Government: Savings

Lord Morris of Aberavon Excerpts

Thursday 24th June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sassoon]

I thank the noble Lord for his concern about the costs of bureaucracy in Brussels, about which we, too, are of course very concerned. The Government will be taking steps to make sure that the budget contribution to Europe fully reflects the need for Europe to restrain its costs. So far as concerns Eurocrats, we want to make sure that the best-quality British officials play their part as senior officials in Brussels.

[Lord Morris of Aberavon]

My Lords, what is being done to reduce the number of civil servants of the rank of Permanent Secretary in the Cabinet Office and Downing Street, of whom there are six in number?

[Lord Sassoon]

My Lords, while there are those six Permanent Secretaries in addition to the Permanent Secretaries in each department, we have over 600,000 civil servants in total. The main question is how we reduce the total number of civil servants, which increased by 28,000 under the previous Government.