Every new prime minister (particularly those keen to demonstrate they have a radical reforming agenda) looks upon “the machine” of government - the civil service - with its dozens of departments, hundreds of quangos and thousands of civil servants and thinks that it’s ripe for reform.
When you want to show that you’re doing something, changing the machinery of government – usually merging or abolishing departments – is sorely tempting, not least because as prime minister it can be achieved at the stroke of a pen.
However, actually doing something to tackle the big public policy challenges of our generation is, of course, a little more complicated. Clarity of purpose and robust evidence-based policy is what changes people’s lives, but that’s a lot slower.
Ask any civil servant and they’ll tell you a tale of constant reform. Some are, of course, driven by ministers. Austerity challenged the civil service to do more with considerably less. Digital by default, the professionalisation of the service or, indeed, the need to respond to the Brexit referendum – all have challenged the civil service to adapt and reform.
Interestingly, I remember a permanent secretary addressing a group of civil servants and saying how we reform and challenge ourselves not because we are told to by ministers, but because that is what all organisations, and particularly public services, must do.
It was perhaps unsurprising therefore that this prime minister and his team of advisers would, following their astonishing election victory, look to reform the civil service as they face up to the challenges of governing. It was, however, a little surprising that it would essentially be their first big announcement, briefed as ever to the Sunday papers.
When David Cameron became prime minister, he heeded the warning not to reorganise for reorganisation’s sake.
The civil service had been chopped and changed under the Labour years, often for political rather than practical reasons. Countless millions were wasted in merging IT systems, back office functions and pay arrangements, to simply reshuffle the cards a few years later. Ask any football fan and they’ll tell you that success is driven through stability: it’s the same for big organisations.
The civil service is far from perfect, but neither is it the dysfunctional “blob” that some have suggested. Only this year, the International Civil Service Effectiveness Index ranked the UK civil service as top among the 38 countries that were analysed, using 46 different metrics for comparison.
Last year I spoke at a conference on Brexit in Dublin, hosted by our equivalent union in the Irish civil service, AHCPS. Among the speakers was Simon Coveney the Tánaiste, deputy head of Government in Ireland and also their Foreign Minister. We exchanged pleasantries before he spoke and I explained who I was. Just as he was finishing, he ventured from his prepared speech.
“I understand there’s a representative of the British civil service in the room”, he said, proving he hadn’t really been listening to my small talk. He then went on to laud the UK civil service as the best in the world, coping with the conflicting political positions of government and simultaneously preparing for a number of potential Brexit outcomes.
Now this was to a room of Irish civil servants. Know your audience I thought, this isn’t going to go down well – to my surprise they all nodded. It was unremarkable to them to recognise the expertise and professionalism of the UK civil service.
In part, it holds this position because it is a permanent, impartial and professional service. It is no accident that if those who advise ministers can speak truth unto power without fear or favour; if they are appointed for what they can do, not what they believe, then the outcome is going to be a better service.
So, talk of making it easier to hire and fire civil servants and of bringing in greater external expertise is convenient rhetoric when you want to be seen to challenging the orthodoxy, but it’s ultimately self-defeating. Almost every senior civil service post is already open to external competition yet only 15% are filled from the private sector, unsurprising when pay rates are often less than half what they can earn elsewhere.
Experts can already be brought in for fixed periods under exemptions to the civil service code, but permanent civil servants need to be appointed on merit and be able to serve different ministers and governments. The alternative is the chaos we see in the American system, where effectively the entire senior civil service is appointed with each administration, losing vital expertise and institutional memory.
This is not an essay in defence of the status quo, far from it. Every day I witness the frustrations of civil servants with bureaucracy and structures that seem to inhibit, rather than enable, innovation and reform.
My plea to the prime minister and his most special of advisers is this: the civil service is full of talented, committed public servants who will serve your government to the best of their ability.
Understand and recognise the value of what you already have before reaching for the levers of reform. Clarity of objective and robust policy should drive the shape of the organisation that’s needed to deliver it, not the other way around.
If, as you state, you want to be a transformative government, then your ministers must hear the advice they need, not just the advice they want.
Dave Penman is General Secretary of the FDA union.