Ministers must stop “going around beating the civil service up” and blaming officials for policy failures, the new chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has said.
Appearing at a Tony Blair Institute for Global Change event this week, Pat McFadden said, the Labour government intends to create a culture of innovation and “learning as you go” for the civil service. McFadden also outlined how he believed Labour’s close relationship with the civil service would enable its long-term goals to come to fruition.
“You’re not going to drive change through the traditional method of writing a white paper, throwing it over a wall and hoping something happens,” he told journalist Jon Sopel at the “in conversation”-style event.
“You’re going to have to break down some of those barriers between what gets put into practice and what gets created. You’re not going to do it by creating a single national policy, without properly testing stuff on the ground and learning as you go.”
McFadden said this approach will be a marked change from that of the previous government, who he accused of “going around beating the civil service up.”
“There are new ways of policy innovation that have to happen and, frankly, I think it should make being in the civil service a richer, more rewarding experience, rather than being blamed for the failures of ministers,” the Cabinet Office minister said.
McFadden could be referencing any number of incidents over the last few years, from allegations that former justice and home secretaries Dominic Raab and Priti Patel had bullied civil servants, to then-Conservative Party chair Oliver Dowden telling civil servants working from home to “get off your Pelotons and back to work”.
McFadden's comments come the same week that Keir Starmer sent a message to civil servants telling them they have his “confidence, support and respect”.
The prime minister said if the government is to achieve its goals, "it will require a different way of working: one of openness, of collaboration and transparency in everything we do."
'Every government needs its sense of direction'
McFadden used a nautical metaphor to explain the importance of having a strong sense of direction when pushing policies through: “If you’re a ship on the ocean you need to have your engine on, your tiller pointing somewhere, you need to be going somewhere. If you don’t have that you’ll be blown around by the weather, and the weather is always there, the events are always there, you might still be just about floating – but where you’re going is not somewhere you are deciding.”
“Every government needs to have its sense of direction and for us the sense of direction is formed around those five missions. We broke it down, we said we would have six first steps, so we are getting on with that already,” he added.
Creating a “mission-driven government” was an integral part of Labour’s general election campaign. Missions include kickstarting the economy, making Britain a clean energy superpower, tackling serious crime, breaking down barriers to opportunity and building an NHS fit for the future.
Labour’s manifesto set out six steps it would take if it got into government, including cutting NHS waiting times; recruiting 6,500 more teachers; setting up a state-backed energy company called Great British Energy; and creating a Border Security Command, which home secretary Yvette Cooper launched this week.
McFadden said these missions have enabled the new government to hit the ground running by giving secretaries of state clear aims: “When Wes Streeting goes into the Department for Health, the first things he’s trying to do is get going on that first step about the waiting list. When Bridget Phillipson goes into the Department for Education, the first thing she’s trying to do is get started on the teacher recruitment. And the same with Ed Miliband in the Department for Energy [Security] and Net Zero, set up GB energy and so on.”
In its first few days of power, the Labour government has ended the Rwanda scheme, announced ambitious mandatory housing targets, and convened the first gathering of England's metro mayors in No.10.