Richard Fuller
Main Page: Richard Fuller (Conservative - North Bedfordshire)Department Debates - View all Richard Fuller's debates with the HM Treasury
(2 days, 4 hours ago)
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Richard Fuller (North Bedfordshire) (Con)
Improving public sector productivity was the No.1 ask of Institute of Directors’ businesses trying to weather Storm Rachel, but under Labour, public sector productivity has fallen further behind pre-pandemic levels. The number of civil servants working from home has gone up and, shockingly, as The Daily Telegraph has found, thousands of civil servants are being signed off to work from abroad. Therefore, whether it is on civil servants working from their bedrooms or from Benidorm, or on other blockers of public sector productivity, what has the Chief Secretary to the Treasury actually done in his last eight months in office, or is he too comfortable with what the Prime Minister calls
“the tepid bath of managed decline”?
Darren Jones
I thank the hon. Member for his question. My No. 1 ask is that he has another go at making better jokes in future. To answer the substance of his question, I agree with him that the state is not productive enough on a whole range of issues. He talks about civil service headcount, about Government offices and locations, and about working conditions. He could also talk about digital transformation. Frankly, we have an enormous amount of work to do, which will become evident through our spending review. It is something that is being taken very seriously not just by the Treasury, but from the Prime Minister downwards. I look forward to his reflecting on what we suggest is the answer to 14 years of failure from his party when it was in government.