Public sector service productivity has collapsed 7.5% 2020-23. This is without precedent and means taxpayers need to pay more than ÂŁ30bn a year extra for their services, with all the extra costs of inflation on top of that. No wonder public spending is so high.
In an extreme case the Post Office, a nationalised industry, admits it wrongly prosecuted hundreds of its own staff and took money from them for losses they had not made. 25 years on from the start of these errors it has still not even repaid the money it wrongly took from them in many cases, let alone paid them the compensation they are due.
In some NHS hospitals there have been bad cases of failure to provide essential care in the form of drinks, food and help to the bathroom. There have been deaths that should not have occurred. In the worst case a nurse murdered babies in the care of her ward.
In some areas schools fail to provide a decent education for young people and see too many youths give up or drop out of school with no qualifications. The NHS waiting lists are very long, but apparently the large numbers of administrators cannot vouch there is no double counting, wrongful recording or people on the lists who no longer need a consultation or treatment
Ask the Opposition parties about this and they usually say it is all down to a lack of money. This is despite record levels of funding and big recruitment drives for extra staff. Where the bad news comes from devolved government in Wales and Scotland, or from Labour and Lib Dem Councils they still usually claim it is a lack of funding and demand bigger increases from government.
Many of the things that are wrong including the fall in productivity come down to bad management. A growing army of CEOs and top management on six figure packages has allowed productivity to fall badly, and in some cases has allowed standards and quality to drop alarmingly. In future blogs I will look at the duties and powers of political leaders and of the senior executives to put this right. What should we expect of public sector CEOs?
January 28, 2024
Does anything work in this country ? The Civil Service are lazy and obstructive. The NHS is incompetently managed. The Bank of England is reactive not proactive . The police are found wanting by not responding to calls and not even bothering with drugs, burglary, knives . Our roads ar congested . The Royal Mail is short of workers but we have 1.4million people on the dole
January 28, 2024
The navy does not have enough support vessels to make the 2 carriers effective; nor enough staff and are farting about with Diversity & Inclusivity instead of getting on with defending us.It lacks sufficient armament to be efficient . The army does not have sufficient materiel nor the RAF
January 28, 2024
Well the RAF actually had an active policy of huge discrimination against white, male applicants. So why would any want to apply to such an evil organisation, even if you got in you would likely be discriminated against further down steam. Why would we want pilots selected not on ability but on gender or skin shade?
January 28, 2024
LL,
Moreover why would you risk the ultimate sacrifice or life changing injury for a govt who actively acts against its own population in preference for foreigners and alien cultures! Vets on the streets. I.legal immigrants given 4 star accommodation, jobs to under cut British workers, allowed home for Christmas and never deported!! 17300 missing without knowing what danger they present to us or our way of life!!
JRs party gave away N.Ireland, border down Irish Sea and checks goods from one part of our country to another. The DUP MPs trying to defend and uphold remaining in UK rather than a EU vassal state had pay cut, coerced, bullied and now Sunak threatens to bypass legislation and change Good Friday Agreement to bypass them to get Stormont up and running! Trecherous, traitorous behaviour does not even begin to describe his EU Windsor sell out against what the nation voted for. Sunak now expects people to risk their lives for him and country! Go fck yourself springs to mind.
January 28, 2024
Much truth in this.
January 28, 2024
You’ve had 14 years to sort this mess out. Left wing activist in all sectors of public service. Failure rewarded with honours, a revolving door is sincerest.
A bit late now, the legacy parties all think more money is the answer when a slim down and forceful management is required.
We’re being let down badly.
January 28, 2024
Yes butâŠI keep forgetting too.
There arenât a whole lot of conservatives in the Tory party.
It has been captured by (LibDem/ lefty entryists)
Remember Cameronâs âTurnip Talibanâ remarks and Mayâs denigration of HER OWN PARTY as The âNasty Partyâ?
Talk about ushering in the wolves dressed up like sheep!
January 28, 2024
Portillo has it right today JRâs party will be gone for a generation not one term. Why would anyone vote for such treacherous people who deliberately act against their own mandate, their people, their way of life and insult them for good measure!!
January 28, 2024
There is no competition to provide most of these public services, so there is no incentive or need to improve productivity. Instead they are dominated by the producer interest, as is the norm for monopolies. The problem is compounded by the political class seeking to buy votes by promising more and more “free” services. The system and the financial burdens it imposed are unsustainable. Only a political revolution generated outside the current political parties who inhabit Parliament will be able to dismantle the current ramshackle structure and rebuild something much smaller that has a chance of actually being affordable.
January 28, 2024
David, the obvious missing element in your list is the Conservative party which has been running this country for the last 13 and more years. I admire Mr Redwood’s brass neck, writing every day about terrible everything is, as if his party had nothing to do with it
January 29, 2024
Indeed. There are many Tories on here that do point that out to him. Every day.
January 28, 2024
Does anything work in this Country you asked?
I racked my brains. What do I think works in this Country.
I get fresh drinking water out of my tap every day and my toilet flushes waste away for treatment.
I can buy food whenever I want to often 24 hours per day, I am satisfied with the choices available including from small friendly businesses and farmers. I can order something on the internet at 7pm at night and it is delivered next day! Clothes are much more affordable than they were when I was in my twenties. TVs and white goods are more affordable now.
My local electricity and gas service hasnât let us down (although gas servicing went through a bad time after covid).
The street lights are on although much dimmer.
The refuelling garages are good with little shops now in most of them and air pressure gauges and air for the tyres.
My internet and broadband is good. I love all the technological improvements in mobile phones, desktop computers and iPads. Programming has improved technology at work.
Iâm content with Amazon Prime and Netflix streaming works to suit the needs of the people to watch when they want to.
January 28, 2024
AND my MP lets me whinge on and on using his website….think back in time….which of our elected MPs would ever have allowed pretty open discussion about failings in Government and his soon to be ex-colleagues?
Credit where its due – which countries have pretty free media to lamblast most things except our late Queen, which I agreed with but want open hunting season on the rest of the Firm.
Try living in China, Russia, N.Korea, and worrying that even a slight glance at somebody or a Police officer in USA might get you shot. S.America could get you kidnapped or one of the family, and in Italy you better not insult iL Papa or the Family.
January 28, 2024
and as for followers of the Prophet, may blessings be upon him.
January 28, 2024
hear hear …..and thats why we should fight every day for out freedoms and check our MPs when they give them away so easierly
January 28, 2024
They’re all provided by the private sector?
January 28, 2024
Donna
Exactly
January 28, 2024
What should we expect of public sector CEOs? Very little of any value it seems. But what do they care it is not their money. They are as happy building new roads or the worthless NHS as they are blocking existing roads so long as they are well paid and pensioned. It is politicians and ministers job to get them to perform and deliver value to the public – but they invariably fail or often do not even try.
January 28, 2024
Government is as usual the problem, the more we have (beyond the basics of law snd order & defence) the worse things get. The Conservative and Labour since Thatcher left have given us ever more government, ever more tax, ever more public debt and dire and declining public services too. Even Thatcher failed to cut it very much.
So much of what government does actually delivers negative value – net zero, HS2, the Millennium Dome, the lockdowns, the Covid 19 virus lab development, the coerced net harm lockdowns, the hige net harm coerced Covid vaccines, the EU membership, the endless misdirected red tape, over restrictive planning, open door low skilled subsidised immigration âŠ
https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/uploads/documents/friedman-government-problem-1993.pdf
January 28, 2024
Correct, yet it was Thatcher who galvanized them. She encouraged the public sector to behave like businesses. Businesses of course only survive if they can tout for more business.
January 28, 2024
In the private sector businesses only survive if they make a profit. The public sector does not have to do this, hence the lack of productivity.
January 28, 2024
Your answer betrays the real issue.
Why is anyone in the public sector a CEO? Public sector behaving like the private sector was the catalyst for today’s mayhem.
January 29, 2024
Someone appears to have appropriated my name and is posting comments which I would never make.
January 28, 2024
In five years most public service administration jobs will be undertaken by AI robots. This will save the taxpayer ÂŁbillions, dramatically improve the quality of services, free up cash for front-line provision and the personel whose jobs will become redundant will be free to start their own leisure businesses.
This will result in a huge uplift to the economy. AI technology will make a huge difference to efficiency, productivity and scientific discovery.
January 28, 2024
If it damages Labour and the unions control of the public sector then AI won’t be allowed to happen, fact
You fail to understand one thing, Labour and the Tories only give a shit about themselves, that is also a fact.
January 28, 2024
S G sees huge pie in the sky.
January 28, 2024
“This will save…”, “… dramatically improve…”, “… free up cash…”, “… result in a huge uplift to the economy…”
Yeah, right.
January 28, 2024
Nice idea.
But…
Could this explain the scaremongering coming out of so many governmental establishments over this matter?
Mefears they are seeking ways in which to suppress AI – for their own protection whilst pretending otherwise!
January 28, 2024
Sakara Gold
I wish I had your confidence in AI. Experience with the Post Office and many other computer systems suggests shit in shit out is the ultimate result. Have you ever tried communicating with a corporate computer.
January 28, 2024
remove the last word at end of your first paragraph. Add ‘until the money runs out.’.
January 28, 2024
Do you seriously expect the Government to procure AI robots which work? Look at their track record with technology:
Horizon – ÂŁbillions wasted and hundred of lives ruined because of a system which (they knew) had glitches
The NHS record system – cost ÂŁ10 billion and didn’t work
January 28, 2024
Oh! Dear me Goldie , you do talk some rubbish at time. So called ai is just a fingers crossed move in computer manipulation and will still be rubbish in/ rubbish out! It could even be worse as unlike humans it will not know when its wrong.
January 28, 2024
It will not work like that they will all stay on and use thia new tech as well to find even more pointless or damaging things to do to harm or tax the public further
January 28, 2024
These are just new tools that the State and State-sector will use to further live off the backs of the productive. Rather like ULEZ, & bus lane cameras and number plate recognition computers.
January 28, 2024
They already have AI that could help the railways, digital ticket machines and tap in cards were available years ago but the unions stymy progress to protect lower grade jobs. How do you think this can ever be squared and resolved, in the last ten years progress hasnât been achieved, the Elizabeth Line could have been driverless. You donât hear about those staff saying to themselves I know Iâll train to be a yoga instructor!!
January 28, 2024
SG :
I think the Post Office scandal shows us the future if we rely upon AI.
January 28, 2024
They seem to have beaten a hasty retreat from the idea that AI will fight their wars for them.
Back to the notion that mass slaughter in trenches is pretty effective in every way.
RecruitâŠreduce populationâŠlay wasteâŠclean up!
Lovely Jubbly!
Trouble isâŠwhen they gave away our country they didnât realise that it might not exactly help errrâŠpatriotism!
January 28, 2024
It will also bring improvements in deep mining, fracking and sea bed oil drilling. Bring it on.
January 28, 2024
SG
And when these Automatic programmes fail, and they enevitably will in some form or another, who is going to correct them and get it all back on track, be careful what you wish for, Example Post Office.
January 28, 2024
I like your confidenece SG. I spent a lifetime working in the IT Industry and was closely involved with several attempts by Government to “computerise” – including our hapless NHS. I’m afraid they cannot connect the dots together, let alone decide what shape, size and colour those dots should be. I’m sure I read something recently about some Government Department experimenting with AI and they were surprised when it started speaking French back at them. Perhaps the AI detected a strong EU bias in their data ?
January 28, 2024
Let us hope and pray these AI robots will be better trained to do their work than the Horizon software. Especially as even those who write the programmes to train the robots do not really understand how they get to their answers.
January 28, 2024
yes we were going to have clean rivers, cheap electricity, much better housing, wonderful medicare, smaller school classes, better jobs, more leisure time (the unemployed millions get that already), readily available fish suppers, better transport, safer roads( nobody knew about Smart motorways then), proper racial integration, safer neighbourhoods, pride in our policing, international respect for our justice system……
January 28, 2024
MT, there are smaller class sizes than those when I was at school, they also have teaching assistants that my schools never had and SEN additional teacherâs helpers. Children are now at school until they are 18 years of age. There are more hours of free nursery provided (itâs not enough for many working Mums who have to go back to work when the baby is 12 months old to pay the mortgage).
The others I agree with you.
January 29, 2024
Smaller class sizes now are as a result of a) kids not turning up, b) more steaming and more subjects.
I never heard of teaching assistants in secondary schools?
Class sizes were bigger, granted when I was at primary school, but that was quite a lot of decades ago!
January 30, 2024
“14% of the secondary school workforce. The number of full-time equivalent TAs has more than trebled since 2000, from 79,000 to 262,800” source Education Endowment Foundation.
MT is there a big problem with absenteeism in primary education or mainly in secondary education?
“In England data from the Department for Education, published in June 2023, shows there are 468,371 teachers, of which 83 per cent (388,929) are female. 221,300 teachers work in nurseries and primary schools. 216,000 in secondary schools. 27,100 in special schools or pupil referral units.18 Jan 2024” TES
I agree that having so many more subjects often causes smaller class sizes, but form classes are also smaller; there is a much richer and more varied curriculum now than in the 1970s. In London, it is reported today there aren’t enough schoolchildren for the schools there, and several are under threat of removal.
January 28, 2024
Employ Fujitsu to sort it for us?
January 28, 2024
We already have a body that is supposed to check that public money is managed efficiently: the Public Accounts Committee. It’s made up of 16 cross-party MPs, and its role is described by its government website as: ‘This Committee scrutinises the value for moneyâthe economy, efficiency and effectivenessâof public spending.’ That sounds fine to me. Maybe public sector CEOs should have to report to it regularly on how they are improving productivity and cutting out waste in their sector.
This HoC committee looks as if it’s doing some good work. Most recently, it reported that: ‘Government is unable to demonstrate value for money across billions of taxpayer pounds of public procurement…. due to significant issues with the quality and completeness of data on contracts.’
Perhaps, then, the efficiency drive should start with civil servants in the Cabinet Office.
January 28, 2024
Indeed, but might these organisations not embelish somewhat & lie to committees and ministers on an industrial scale as Sir Ed Davey said:- âThe Post Office was lying on industrial scale to me and other ministers’. What did he expect and why did he not listen to both sides and investigate. Is this man really intending to stay on until the election? I trust the people of Kingston and Surbiton will kick him out?
How are the NHS & MPs getting on finding the causes of the excess deaths (mainly cardio vascular related) must be over 100,000 now. Are their brilliant âexpertsâ still blaming them on low statin uptake or NHS delays! Another good podcast from Dr John Campbell with Mirriam Cates MP and others.
January 28, 2024
Alex Berhart MP said some very silly things on Question Time this week he even blamed the ever larger NHS waiting lists on Covid. Actually Covid has reduced NHS demand by bringing forwards so many deaths of the elderly. The Vaccines and the NHS lockdown and delays however have done the reverse. Government to blame. He even pretended the government were hit by high interest rates (Sunak as Chancellor, lockdowns, QE and Bailey caused them, doing well on bringing crime down and Sunak was doing a good job. No one in the audience thought so.
Some good sense from Konstantin Kisin though.
January 28, 2024
The CEOs could just point to the latest round of legislation piled on them, which shows they need more people to administer.
January 29, 2024
Fair point, Dave A. And it’s MPs that pass that legislation. When it wasn’t the EU, of course.
January 28, 2024
Alex Burghart MP even said Sunak was doing âan incredibly good job under difficult circumstancesâ. I assume the difficulties are a party stuffed with net zero, woke, open door to immigration, tax to death socialist MPs. This and the vast economic damage done to the country though lockdowns, Net Zero, the vast government waste, QE, the net harm vaccines, the extremely high tax levels and massive over regulation of almost everthing.
January 28, 2024
Good point Hat man. How many people are paid to feed information back to that committee.
January 28, 2024
The public service exists to serve the public consumer, so:
SUGGESTION:
Allocate ÂŁ100k for each needed public sector CEO into one pot.
Assign 10,000 members of the public to rate each of their performance between 1 and 10.
Adjust each CEOâs income for the year to match the value of their scores.
Then the best receive the most at the expense of the worst, who may receive nothing and be dumped.
January 28, 2024
bet it won’t catch on!
January 28, 2024
Yes, you’re right. It won’t. Nor would anything that might work be likely to be considered.
January 28, 2024
Public sector productivity was very low and unacceptable before 2020. I suspect (more than that, know from experience in dealing with public sector bodies) much of the further deterioration since then has been due to allowing staff to ‘work from home’ which is both usually unsupervised and usually easy to cheat on in terms of hours actually worked and also productivity.
I don’t share John Redwood’s belief that in the real world this can be cured by Ministers – the fact of the matter is that most Ministers don’t have John Redwood’s intellectual and commercial ability nor even his energy (nor indeed generally do the Chief Executive Officers on six figure salaries). Realistically it is not a matter of better management personnel as there is no pool of highly talented people available (and if there were any such pool they would either be working at many times the pay in the private sector, or better still running their own businesses). It is systemic change that is the only solution, minimising the public sector, discarding the inessential and even the unachievable objectives within it and so far as one can operationally privatising the rest so as to provide some genuine competition and some real financial discipline.
January 28, 2024
So much of what they âproduceâ does vast positive harm anyway so more productivity might do even more harm. Can we at least fire these sections now?
January 28, 2024
Agreed. Useless politicos have high opinions of themselves and on every occupation, although no experience. They’re all working from home and delivering didly squat and no action by Managers/ politicos. No dangle bits or courage to take remedial action. MOD anyone?
January 28, 2024
The authoritarian Left now control this nation and its public sector institutions because your party found it easier to remain silent and complicit rather than confront the Left’s Gramsci-inspired takeover and fight back against it. You also pass oppressive speech laws against to silence your own supporter’s criticism of the authoritarian Left. How low can you go than that?
The Tory party must be extinguished before it destroys our nation
January 28, 2024
How about âŠ
â Corporal Johnson reporting for duty, Sah!â
Complete with Benny Hill salute?
Blatant propaganda and manipulation.
Your country need YOUâŠ
Oh excuse me âŠI thought it hated us!
January 28, 2024
Agreed. Non Equality laws ensure useless candidates succeed and then race laws etc prevent any free speech dissenting voices. The Tory’s not only done nothing about it but added to the problems. Tory’s are the problem, not the solution. Reform.
January 28, 2024
SJR says there’s bad management, there is. But so much of management seems to concentrate on the wrong things, such as diversity, and all the other politically correct nonsense. The public sector is too heavily staffed with the wrong people – and the wrong work ethic. Until that changes, productivity and efficiency will not improve.
January 28, 2024
Sharon, in three lines you put your finger in exactly the right place
Wrong people and wrong work ethic.
Time now for a big change!
January 28, 2024
Having retired I went to work in a local Council. I resigned as soon as I could. There is no work ethic, just PC woke avoid decisions, kick any can down the road and keep your head down. DEPRESSING!
January 28, 2024
100% agree.
You canât have productivity if you have EDI ( or whatever they call the rubbish).
And when working I always noticed how otherwise dim people were promoted on the strength of their ability to make all the utter cr*p into their âthingâ. ( Ah, yes! Useful idiots!)
They could not do the simplest maths, speak grammatically or get things done but they knew all the latest ridiculous buzz words.
And they just LOVED courses and being put up in good hotels.
And without exception they were whizzes with the whiteboard presentations ( aka gobbledygook)
A colleague once remarked of the batty nonsenseâŠ
â THIS is the job nowâ
But it donât butter no productivity parsnips!
January 28, 2024
07.21
If the debate is desultory, could it just be a reflection of public service thinking. As is said “Fish rot from the head down”. It starts in Parliament, runs into Cabinet and becomes endemic throughout the public service. We experience daily the broken infrastructure of the UK.
The degredation is such that were I to be running the next incoming government I would declare a “State of Emergency”, akin to a state of war. Cabinet would comprise only those who had experience of successfully running something in the private sector. A lack of them would be made up with outsiders who had, replicating Boris’s decision in running the Covid vaccination programme. The civil service would be shrunk by two thirds to those prepared to sign up to a new form of hire and fire contract. Those in the private sector tasked with running public services, such as water supply, would be told to shape up to their responsibilities or face sequestration. Accommodation of a punative EU would end, specifically in respect of Northern Ireland. The right to protest would end at least until the war was over.
One of the brighter stars in education, based on results not dogma or PC, Katherine Birbalsingh, would find herself in charge of state education with the power to make things happen, and the search would be on to find others of excellence in other fields.
Some will say this cannot happen in a democracy, but it did in 1940 ending in the democracy you enjoy today. Personal freedom without responsibility has been taken to such a degree that you can witness at every level of public service and smell the rotting fish.
January 28, 2024
For starters drastically reduce the number of NHS trusts . Which will mean a natural reduction to overpaid CEOs & senior managers. Ensure all have the same KPIs to deliver. To include the removal of Diversity managers & teams.Then annually publish their successes & failures in the media. Accountability is the answer to increase productivity levels not just in NHS but across all public services.
January 28, 2024
Absurd idea. How will that make my local trust hospital more efficient?
January 28, 2024
Well government has the ultimate control over these things. The failure of this government will no doubt be continued and compounded by Labour, which will test it to destruction. Ultimately we used to rely on Conservatives to right the ship. No longer. In the words of Roy Orbison, It’s over.
January 28, 2024
Why has the Government not held Simon Case, Head of the Civil Service, to account for the collapse in Civil Service productivity? Why is he still in his post?
Why has the Government not held Nick Read, currently CEO of the Post Office, to account for the failures of the Post Office – or his predecessors? Why is he still in his post?
Why has the Government not held Amanda Pritchard, CEO of the NHS in England, to account for the failures of the NHS? Why is she still in her post?
Why has the Government allowed and encouraged an explosion in Managers and Administrators, particularly in the Diversity, Equality and Inclusion “woke-fest” which has taken over the public sector and large parts of the private sector?
Ronald Reagan had a sign on his desk which said “the buck stops here.” Why doesn’t Sunak? The Not-a-Conservative-Party has had 14 years ….. and they’ve done NOTHING to reverse Blair’s politicisation of the public sector; nothing to reduce the Quangocracy; nothing to try and promote, let alone deliver, conservative policies to the electorate.
January 28, 2024
Truman rather than Reagan surely?
January 28, 2024
Reagan had a sign saying ‘ Ensure Nancy is right next to my ear’
January 28, 2024
Very well said Donna. The PM presides over failure, he is not stupid, he must like it.
January 28, 2024
Yes but….
Clearly your party members who have become MPs and then ministers have had no belief, interest, or ability to stop the country in the past decade or more from getting into the desperate position of almost total failure it is now in. I don’t believe the Labour party will do anything when they get in, so the problem solving action is urgent now.
Everywhere you look our nation is collapsing. Our PM cannot understand what to do because he is not from here, his Cabinet are creeps and the overwhelming majority of MPs are cowardly too.
England needs a dictatorial leader who is a true Conservative, but we won’t get one.
Answer – Leave the country. England mainly is being taken over by immigrants who have no interest in changing, far too many bringing their crime, cultural and religious demands, each of which is unpunished or unchallenged by most in authority and since our administration, national and local is corrupted by the political Left we are lost unless someone who wants to protect our culture and history, and is brave takes charge.
January 28, 2024
@ The PrangWizard “Answer â Leave the country” – for where? Where is the happy land, far far away?
January 28, 2024
I’d go to the USA. I know it a little as one of my daughters lives there with her family. It with its people is far more open.
January 28, 2024
@The Prangwizard. – I to get to the USA regularly, as I have family there also. It is more relaxing and chilled out compared to here. Even the likes of Chicago, with its media reputation which I have never found to be true makes London look like a third world ghetto, Clean tidy organised
Low taxes, cheap cost of living and energy prices half of the UKs what’s not to like
January 30, 2024
Prangwizard isn’t the States having a similar meltdown of political correctness, diversity training and hires, and out-of-control immigration?
Half the population disagrees with the other half, total opposites; some Cities are completely crime-ridden, and they want to stop police forces! America’s religious demands are even more extreme.
January 28, 2024
I should also have mentioned moral corruption, endemic now. Those who we thought and would in the past have might have stopped it are corrupt themselves. Those who try are eliminated.
January 28, 2024
Public sector is a very broad definition and is also either sainted or pejorative depending upon where you stand in the debate.
I would suggest breaking those productivity figures down into constituent parts. I suspect education has not decreased in productivity and I will wager that policing with its focus on hate crime and diversity is not recording productivity drops.
By breaking the figure down we can see if working from home is a factor or if it is our management or targetting.
January 30, 2024
NS, I would like to see productivity broken down into regions and activities.
I think Education will have decreased productivity. They often teach smaller classes now than they used to and have teacher assistants. They teach children for more years and more subjects, at my school, there was a limited number of subjects. There are rules for the number of face-to-face hours teachers work, with time off (half a day a week for marking).
January 28, 2024
It would help if we saw credible candidates running for office. In the last local councillor election in our area I couldn’t identify anyone worth voting for. When the only people putting themselves up for election are left-wing activists it’s not surprising government drifts to the left. These people have no concept of business principles and are only in it to push their own agenda.
As Mr. Berg says above, anyone who would make a good candidate for local or national government is already engaged in his own successful business and doesn’t have the time to run for office. Remember Jotham’s parable (Judges 9 vs 7-15), written so long ago yet so up to date.
January 28, 2024
We need a few dozen more like Lineker and Neville, they have opinions about everything and are convinced they have the answers.
January 28, 2024
We should expect public sector CEOs to be highly competent and more than capable of doing their jobs, chosen purely on merit, regardless of sex or skin colour, but above that, we should expect their political masters to be willing to, and capable of, ensuring that this is the case, and failures, or misfits, are weeded out and replaced. Ministers should not allow incompetence or the existence of private agendas in their departments, and in my view this is more than half the problem.
January 28, 2024
People say you canât have competition within the public sector but you can. Each passport office has a turnover paid for by passport buyers, which office is the most efficient, which turns a profit because at those fees they should be.
Hospital trusts – I do not believe that every single trust is failing. I know there are successful hospitals out there, dragged down by reports of the worst. Instead of giving bulk numbers all the time that seem too big for people to comprehend then break them down. The failing trusts are they too big, do they need separating out, what is the most manageable size if theyâre not making cost savings from the sheer size of them then cut them in half. Compare one half to the other. If I worked in a successful part of the NHS I would be so frustrated that I were lumped in with the rest. Not all GP practices are failing, some have too many patients for the numbers of GP âHoursâ why are they allowed to get that big if they donât see people when required and donât pay sufficient skilled staff for the per person amount they receive?
It seems the monopoly industries unionised workforce is working to bring your government down and they think their reputations can be recovered with an immaculate recovery when their paymaster takes over.
January 28, 2024
Ministers get deposed if they attempt any supervision of the Civil Service nowadays.
Vis Raab and Patel.
January 28, 2024
Read Sir Geoff Mulgans recent article in the DT. Starts with inexperienced untrained ministers, short termism, failure to upgrade systems (difficult and no career enhancement so ignored by them and Civil Servants) the private sector has done this umpteen times more than the public.
Now add failure of directional and brave management at CEO level often appointed as a political thank you, to meet diversity targets etc again totally unprepared, under trained etc and the final insult to the tax parking public, utter lack of accountability and you have the current shambles.
Finally add an unchallenged entitled jobs for life Civil Service.
The country is gripped by soft left (Tories One nation group as an example) elite incompetent woke failure mongers.
The fact that the Tory Party thinks an office manager is fit to lead/run the country (Sunak) rather than a visionary brave leader, an arrogant rich âlooking down his nose at ordinary peopleâ Cameron, an incompetent indecisive woke machine politician, May, totally correct but politically naive, Truss, and finally a chaotic not to be trusted Johnson, all of whom supported by career first MPs looking for crumbs from the top table will give political historians a field day as they document the implosion of a once great party as it breaks promise after promise and ignores its voters, indeed now is making their lives worse.
January 28, 2024
How about removing the generous public sector pensions? Ensure all public sector workers have a commercially regulated pension, remove the liability of a public sector pension from government, and ensure the pension provision is on a commercial basis. Make the CEO pension contribution contingent on measurable deliverables (the equivalent of public sector CEOs targets around share price or other metrics).
Make remuneration contingent on deliverables measured over 5 years, to prevent short-terminism and pigeon management.
This wonât appeal to the type of people who want to work in an environment without risk, but it seems the civil service attracts the wrong type of people to be able to deliver the type of work and performance required.
Make one of the objectives to be a reduction is operating costs year on year. Use AI if needed, or outsource services, or reduce service to a minimum.
Ensure underperforming civil servants can be made redundant or fired, rather than moved around to other organisations. 3 years of underperformance and you get a p45.
January 28, 2024
3 years? It is 3 months for most in the private sector.
January 28, 2024
This cannot be resolved by the current useless government or by the next Starmer government.
The best that can be done (imho) is for the Conservatives to boot out the socialists from its ranks and reform in time for the election after next and have a good plan to sort out the woeful public sector.
January 28, 2024
The pollical answer to any problem is to throw money at it including the voters
January 28, 2024
Weâve had years to take on the blob, itâs too late now. As Dan Hannan points out yesterday the blob is doing everything it can to frustrate Conservative policy in the hope and expectation of a Labour govt in some months time. The only thing to be done now is to set a clear sense of direction together with some high profile sackings of the most obstructive blobbites. An example could be a ministerial order – an emergency law if needed – banning wokery (all forms of âdiversity and inclusionâ policies) In the armed forces. The shutting down or immediate defunding of politicised âcharitiesâ and govt agencies could be another.
A small example of the leftist mission creep of quangos cropped up the other day. The FCA – meant to be there to ensure stability in the financial sector – has now taken on itself a power to require all financial firms to report on diversity and inclusion. Did parliament order this? Or a Conservative minister? There are very few months left to start acting on this kind of leftist activism which is so much of the reason for the productivity problem.
January 28, 2024
ESG/EDI implemented by the Tory’s plus non Equality (anti English men) legislation. Add a splash of Sex Act stuff in schools to brow beat parents and propaganda for young children to promote LBGT xyz. The Tory’s complete the Uni Party. They are the problem, not the solution.
January 28, 2024
Labour would be worse
January 28, 2024
The public sector service is largely run by a communist fifth column and the collapse of productivity is deliberate.
This can only be democratically solved by the electorate refusing to vote for the existing Parliamentary parties and instituting a totally new party who will cut spending, cut the public sector down to the size it should be and privatise as much as is feasible. A few referendums will probably be needed along the way.
Failing that, together with Net Zero, will ensure a fast decline to third world status, necessitating an authoritarian state to clamp down on serious social unrest. No doubt we will be told how much better everything is by the civil service, the government run state broadcaster and all the statistics issuing organisations.
January 28, 2024
Off Topic.
According to the Sunday Express, Rishi Sunak is targeting the “Saga generation” – voters over the age of fifty – at the general election. The prime minister has told the paper he wants to harness the “energy, wisdom and experience” of older voters. The Express says No. 10 is working on policies aimed at the middle aged.
Gave me a wide smile, if ever he backed the wrong horse it was this. The man hasn’t got a clue if he thinks a few pounds will turn around a disgusted multi-million vote.
January 28, 2024
John
Have you ever thought that politicians may hold some of the blame here, by passing so many laws and rules that actually stop effective management.
Tell someone off and you are bullying, ask them to return to the office and not work from home, and it affects their Human rights. Sack a member of staff for incompetence or a host of other reasons and they claim unfair dismissal.
The list gets longer and longer, many managers do not know now how to manage people for fear of the consequences on themselves.
January 28, 2024
Afraid you are correct John, it would seem that every aspect of Government run or controlled services is failing.
ÂŁ Billions have been spent and wasted with no apparent improvement, indeed in may cases it would seem more money has even made matters worse.
The Governments of late seem to want to control almost every aspect of our lives, why, do they really think they always know best.
Perhaps we should try less government, less control, let people make their own decisions and accept responsibility for their own actions, because we are now breeding a society which blames Government for all of their ills, and then expects Government to solve all of life’s problems, at no cost to themselves ,not realising that it is their own taxpayers money that actually funds all government spending
Government has got itself to blame because it has become too involved, and is too controlling.
January 28, 2024
Sir
An extract from a social media post yesterday:
“The state is not good at running services that require efficiency and responsiveness to change, commitment to the consumerâs preferences, value for money, an interest in constant innovation and an appetite for progress.”
Just about sums it up.
January 28, 2024
Sir John
Thank you for highlighting the Post Office situation. It would appear the Government is just prevaricating and dancing around refusing to get a grip and managing â they after all the âmanagersâ of this industry on our behalf.
The other worrying thing is so many were convicted of falsified and/or false evidence. Also, no evidence has ever been found to show âanyâ of the money is actually missing.
Common Law, English Law has been allowed to be bypassed by the Conservative Government. If you have one false conviction, then all others convicted where the same criteria was used to falsely convict â why havenât they all been cleared exonerated and compensated. The concept of reviewing each case is flawed, in insult to us all and our justice system, it has now become false imprisonment and that just doesnât mean those behind bars.
The flaw as with your main theme today, is that those employed by the State, employed by the Taxpayer are shielded in that they donât really pay, at least not to the extent the Taxpayer will be paying.
We are being let down by those we elect to represent us â they refuse to do their job.
January 28, 2024
This situation is going on elsewhere. Under ULEZ the accuser has ânotâ had to prove wrong doing. A recent freedom of information request has shown around 50% of those that have appealed have had their convictions quashed. What about those that havenât appealed. The victim is the one that has to prove innocence – what sort of way is that to run the laws of this Country.
In a similar situation âCapitaâ another large supplier to the State that is running these operations are shown not to be checking or finding evidence â just causing prosecutions. They have also been found to have leaked people personal information to the web, with the boss resigning with what is said to be even more big fines heading their way. Think about it, the CPS has to prove their(Capitas’) guilt, Capita doesn’t have to prove those it accuses are guilty – that id not a good way to run Law
The point I am making is those behind all these situations, those charged with managing on our behalf, this Conservative Government, our MPs, are all so up themselves on ego and self-gratification trips that the neglect their only purpose â that is manage the UK for everyone that has voted and paid them. Other than that there is no instance where they should be working for themselves or others.
January 28, 2024
The worrying part in all of this is no one had a trial before a Jury, as far as I am aware. !
No actual proof of funds missing, just the computer system says so.
Innocent until proven guilty ?????
How can you prove you are innocent ?
Must bring into question the thinking of some of the Judges in charge surely.
January 28, 2024
@Berkshire Allen – apparently the Law was changed as to the level of proof needed by an advisor to the Government who just by coincidence also worked for the Post office
January 28, 2024
The Probate Registry does not work. The grant of state approval for named executors or trustees, often bereaved relatives, to gather in the deceased’s assets and wind up their affairs, should only be a matter of checking that those seeking to do so – who will have sworn an oath to the effect that they are correct appointees and will carry out their duty – are named on the will or within the intestacy parameters, and that the correct fee has been paid. It should not take more than a week. Instead, we hear stories that it has taken over a year, no doubt because of the army of snoopers taking their time to check that IHT has been paid properly.
The civil courts do not work. Thirty five years ago, the flat fee to issue a writ was ÂŁ60, whatever the size of the claim. The claimant’s solicitors would produce it and have it taken or posted to a local District Registry, where it would be rubber stamped and given an issue number, and back with the solicitors for service by return or even on the same day. Today, everything has been centralised. The postal issue service is a delay ridden joke. The issue fee for a claim up to ÂŁ10,000 is now in the hundreds, despite the fact that the bulk issue centre does no more work other than allot a computerised rubber stamp and issue number; for a claim over ÂŁ10K, it is 5% of the claim up to an eye watering ÂŁ10,000 for claims of ÂŁ200,000 or more. This extortionate stealth tax has not helped improve a system in which subsequent court office attention is ridden with delay and errors.
I won’t get started on the employment tribunal system – you’ll get the drift.
January 28, 2024
David C
Yes had first hand experience of Probate delays for months on end, with a relative who had a very simple estate valued at a very small amount, which was just above the Probate qualifying sum.
January 28, 2024
You could cut in half the number of
1. Civil Servants
2. Quango
3. House of Lords
and we wouldn’t notice any difference
January 28, 2024
They’re all provided by the private sector?
January 29, 2024
And again, someone has deliberately decided to use my name to post their left wing views
January 28, 2024
over time it has doubled – and we still didn’t notice the difference!
January 28, 2024
Seeing the pictures on the BBC from the huge Liverpool warehouse fire yesterday was the equivalent to tens of millions of cars emission of co2 for a year âŠgo figure
And the answer our public & civil service came up with = ban the internal combustion engine car
January 28, 2024
Today another fire billowing out co2 and not cars
”A large fire broke out in Manchester city centre this afternoon as pictures showed black smoke billowing from a building” – GB News
January 28, 2024
The last few words of Sir John’s post today indicate where and what the real problem with the Civil Service is – its the political leadership . If there is a lack of management experience and skill at the top of any organisation no matter what the size and scope of it is , then all sorts of difficulties and problems will occur . The selection process obviously is inadequate when individuals set out to become MPs ; a more rigorous system of investigation should be included to make sure this is overcome .
January 28, 2024
Sir John
What a mess, it would appear that all this extra money being stolen from us isnât for services or delivery. It would appear the big growth from all the extra taxes is with what they call diversity, Inclusion etc, in plain English setting out to discriminate as the first call on function.
Yesterday we get to read that the chronically undermanned Royal Navy, although they now have more Admirals than ships, has a new direction – âThe Royal Navy is redeploying marines and sailors to become diversity and inclusion officers to enhance the âlived experienceâ of personnel amid ongoing recruitment challenges in manning its ships.â
January 28, 2024
“What should we expect of public sector CEOs?” – aside from hand-wringing, hand-washing , weakness in the face of harmful fads and fashions and a repugnant obsession with receipt of an honours list bauble?
We could do with CEOs driven by a recognition that monopoly places upon their organizations a tremendous burden to avoid abuse, given users have no alternative choice. It follows there ought to be a constant awareness that utility to user-taxpayers is the chief measure of success followed closely by value for money, not the comfort and convenience of employees. None should suppose that minding the shop is sufficient, rather that constant improvement is demanded, best with some vision inspired by appreciation of the changing circumstances faced.
January 28, 2024
Sir John
To sum up the real logic, the real situation as commented by nearly everyone here today. This Conservative Government lost its way when it picked up the Blair/Brown doctrine of Socialist destruction of the Country, by lurching even further to the left in pursuit of ego.
It is now a case of the group think âwhat can we spend money on to appease the extremistsâ we can always contrive more ways to tax, more laws to entrap. The UK mustnât exist as a Country our place is a EU Puppet and it always be.
Our elected representatives accept a few like yourself Sir John are kicking us in the head while we are nearly down and out, instead of addressing the only problem we have â our tractorist Political Class.
50 odd Conservative MP’s have had enough so don’t care they have just got other places to be, Hunt & Sunak are looking forward to leaving this mess behind. The rest of us not so much will be left pick up the pieces but pay the bill for the next few generations, and we haven’t even paid down the Blair/Brown debts.
January 28, 2024
They haven’t balanced the books after 14 years. Just keep raising taxes for the welfare receiptients and public servants.
January 28, 2024
Answering the question, and analysing how to get there, would require a couple of years of work and writing a 500-page report. As said before: a good starting point would be a firm policy of reducing the public sector payroll by 10% annually for ten years, bringing the parasitic load down to about 30% of the current level. Doing this would require the scrapping of red tape, legislation and regulations en masse, thus improving the functionality of society as a whole and the administration in particular. CEOs should, in the public, like in the private, sector, be personally responsible for defining and attaining targeted results.
January 28, 2024
Instead of having a blanket ban on recruitment to the civil service, why not have a blanket ban on know nothing arts graduates? Our universities are educating foreigners in useful subjects like science and medicine to get in the cash and educating large numbers of British students in the sort of subjects that unqualifies them for anything other than the public service. Educate British students in more science and less arts subjects so that the public service can recruit people who can think.
January 28, 2024
@ forthurst – you have fond memories of the thinking done by numerous officials extensively qualified in sciences
during the pandemic then?
We could have done with a senior Minister well-versed in great works of literature, Albert Camus’ “The Plague” amongst them
January 28, 2024
Government ministers with Arts degrees decided policy on closing the borders and locking down thereby destroying thousands of businesses whilst they partied in Downing Street. Then we had exhortations from them to get the untested experimental jab. Completely out of their depth led by the nose by crooked pharma companies to which they gave total immunity leading many more deaths and also in all age groups then from original infection.
Arts graduates are totally out of their depths in the modern world. They can’t put a foot right.
January 28, 2024
You shouldn’t discuss this subject without discussing the huge number of non-jobs in the public sector and also in big sleepy corporations of the type that join the CBI, rely on Government contracts and hold out their begging bowls. Let’s highlight a few categories:
– Equality & Diversity Officers. They reduce productivity, both directly and indirectly. Sack the lot.
– Senior Managers. The ratio of these to ordinary Managers is too high, particularly in the NHS.
– There are too many Quangos. Reduce them to a necessary minimum.
– The regulatory bodies are overmanned and too cosy with the companies they are supposed to be regulating.
– Monopolies such as Thames Water should have fewer directors, lower pay for directors and zero bonuses.
– Most non-executive directors do not enhance the quality of decision making. Get rid of most of them.
– Since 2010, the number of Civil Servants has increased by 25%, in London by 33%. Thin them down.
– Get rid of the OBR. If you want to monitor the Treasury, consult Universities and Consultants occasionally.
– NHS doctors are reluctant to delegate tasks to competent nurses and pharmacists.
– The NHS employs 52% clinical staff and 48% non-clinical staff. Thin down the latter category.
– We would be better off without Leftie Lawyers defending illegal immigrants. Withdraw their Legal Aid.
And that’s just payroll costs. Many NHS hospitals have very expensive equipment that is idle between 5 pm and 9 am. That’s crazy economics. They should sweat their assets, and if that means paying doctors and nurses to do overtime, so be it. Given all the economies the NHS could make, they could afford to give doctors and nurses better pay rises and overtime.
January 28, 2024
Limit all public office posts to 4 years with a minimum level of qualification to get the post; recruitment based on meritocracy, skills (NOT diversity/woke criteria), supporting by regular review of delivery vs performance/financial targets.
January 28, 2024
It could be reasoned that as the Conservative Government doesnât care what happens to the taxpayer money they collect then spend, spend. When this Conservative Government rewards failure, protects failure, nurtures failure why should anyone else employed by the State even think about caring, they are following the lead from the âtopâ. After-all this Conservative Government knows how to tax and borrow â they just don’t know how to deliver. Mirror the Government and you have done a good job, honors are on the way.
This Conservative Governments narrative is to signal a virtue, then pat themselves on the back âlook at thatâ we are great and we are loved.
January 28, 2024
and why do we expect this all to carry on getting worse?
We seem to be locked into a frantic global future that has been defined for us.
January 28, 2024
Civil Service productivity is down, but the number of CSs is up. Do you not see the link? I suggest making 430,000 redundant and making the Civil Service work with 100,000 staff.
As for the NHS, freeze the budget for three years. As they can afford DIE staff and departments, some on incredible salaries, they have too much money.
Then, sack underperforming CEOs, starting with Andrew Bailey.
Hooray that the Chairman of the Post Office has been sacked, finally a Minister with some teeth.
January 28, 2024
I must be particularly dumb but I cannot find a proper explanation for the relationship between the figures that Sir John puts in his first paragraph. May I ask a step-by-step explanation how a 7.5% decrease in public sector productivity between 2020 and 2023 leads to a ÂŁ30 bn annual increase in costs to taxpayers.
I know that state finances are a complicated topics, but I guess the explanation must be straightforward to be put as such an obvious point in some opening remarks.
Or am I the only one not to understand such an obvious point?
reply 7.5% of the costs of public services. PE excluding transfers.
January 29, 2024
Reply to reply: Public services cost 7.5% more? In this case, is that really a loss of productivity? A Price Effect, but directly linked to public services becoming more deficient? How is that defined specially over 2020-2021 when there were lockdowns and other effects of Covid, over 2022 with the effect on energy prices linked to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, over 2022-2023 with the effect of inflation? If public services became less âproductiveâ, is that due to internal or external pressures on them? And if external pressures, doesnât the loss of productivity argument just fall apart?
From the start, what is the productivity, say, of HMRC, of the national school and university system, of the NHS, of the armed forces, of the environmental agencies, of the Ofxxx agencies, of Parliament, ⊠? How are these productivity rates defined? computed? Who does it? Does Parliament check the numbers? Does Parliament include people clever enough to understand these numbers?
Reply I thought you knew all the answers. The numbers come from ONS
February 2, 2024
ONS, which report? If you donât give the reference, Iâll be very much tempted to say I âdonât believe youâ.
January 28, 2024
Got to be said that Michael Portillo is making more sense than any government minister at the moment.
Such a shame that he has been lost to public service.
Everything you say is correct John, but nobody in the bubble is listening.
January 28, 2024
Maybe we should make him a Cabinet Secretary and a Peer ….thats the latest trend, bypassing elections & democracy
January 28, 2024
don’t think he would take it.
he would make a good PM, unlikely anyone could succeed as a minister with Rishi in the top job
too late now anyways, Conservatives are toast
January 28, 2024
+1
January 28, 2024
Having been caught using just one high wind year to persuade British parliamentarians to donkey-nod through an insane rush to Net Zero in 2019, interest is growing in some of the other stunts pulled by the Climate Change Committee (CCC) to promote the green collectivist agenda. In 2020, the CCC used a supposed finding of the Citizen Climate Assembly to promote to Parliament the idea â found in its Sixth Carbon Budget â that meat and dairy consumption should be cut by up to 40%. In fact only a third of the 108-strong assembly discussed the matter, and only 10 people expressed priority support for such severe reductions in the diet. The assembly was largely curated by the CCC, while ÂŁ200,000 of funding for the event organiser was supplied by the European Climate Foundation, a green activist operation drawing heavy financial support from Extinction Rebellion funder Sir Christopher Hohn
https://dailysceptic.org/2024/01/27/more-revelations-emerge-of-how-the-climate-change-committee-dupes-parliament-into-voting-for-net-zero-measures/?mc_cid=06f454efa4&mc_eid=4961da7cb1
Who’s wagging who’s tail
January 28, 2024
ig :
They donât want to!
January 28, 2024
From the MsM
“The health service is spending more than ÂŁ2.3 million per year on 50 workers in dedicated equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) roles across Scotland, with the headcount rising by more than 40 per cent in five years.”
Yes it is Scotland, but it is still UK Taxpayer money. This practice now embedded in taxpayer funded entities everywhere, is a political decision by those involved. In a practical a sense its about creating the very discrimination the left wing headline says it wants to tackle. It is political virtue (in practice non-virtue) signalling.
Just listen to what is being said, your work must focus on discriminating before service. Ability mustn’t hinder box ticking. 100% Political views, by political activists, political indoctrination and mind manipulation funded by the Taxpayer. Why does this Conservative Government permit our money to be spent on political manipulation before service and delivery. Oh,… I forgot this Conservative Government puts the virtue signal above management, delivery and service – it is itself part of the left Wing political activist program.
January 28, 2024
How our country has changed.
ï»żThe more that I listen to the woes of the country the more I am convinced that we have become a very sloppy liberal left of centre country. We lack a lean and slick management structure with clear lines of responsibility. This has lead to a complete breakdown of discipline within organisations.
Secondly our society has become overwhelmed by the views of minorities, which the majority have no truck with, such as transgender. Unfortunately this particular issue has consumed hours of government time, police time and many other areas within society. A simple decision saying we have two biological states, male and female. It is a personal choice to be regarded as anything different. I will never forget what was said to myself when I was being teased about my height. My mother said to me that sticks and stones will break my bones but names will never hurt me.
The other area which definitely needs returning to an efficient, structured and disciplined organisation is the Civil Service. Responsibility must be defined clearly and those who fail must be treated as within any private business.
Tony Jacks.
January 28, 2024
The 3 main parties have all taken a step to the left and a further step towards the EU and UN …..we’re sick as a nation as our political ratio is out of kilter with no center right, right or independance parties
Thats the only reason the reform party is doing so well
January 28, 2024
Its being reported that the tories are banning vaping …..just another freedom lost without a fight
February 1, 2024
The conclusion we draw from years of failure provided by the Public Sector is, the Public Sector is not fit for purpose.
Sir John does not mention Border Control in his above list, we thank him for sparing us that failure. He also didn’t mention Police performance….just as well.
February 2, 2024
It is not down to lack of money. It is down to lack of aspiration and moral duty to the firms people are working for. The Post Office is one organisation I have experience of (we will leave the bank I worked for for another day) and am so incensed by the way SubPostmasters have been treated. I left the employ of the Post Office in the late 1980s when I was getting disillusioned by the types of management at the top that were being allocated to us in the middle management grades who were holding the whole business together. We knew then that our chances of promotion were out of the question and we were just being kept in place to run the show while these people who had no idea how the organisation ran took all the money but showed little responsibility. I left and found another career working on my own as many others did, some became SubPostmasters which I had thought of (thank God I did not go down that avenue). This is the real problem. Also the education system in place in this country is not fit for purpose. You need to go back to the 1940s/50s to the system which Lord Butler was it introduced and I experienced from an ordinary working class background. I passed for grammar school and it took me into another world which I would not have experienced from the comprehensive systems which just cover all types we now have. You need aspiration being put into young people to achieve something for themselves not just settle down as previous generations have done with two or more kids and a mortgage to pay. What joy is that to look forward to? It might suit some (the majority now it seems) but you are not going to aspire to something which you never thought possible are you?