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The papers have been full of frothy stories and silly stereotypes about the civil service, says Mark Lowcock. This risks distracting us from the real – and very important – challenge of adapting to the tasks at hand

The civil service should be more confident in its ability to deal with the challenges facing it, Department for International Development permanent secretary Mark Lowcock has said in an article for CSW.

Suppliers are interested in low-carbon goods and services, but doubts over demand limit investment. Becky Slack examines carbon compacts, which demonstrate that customers really are hungry for eco-friendly supplies

Legal Services Commission chief Matthew Coats has a reputation for carrying problematic services through political storms. Matt Ross asks him about organisational reform, service quality – and the looming cuts to legal aid

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CBI director-general John Cridland writes (CSW p4, 12 April 2012) that the government has made little progress with its public service reforms over the past nine months. Those working in health and education witnessing major changes being pushed through might beg to differ, as might the civil servants trying to make sense of proposals from ministers for the ‘right to challenge’, ‘right to provide’ and now the ‘right to choose’.

Under Labour, the Cabinet Office reviewed departments’ capabilities – but these days, departments examine their own performance before producing Capability Action Plans. Ben Willis sets out their findings, warts and all

A council worker tries to stay positive despite continued uncertainty

As the government prepares its civil service reform plans, CSW has carried out a major survey of civil servants – testing views both on how Whitehall is changing, and how it should change. Joshua Chambers reports.

The government’s online safety initiative, Get Safe Online, is to receive a further £400,000 of funding in a bid to improve the UK’s knowledge of cyber-security threats.

The government’s civil service reform plan will increase the “corporate management” of the senior civil service and allow departments to better understand the abilities of employees in other organisations when recruiting, Sir Bob Kerslake, head of the civil service, has told CSW.

Civil servants in the Department of Health (DH) have raised concerns over its approach to policymaking, its risk-assessment skills and its effectiveness at consulting stakeholders, an exclusive opinion poll for CSW has found.

Dave Penman, the current deputy general secretary of the FDA, will become the trade union’s next general secretary later this year, it was announced yesterday.

The coalition promises more public contracts for small businesses – but we’ve heard this language before, without seeing much in the way of results. Becky Slack meets the man tasked with turning rhetoric into reality

Roy F. Baumeister and John Tierney

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Royal Hospital, Chelsea, London

It's the UK’s only way out of the ‘energy trilemma’, says David Handley.

Andrew Manley, chief executive of the Defence Infrastructure Organisation, looks after the MoD’s £23bn estate – and he’s pushing through one of the most ambitious reform programmes in government. Matt Ross meets him

The chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee has been impressed by the FCO’s work, and applauds many of the coalition’s foreign policies. But he tells Joshua Chambers that the cuts risk damaging our overseas capabilities

The MoD reforms make sense; the carrier cuts do not

The legal clock is ticking for the government, as ministers must decide next week whether to release the NHS transition risk register or appeal again against the Information Tribunal’s decision that it should be published.

The Northern Ireland Civil Service (NICS) is in competition with ministers’ special advisers, friends, think tanks and other groups, NICS permanent secretary Malcolm McKibbin has said, and must demonstrate to politicians that its advice is the highest quality if ministers “are to properly value our information and our service.”

The Cabinet Office has scaled back plans for a ‘Giving Summit’ due to fears that the event will be hijacked by debate over the income tax relief cap.

The Department for International Development (DfID) has the greatest capability to meet its delivery challenges while the Department of Health (DH) is least well-equipped to do so, the latest round of capability reviews suggest.