the public sector. The taxpayer is entitled to expect that the Government will grip that issue, which, for the first time, is being done.
Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (LD)
2. What assessment he has made of the effect on small towns of outsourcing under the shared services programme.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
Our assessment showed that any employment impacts arising from outsourcing are likely to be substantially mitigated through redeployment. I expect that additional new employment opportunities will be generated through what I hope will be a thriving UK-based service provider that will result from the joint venture we have created.
Sir Alan Beith
Does my right hon. Friend recognise that offices in rural locations, such as the Alnwick DEFRA office, can be excellent locations for shared back-office services because they have good staff and low staff turnover? Will he therefore do all he can to encourage the public-private partnership company to make sure that the Alnwick location is used, either for its existing work or for alternative work in the field?
Mr Maude
I absolutely take the point that my right hon. Friend makes. It is very well made. I know that the new joint venture company will look very carefully at all the implications. It will want to be able to do the work effectively and to create a new provider in the marketplace that has the opportunity to create more jobs rather than lose jobs. I know that he will talk to the new company and that it will want to hear his views.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
3. What recent progress he has made on the Government ICT Strategy.
Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)
7. What recent progress his Department has made on improving efficiency across Government.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The efficiency and reform group supported Departments across Government to deliver savings of £5.4 billion in the first half of 2013-14, which was an increase of 73% on savings over the same period in the previous year. I am extremely proud of the hard work that civil servants across Whitehall have undertaken to achieve this success for the taxpayer.
Mr Hanson
Will the Minister tell me why the costs of the efficiency and reform group, which now employs 440 members of staff, have ballooned to £60 million? More importantly, will he tell the House today what he would not tell my hon. Friends on the Front Bench—how many people work there now and what is the cost?
Mr Maude
A lot of this work simply was not being done under the previous Government, but the predecessor organisations employed more than twice as many members of staff as the efficiency and reform group now employs, and the simple fact is that in the last financial year it was responsible, with its colleagues across Government, for delivering savings of more than £10 billion by eradicating waste left by the Government of which the right hon. Gentleman was a member.
Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab)
We know that universal credit will not be delivered on time, that £40 million has been wasted, that £90 million will be written down and that the IT system Agile was deeply inappropriate. The Opposition have learnt that Agile was used on the insistence of the Cabinet Office, so will the Paymaster General, who boasts of his efficiency drives, give us a full explanation of his Department’s role in this debacle and publish all guidance the Cabinet Office sent to the Department for Work and Pensions?
Mr Maude
Oh dear. Is that the best the hon. Gentleman can do? I suggest he read the report by the Public Accounts Committee on what went wrong with universal credit. The problems only came to the attention of the DWP because of a review commissioned by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.
Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (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 society, cyber-security and civil contingencies. In that context, I would like to thank all those in the emergency services who did a brilliant job working to prepare effectively for and respond to the effects of last week and weekend’s storm surge. I am sure the whole House will want to send its best wishes to those adversely affected and our thanks to those who worked massively to prepare for it.
Stephen Metcalfe
May I take this opportunity to congratulate my right hon. Friend on the open government partnership conference held in London last month and ask what plans there are for the open government partnership for the coming year?
Mr Maude
We passed on our chairmanship of the open government partnership at the conference. I thank my hon. Friend for his remarks; it was very successful, with contributors and participants from civil society and from Governments right across the world. It was attended by a number of UK Ministers, including my right hon. Friends the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister. We hope that this will develop, with more Governments taking part and with a deepening of the relationship with civil society organisations in some countries where their life is not nearly as protected as the life of civil society organisations here. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. The Minister is providing serious answers to serious questions, but I am not sure that he is getting the serious attention that he and I would think those answers warrant. Perhaps we could have a bit of order.
Michael Dugher (Barnsley East) (Lab)
It was revealed in a leaked letter yesterday that the Minister for the Cabinet Office tried to use emergency powers to block a freedom of information request for the Government to publish the HS2 project assessment review from 2011, which he did because of “political and presentational difficulties”. Those who support HS2 in principle know that public confidence is vital. Concerns have already been expressed about accelerating costs because of the Government’s failure to get a grip on the project. Questions have been raised by the National Audit Office about the economic benefits. Will the Minister now publish that project assessment review?
Mr Maude
Under the last Government, when the hon. Gentleman resided in Downing street, information about the progress on major projects had to be extracted by force. Earlier this year, we published the ratings for all major projects. We did that voluntarily—the first time it has ever been done—and we will continue to do so. We are now the world’s leading Government on transparency, so lectures from the hon. Gentleman come pretty thin.
John Robertson (Glasgow North West) (Lab)
T2. Thank you, Mr Speaker. Following the question on outsourcing from the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith), we have now passed £100 billion-worth of contracts to large companies that have absolutely no transparency. Is it not time to revisit the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to make sure that these companies do have the necessary transparency and are brought into the scope of the Act?
Mr Maude
The hon. Gentleman will know that my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith), who chairs the Justice Committee, presided over an inquiry into the working of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and did not recommend that any such change should happen. The hon. Gentleman refers to large companies taking part in outsourcing, but one of the things we have done is to reduce the Government’s dependency on large companies by opening up procurement to small and medium-sized enterprises across the country, which was not even measured under his Government. We have made big steps—though not yet enough—to open it up to many smaller UK businesses.
Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)
Last week’s tidal surge devastated hundreds of homes in my constituency when our flood defences were breached by the Humber, the Ouse and the Trent. During that emergency, the real heroes in communities such as Burringham and South Ferriby were—apart from the emergency services—our parish councils, which had in place emergency plans that ran 24/7. Will my hon. Friend pay tribute to those parish councillors and urge other such councillors to ensure that they have proper community emergency plans in place?
Mr Maude
My hon. Friend is completely right: there was an amazing community response to the emergency caused by the storm surge. He is quite right that parish councils, particularly in rural areas, play an incredibly important role in a completely voluntary way. I would also like to pay tribute to my hon. Friend, who I understand was out there in the small hours of the morning, working alongside his constituents to support them.
Ms Margaret Ritchie (South Down) (SDLP)
T3. Can the Minister tell us what proportion of the files subject to the 30-year rule the Department has released to the National Archives, and how many of them relate to Northern Ireland?
Iain Stewart (Milton Keynes South) (Con)
May I invite my right hon. Friend to visit Matrix SCM at Milton Keynes and see how it is helping local authorities to save an average of 17% on public procurement contracts, increase the number of small and medium-sized enterprises winning those contracts, and speed up the payments process?
Mr Maude
I shall be happy to do that. I know how much support my hon. Friend must have given the company in his constituency. We have opened up procurement, which was being run in a way that, in many cases, froze out SMEs and prevented them from doing work for councils and the Government, but, although we have made some progress, we still have much more to do.
Cabinet Committees List
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(10 years, 11 months ago)
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The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
Today I am publishing an updated Cabinet Committees list. I have placed a copy of the new list in the Libraries of both Houses.
Oral Answers to Questions
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(11 years ago)
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John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)
1. What assessment he has made of current arrangements for disaster planning in the UK; and if he will make a statement.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The primary responsibility for emergency planning sits with local responders. The Cabinet Office works with other Departments, devolved Administrations and emergency responders to enhance the country’s ability to prepare for, respond to and recover from emergencies.
The whole House will want to thank the emergency services, local authorities and the Met Office, who did a brilliant job working together to prepare effectively for and respond to the effects of Monday’s storm.
Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)
In the Minister’s initial response, he praised responders and local authorities. Will he also praise parish councils—those unpaid heroes in many of our communities—which provide emergency responses, and encourage those that do not presently do so to create and implement emergency plans?
Mr Maude
My hon. Friend makes a really good point. A lot of the response needs to be done on an extremely local basis. Many parish councils take this seriously, with volunteers who rise to the occasion superbly—a huge amount of which happened on Sunday and Monday in preparation for and in response to the storm.
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
2. What assessment he has made of the effect on the functioning of government of reductions in the number of senior civil service staff; and if he will make a statement.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
Since April 2010, the number of senior civil servants has reduced by 16% and the senior civil service pay bill has reduced by 20%. Last year, civil servants helped to deliver more than £10 billion in efficiency savings by changing the way in which Whitehall and central Government operate. We are determined to drive even greater value for the taxpayer while continuing to provide exceptional public services.
Kelvin Hopkins
Is not the truth that Government cuts have seen many senior civil servants take early retirement, with an enormous loss of expertise and capacity, with increasing staff churn and work overloads, leading to problems like the west coast main line franchise chaos, delays in replying to Members’ correspondence and much else besides?
Mr Maude
I wish to take this opportunity to praise civil servants for the work that they have done. With a civil service that is significantly smaller than that which we inherited in May 2010, productivity has improved markedly. The civil service is delivering at least as much as it was before, with fewer people. Engagement scores have stayed high, and I want to praise them rather than run down what they do.
Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)
I join my right hon. Friend in commending the senior civil service for operating in the way it does. Does he agree that its capability is not enhanced by the degree of churn in the top jobs in the civil service, and what will the Government do to address that?
Mr Maude
There has been concern over a long period about senior civil servants—and not just senior civil servants—not staying in post long enough. We are seeking to address that, and I know that the leadership of the civil service takes the issue very seriously. One of the effects of moving to fixed tenure for permanent secretaries will, I suspect, be to lengthen the period they stay in post rather than, as some have feared, shorten it.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
Have the Government yet worked out when we will reach the tipping point at which reducing further the number of senior civil servants will not improve the service they provide but will impinge on it?
Mr Maude
As I say, there have been significant reductions. Productivity has improved and we believe that significantly more productivity can be gained. Current departmental plans show a continued reduction in the size of the civil service through to May 2015. We are finding different ways of doing things better with fewer people and at lower cost.
Richard Fuller (Bedford) (Con)
Is it not absolutely right that the effectiveness of public services is more important than the number of civil servants who are employed? What measures is my right hon. Friend taking to measure the productivity of civil servants so they can no longer be a drag on our economy, but enhance it?
Mr Maude
At is best, the civil service is not a drag on the economy; it is an important component of the economy working successfully. The leadership of the civil service identified significant deficiencies in capability, which are now being addressed. Frankly, they had been left unaddressed for far too long. Urgent action is now being taken and we need to drive it through.
Nick de Bois (Enfield North) (Con)
4. What assessment he has made of the work of the National Citizen Service.
Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)
5. What progress his Department has made on the cyber-security programme.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
We have committed an additional £210 million to the national cyber-security programme for 2015-16, underlining our commitment to tackling cyber threats. This year, we have launched the cyber-security information-sharing partnership and increased specialist capability in police forces, and we are currently setting up UKCERT, the national computer emergency response team.
Julian Smith
Following the Snowden leaks in the US, where a contractor working for Booz Allen was able to cause untold damage to US and international intelligence services, what steps is the Minister taking to put in place restrictions on contractors and staff vis-à-vis access to this programme?
Mr Maude
My hon. Friend has taken a close interest in this matter and made some extremely robust and helpful comments. We take contractor security extremely seriously, and following this breach, which took place in the United States, we are obviously redoubling our efforts to ensure that it is as secure as it can be.
Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)
When assessing the leaks from Edward Snowden and the reporting by newspapers, including The Guardian, will the Minister and the Government take clear account of the statement from President Barack Obama last week that some of the activities of the National Security Agency in the US raised legitimate questions for friends and allies?
Mr Maude
I hear what the hon. Gentleman says, but I would just like to make this point about GCHQ: it comprises very, very dedicated, hard-working Crown servants who do incredibly valuable work to protect our safety and security every day of the week, and they deserve solid support from right across the Chamber and from both Front Benches. I hope that that will be made absolutely clear.
Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)
The Government are rightly trying to tighten up on British cyber-security. Does the Minister share my concern that anybody who weakens encryption methods or puts in back doors exposes us all to greater risk?
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
According to the Government’s own figures, 87% of small businesses experienced a cyber-security breach last year and were attacked, on average, 17 times, yet more than four fifths of the Government’s cyber-security budget goes on the intelligence services, big business and government, leaving small businesses and consumers to fend for themselves. Now we learn that the Minister has set up his own wi-fi network in the Cabinet Office to bypass all that expensive security. When will he stand up for small businesses and consumers and get a grip on cyber-security?
Mr Maude
I am glad to say that the most recent rankings of countries in relation to cyber-security had the UK in top position, but we are not at all complacent; much more needs to be done. The hon. Lady is very interested in the wi-fi arrangements in my office, which were installed by the Cabinet Office IT supplier and are fully compliant. We take all this extremely seriously, but the threats are changing all the time and we need to be agile in how we respond to them.
Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)
6. What recent discussions he has held with his ministerial colleagues on the use of the Post Office as a front office for Government services.
Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)
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 services issues, industrial relations strategy in the public sector, Government transparency, civil contingencies, civil society and cyber-security.
Tom Blenkinsop
Last Friday afternoon, the Cabinet Office snuck out details about special advisers, showing that there are more of them and that their cost has risen by more than £1 million last year. At a time when the Government are demanding cuts and claiming that they are necessary, is it right that such profligate spending by the Cabinet Office on special advisers is allowed to go uncontrolled?
Iain Stewart (Milton Keynes South) (Con)
T2. What outcomes does my right hon. Friend hope to see from the Open Government Partnership summit being held in London tomorrow?
Mr Maude
We are looking forward to welcoming to London the representatives of 62 Governments who have chosen to belong to this unique partnership both between Governments and with civil society organisations. Transparency is an idea whose time has come, and we will celebrate the progression of the open data and transparency agenda over these two days.
Michael Dugher (Barnsley East) (Lab)
Last Friday afternoon, the Cabinet Office finally released some information, but the Government failed yet again to release the Prime Minister’s annual Chequers guest list, which has not now been published since July 2011—an interesting definition of “annual”. This follows repeated failures adequately to answer parliamentary questions and freedom of information requests about visits to No. 10 by the Prime Minister’s adviser, Lynton Crosby—despite the Government answering exactly the same questions about other individuals in other Departments. When are the Government going to release this information, including about that cigarette lobbyist running around at the heart of Downing street?
Mr Maude
I am sure that when the hon. Gentleman was in residence in No. 10 Downing street in the last Government—when the degree of transparency was virtually nil—it would never have been disclosed, as it will be, that the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Katy Clark) was at Chequers helping the then Prime Minister to plant a tree.
Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)
T4. This time last year, Ministers announced a radical overhaul of facility time. With Royal Mail, teacher and fire brigade strikes inflicting disruption on the public and with the appalling behaviour of Len McCluskey in Grangemouth, FOI data I have received show that the overall public subsidy from Whitehall to the unions has gone up, not down. What further action is my right hon. Friend taking?
Mr Maude
The events at Grangemouth illustrate the problems that can arise when full-time union officials are paid for by the employer. I am glad to be able to tell my hon. Friend that the number of full-time union officials on the civil service payroll has halved and that the cost has more than halved.
Pamela Nash (Airdrie and Shotts) (Lab)
T3. In response to the question of my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah), the Minister said that he took very seriously the threat of cybercrime to small and medium-sized businesses. However, cybercrime has cost SMEs £800 million in the last year, yet the Government are giving only £5 million to spend on it across the board. What are the Government doing to tackle that problem?
Mr Maude
I accept that awareness of cyber-threats by all businesses is still too low. As the rankings show, the threat is higher in Britain than it is in most countries, but awareness is not good enough and too many businesses have left themselves vulnerable. We are working hard to raise their awareness. My right hon. Friends in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills are leading that work, but there is much more that we can and should do.
Karl MᶜCartney (Lincoln) (Con)
When my right hon. Friend came to office in 2010, what cross-Government work had been done to tackle fraud, error and debt?
Oral Answers to Questions
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(11 years, 2 months ago)
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David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)
1. What progress the Government have made in response to the 2010 report on use of the Government estate.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
We are committed to saving money by, among other things, cutting our occupancy of property in London and elsewhere. We are consolidating into freehold space wherever practical. Since the general election, the central civil estate in London has been reduced by about 22%. Across the country we have cut estate costs by nearly £500 million and we are on track to deliver a further £80 million by the end of the current financial year.
David Mowat
I thank the Minister for that answer. The Smith report identified that 15,000 jobs could be moved from London to the English regions by 2015. That would first of all save money, but also correct the spending imbalance by which London has the highest current spending per head of any English region. Is there more we can do to make swifter progress?
Mr Maude
The Smith recommendations were, so far as I can see, made on an assumption of stable public sector employment. Owing to the size of the public sector deficit that the coalition Government inherited, public sector employment has been falling since then by more than 400,000, and the size of the civil service is down by about 73,000 since the election, so the priority has been to reduce the amount of property we occupy, rather than moving employment from one part of the country to another.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
The problems with finding savings from the Government estate are that many Departments are finding it difficult to surrender leaseholds early and to find private sector businesses to take up surplus accommodation, and are even having problems with selling freeholds because of the state of the property market, meaning that it is very unlikely that the full potential savings of £830 million will be met before 2020.
Mr Maude
I do not think the hon. Gentleman is right on that. Actually, vacant space in the central Government estate is running at about 2.5%, compared with the national average of over 10% across the public and private sectors, so in fact Government Departments and agencies are not finding it impossible to surrender leases—they are doing so very effectively—or to sell properties where that makes sense, although our preference is to occupy the freeholds and get out of the leaseholds.
Mr Hollobone
What does the Minister expect the footprint of the Government estate to be by the end of the present Parliament compared with May 2010?
Mr Maude
Certainly, so far as the central Government estate in London is concerned, it will be down by well over a quarter, but that is only the beginning, because obviously property disposals and vacancies take time, for some of the reasons that the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) just referred to; that cannot be done literally overnight. We have made considerable progress already, however, as it is down by nearly a quarter and there will be much more to come.
Mr Bone
I am glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone) did not have the nerve to suggest that Government should relocate to Kettering, because he knows the place to come to is 50 minutes from London and it is Wellingborough. Will the Minister encourage Departments to move to Wellingborough, especially the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister?
John Robertson (Glasgow North West) (Lab)
2. What steps he is taking to promote public trust in Government statistics.
Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)
11. What steps he is taking to increase information-sharing between Government and businesses on cyber-attacks.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
As part of our £860 million investment in the national cyber-security programme, earlier this year I launched the cyber information-sharing partnership. It provides a secure online and face-to-face environment for Government, law-enforcement agencies and business to share information on cyber-threats and how best to combat them. Already over 150 firms and other organisations have joined, and it is our intention to expand the membership to include SMEs.
Stella Creasy
I thank the Minister for that response. Given the important role that the police will play in helping small businesses tackle cybercrime, can the Minister tell us precisely how much of the £650 million cybercrime budget has been allocated to the police, and how much of it has been spent and on what?
Mr Maude
I cannot give the hon. Lady the exact figures off the top of my head. Obviously a considerable amount is being spent with the law enforcement agencies to combat cybercrime, about which the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) was complaining earlier. This is a very wide-ranging problem. There is a huge issue about awareness in the business community and we are working hard to promote it.
Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (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 Efficiency and Reform Group on the public sector, civil service issues, industrial relations strategy in the public sector, Government transparency, civil contingencies, civil society and cyber-security.
Glyn Davies
Will my right hon. Gentleman give us an update on how he plans to take his very valuable reform forward?
Mr Maude
We are making some progress on civil service reform. It was absolutely essential that we published in July our one-year-on report on progress. The head of the civil service, Sir Bob Kerslake, and I were very forthright in saying that progress had not been as fast as we would have hoped, but we are stepping up the pressure and the pace.
Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)
While there are now rumours of significant concessions, Ministers still need to explain why charities were not consulted before the lobbying Bill was published. Why could not even the junior Minister be bothered to pick up the phone to the Royal British Legion, cancer charities or the National Council for Voluntary Organisations before producing a Bill that will have such a chilling impact on the work of charities?
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
T3. I congratulate my right hon. Friend on the £10 billion- worth of efficiency savings that his Department has made on behalf of the taxpayer in the past year. What ambition does he have for the coming year?
Mr Maude
We hope that those savings will rise to £15 billion in the current year, and potentially to £20 billion the following year, with a further £5 billion, at least, after that. If only the Leader of the Opposition had started to do this when he held my job, perhaps we would not have inherited quite the size of public sector deficit that we did, but I am afraid that he was showing weak leadership even then.
Gregg McClymont (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (Lab)
T2. The Minister’s response to my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Mr Thomas) was to say that she had met charities on Monday. What was she doing all summer while the ramifications of this dog’s breakfast of a lobbying Bill became clear?
Ministerial Pensions
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(11 years, 3 months ago)
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The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The Public Service Pensions Act 2013 abolished separate pension arrangements for future holders of the great offices of state. Future holders of the great offices of state will instead accrue pension in the ministerial pension scheme.
Amendments to allow future holders of the great offices of state to participate in the ministerial pension scheme are therefore required.
These amendments will:
Allow future Lord Chancellors, Prime Ministers and Commons Speakers to remain members of the ministerial pension scheme on appointment.
Allow the current Lord Chancellor to rejoin the ministerial pension scheme for future appointments.
The changes do not affect the current Prime Minister and Speaker.
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 will be laid in the House today, along with a copy of the response to the consultation from the chairman of the parliamentary contributory pension fund trustees.
National Fraud Initiative
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(11 years, 3 months ago)
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The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
I am today announcing that the Cabinet Office intends to take over hosting of the Audit Commission’s National Fraud Initiative (NFI) subject to the passage of the Local Audit and Accountability Bill.
The move to the Cabinet Office will allow the NFI to develop its existing work in line with Government activities to tackle fraud, error and debt. The programme will become part of the fraud, error and debt taskforce. I look forward to working with the NFI’s stakeholders to ensure that it continues to build on its existing success.
Officials in both DCLG and the Cabinet Office will work closely with the Audit Commission to prepare for a potential transition at the appropriate time.
Civil Service Reform
Lord Maude of Horsham Excerpts(11 years, 4 months ago)
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The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
In June 2012 Sir Bob Kerslake and I published the civil service reform plan. Today we are publishing a report on civil service reform one year on.
The plan set out a series of actions which, fully implemented, would deliver a civil service that is smaller, flatter, and faster; more digital, more unified, focused on outcomes not process; more capable, with better performance management; with modern terms and conditions, and more accountable for delivery. Progress in implementing these actions has been mixed.
The civil service today is 15% smaller than in 2010, and productivity is correspondingly higher. Some of the actions in the plan could not have been expected to be complete in 12 months. On others, substantial progress has been achieved. But on too many actions too little of what was set out to be delivered by this point has been fully executed. We are determined that the pace of implementation will now accelerate.
I said in June 2012 that the plan was not the last word in reform. I set out today some further reform actions. We will introduce five-year fixed-term tenure for permanent secretaries. We will enable Ministers in charge of Departments to appoint personally an extended ministerial office (EMO) including career civil servants, civil servants recruited externally on fixed-term appointment (according to Civil Service Commission guidance and subject to the civil service code), and special advisers. IPPR concluded in their report which I published last month that Ministers in Britain received much less direct support than Ministers in countries with systems similar to ours. We will strengthen the corporate leadership of cross-Government functional services, including HR, procurement and commercial, IT and digital, legal and finance. We will make changes to improve further the delivery of major projects.
Fuller details are set out in the “One Year On” report, which I am placing in the Library.