Analysis

Britain is not ready to cope with its ageing society – and government should say more on the subject, argues Lord Geoffrey Filkin, chairman of the Lords Committee on Public Service and Demographic Change.

Number 10’s briefing against Sir Bob Kerslake was motivated by a desire to speed up civil service reform – but in the short term, at least, publicly undermining the civil service chief is likely to achieve just the opposite.

America’s fracking revolution has driven down energy prices and given the economy a boost – but could the same happen here? CSW asked the Institute of Directors’ Corin Taylor and energy expert Professor Jim Watson of the University of Sussex to address the question: will fracking be good for the UK?

Improve IT, HR and training – and policy delivery will benefit

Benjamin Franklin once spoke of the perils of sacrificing precious liberty for a little temporary security. His words have a powerful resonance following the saga of state surveillance exposed in recent weeks.

Intelligence agencies’ tools must be updated, not expanded

One man’s honest discussion is another’s backstreet mugging

Allowing ministers a greater say in appointing civil servants will not help to strengthen accountability, argues Dave Penman

Just follow the patented Department of Health HR manual

Search for ‘PFI’ online and you’ll soon conclude that it is desperately in need of a PR makeover. So it was unsurprising when, in November 2011, the chancellor announced a fundamental reassessment of PFI. The result of that exercise is PF2.

A promising model requires evidence and caution.

Let’s hope ministers don’t put it to their blind eye

Community budgets may be overtaken by their big brothers

Private offices should be boosted by letting secretaries of state recruit experienced policy and implementation advisers, says Akash Paun

Many civil servants work in the government analogue service

It’s not clear that the MoJ is ready for its next big challenge

There is a new dynamic in the relationship between select committees and government departments. The Wright reforms agreed in 2010 – including the election of committee chairs by the House, and of committee members by their parties – have changed the way committees work and what they expect of their departments, while the public profiles of committees have been raised.

Civil Service Learning is struggling to reverse a terrible trend.

The annual drama of the Budget is a dysfunctional relic and should be scrapped, says Julian McCrae. Ministers and civil servants have bigger – and more nourishing – fish to fry.

The Civil Service Commission can help civil servants flag complaints about breaches of the Civil Service Code. First civil service commissioner, Sir David Normington, explains how his organisation has just launched an 'Open Week' to encourage civil servants to ask questions and engage with them:

Ministers & officials must also put those lessons into practice.

On February 21, a seminar was held in the Foreign Office to mark the publication of a book by the head of the FCO Historical Section, Gill Bennett, called ‘Six Moments of Crisis’. The book discusses six major foreign policy decisions taken since the Second World War. These were the decision to send British troops to Korea in 1950; the Suez invasion; the first application to join the European Economic Community; the withdrawal of British forces from East of Suez; the expulsion of 109 Soviet diplomats; and the sending of the Task Force to recover the Falklands.