Oral Answers to Questions

Rehman Chishti Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Oliver Colvile (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Con)]

1. What steps the Government are taking to ensure that people from all social backgrounds can progress in the civil service.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

2. What steps the Government are taking to ensure that people from all social backgrounds can progress in the civil service.

[The Minister for Civil Society (Mr Rob Wilson)]

We want to ensure that the civil service is fully representative of the nation it serves and benefits from the widest pool of talent in our communities and from every part of Britain. We have made considerable strides to increase diversity already, and we will shortly publish our strategy for social mobility, in which we will set out how we will further increase social diversity in the civil service.

[Mr Wilson]

My hon. Friend reminds us that there is big talent in Plymouth, and we want to make the most of it. Over this Parliament, as part of our broader commitment to 200,000 apprentices across the public sector, we will invest in more than 30,000 new civil service apprenticeships, which will offer a range of rewarding opportunities for people without university degrees, including opportunities already available in Devon and Cornwall. I am delighted to say that I have an apprentice in my private office. I hope that one of our apprentices will one day be Cabinet Secretary—and if that person is from Plymouth, so much the better.

[Rehman Chishti]

I welcome the news that the Government have recently introduced name-blind recruitment across the civil service. What are they doing to prevent unconscious bias at later stages of the process?

[Mr Wilson]

Name-blind recruitment has been implemented in 75% of the civil service. We are working with other major workforces across the public sector further to embed name-blind recruitment. In addition, all civil service recruiters are required to undertake mandatory training to avoid unconscious bias before they embark on any recruitment exercise, and this includes panel members involved in sift and interview for fast stream apprenticeship schemes and executive recruitment.