The surge in civil service numbers since 2016, up by a third has been coupled with plenty of grade creep. We have a much larger more top heavy civil service.
One of the reasons is departments always want new  people and new resource for any new policy or Ministerial initiative.There is  a reluctance to wind up old initiatives and transfer all the staff to the new. Another reason is people are kept in any given post for too short a time. They are regularly transferred and promoted, with their old roles being filled by  someone else caught in the  eternal reshuffling.
It means at any given time there are numerous people recently arrived in a new area needing to spend time trying to get up to speed, and others getting ready to move with diminishing interest in what they are still meant to be doing. There is a strong reliance on collective working entailing several personnel and layers of management being involved in framing advice to Ministers or making administrative decisions.
The danger of this system is no one ever feels responsible or can be blamed for an outcome. It means people with too little experience or  knowledge of the issues is involved in the work. It makes officials dependent on others often outside the civil service to be informed. It encourages duplication by hiring external consultants to do much of the task that an experienced official could do without outside help.
November 6, 2024
In the run up to the election Richard Rice called for a 10% reduction in the civil service headcount. He said a business in deep trouble has to take such action and so should the UK state. I do not know natural wastage rates in the civil service but a government determined to cut its costs should find a way. Billions is being spent on IT projects, supposedly to cut costs. Those cuts must include substantial headcount costs.
November 7, 2024
+1
November 6, 2024
It is fine to outline the failings of the CS, but altogether a different matter to offer solutions. I have my ideas and have expressed them often. What would you do to modernise and control the CS.
November 6, 2024
Given the difficulty of managing such a system, surely there ought to be rules like:
Home Office – maximum staff – x people
maximum Grade 1 – y people, Grade 2 n people etc.
Just limit the numbers so the otherwise inevitable growth is contained.
The new Labour government is hiring people left, right and centre. Itâs like living in a lunatic asylum.
November 6, 2024
Some years ago Sir Peter Levene was recruiited from industry to head up MOD(PE). He couldn’t solve all the problems because the causes were often outside MOD(PE) in other departments. Something similar needs to be done in other departments coupled with changes to the rules for civil service appointments at senior levels. the continuity problem is not new and has always evaded solutions. It is the equivalent of sideways promotions and leaving one company to join another that occures in private indutry. there is a need for collective memory in the civil service that does not exist to the same extent in industry.
November 6, 2024
We all know bureaucracy feeds off itself. The UK civil service which at one time ruled the world with a handful of staff has become a parasitic monolith feeding off the taxpayer.
There is no pretence of giving value for money, just continuing expansions of the jobs for the chosen few.
A severe culling is necessary.
Three cheers for the Donald.
November 6, 2024
The growing view in the public space is why bother working when you can live on benefits or join the growing ranks of the Public Sector and be paid even more for doing nothing.
November 6, 2024
Except in the diversity roles where proponents land and expand
November 6, 2024
I think that Francis Maude has a lot to answer for. He encouraged experienced civil servants to leave, so junior civil servants had to pick up three people’s jobs but on reduced pay so they felt discouraged and some became ill by consequence. It’s easy to be wise after the event
November 6, 2024
Annie,
Maude was the man behind the disastrous ‘preferred supplier’ approach to outsourcing. Once on the list, it was a licence for firms to print money. Poor performance was never challenged. Instead further contracts were awarded.
November 6, 2024
A lot to answer for indeed History and Law Corpus and never had a proper job.
November 7, 2024
Correct. The Dept I worked for, over about 3 years during the Coalition Government, lost about a 3rd of its experienced staff and younger, far less experienced people were recruited. It was chaos and incredibly stressful, which is one of the reasons why I took early retirement.
November 6, 2024
The Civil Service is another of the government organisations (also the QUANGOs) that soak up huge amounts of taxpayer’s cash – and export nothing. The senior ranks love grade creep because it does not involve having to do a good job, there is no accountability after the inevitable cock-ups; the worst that can happen is than an incompetent civil servant is asked to write a “justification”
The Civil Service is ripe for improvement by the introduction of AI. Managed properly, AI robots could easily replace 4 out of 5 incumbents; the huge salary and pension savings would reduce the amount we have to borrow each month. Not to mention the considerable savings that would accrue from the avoidance of more cock-ups. Fortunately a Civil Service AI could easily be taught to communicate with them in Group Speak and Latin.
November 11, 2024
Despite JR-M’s late efforts, in 14 years, the Conservatives failed to get to grips with the civil service and local government. It is totally unrealistic to expect Labour to do anything but make the situation worse. Much worse.
Se are already seeing the signs : massive public sector pay rises awarded within a month of coming into office with absolutely no call for any efficiency savings o offset the cost. The train drivers are the very worst example. Northern Rail is already exposing the Labour lie than the problems have been caused by the privatised companies. Trains are being cancelled especially at weekend because, unbelievably, weekend working is voluntary and pay is so high that drivers don’t want to work, even at sky-high overtime rates.
Back to the cvil service : a recruitment freeze is essential until numbers are at least back below pre-pandemic levels, and that’s just for starters. Sooner rather than later, pensions across all levels of government have got to be reformed, as the cost in already unmanageable. Pay needs to be related to regional pay in the private sector. In many areas, such as Wales, public sector employees are the highest paid people in their area. This is ridiculous.
November 6, 2024
The civil service should be halved in size. Billions of pounds would be saved, both immediately and in gold-plated pensions. Procedures would be streamlined and productivity improved. If they went on strike in protest, no one would notice. Mrs B. Should incorporate this into future Conservative policy.
November 6, 2024
No longer ‘Mission Creep’, but Empire Creep. First objective is to build a shield around those running the show, the bigger the shield the greater the protection. Either some one at the bottom gets the blame, or the entity is to large to ‘cull’
It is not about delivery or value, the mission is protection
November 6, 2024
Is it possible that the movement of staff horizontally across departments after short periods of tenure has also impacted on performance?
November 6, 2024
No wonder UK governance is so dire.
We can’t expect labour to sort out this mess, so we are stuck with it for another decade.
If parliament cannot control those working for it, and us, what would the result be of removing Parliament from the mix – would things be any worse?
November 6, 2024
Exactly and many of them are/were doing nothing useful or even positive harm (like net zero, road blocking, giving away the Chagos islands, pushing net harm vaccines, lockdowns, duff degrees, over regulating everything, inconveniencing the productive, rigging markets in energy, housing, schools, duff degree universities, transport, housing, banking…
November 6, 2024
My thanks to the 100 Labour activists who went to help Kamala – as it surely must have helped Trump get an even larger majority. So what is the betting on how long daft as a brush David Lammy will last as Foreign Sec?
November 6, 2024
The Democrats claim to have knocked on 2,000 doors a minute in Pennsylvania.
Our guys have never worked so hard in their lives đ
November 6, 2024
how many were threatened with guns?
November 6, 2024
It used to be the state of the economy, which was the biggest driver of votes.
Then it was the economy, AND immigration.
Now it is the economy, immigration AND State Departmental cost and performance.
The Conservatives lost because they failed on all three, and so looked incompetent.
November 6, 2024
From what you describe John, is it no wonder Government is not working, It is not efficient, not cost effective, far too large to move swiftly on any matter, and now with so many appearing to work from home, completely disjointed, and quire honestly would be almost unmanageable.
A huge change is needed, but Starmer is not the man to implement such, because he has never run anything on a commercial basis in his life, so it will simply get worse and ever more expensive.
November 6, 2024
This is going to get worse as people, especially young people, get laid off from private sector firms that can’t raise prices. They will need to be employed in the public sector; this Country will never get hold of this problem again; a Tory government leant into it rather than deal with it.
Musk has been said to be prepared to cut $2 trillion from the US budget. People call the plan “crazy”, he wants to reduce spending and live within their means. 5 days ago he told voters they had to brace for temporary economic hardship.
November 6, 2024
“The danger of this system is no one ever feels responsible or can be blamed for an outcome.” Indeed rather like the whole of the state sector. Also almost no one is ever fired however useless or incompetent.
Also there is the huge problem of misdirection and group think. I knew a sensible civil servant who know what she was expected to do was totally bonkers but the departmental and “group think” ment she went along with it all wasting billions.
November 6, 2024
“The danger of this system is no one ever feels responsible or can be blamed for an outcome” – although we might very much doubt the people in the system see a danger, rather a huge advantage. Bonuses all round!
November 6, 2024
Good morning.
There is another issue with the CS that has not been as widly covered as it should be. And that is, ‘Working from home’ (WFH).
There are some jobs that require you to literally be in the office five days a week. Some part time. And some not at all (WFH). Managers should be allowed to assess this and state whether or not a job role and person work under the aforementioned three. It should not be a condition of employment. If a Minister requires the CS staff to be at their desks ‘x’ numbers of days, even if is the full five days, then that is what must be done. No if’s or but’s ! Managers need to be able to manage their staff and work and to do that they may need to have them with them.
Currently WFH in the Private Sector is something I can do and have done. It is OK but, it is not my prefered way of working as I need to have the person(s) I am working with close to hand. WFH Therefore is not a good idea for all and one in the CS that should be under constant review.
PS Viva La Trump !
November 6, 2024
Grade creep and increasing staff numbers go hand in hand. Not so bad you might think.
Stop and think. What about the unmatched quality of pension entitlement.?
All those grade staff increases mean the state bill soars as they take pension, usually at 60.
November 6, 2024
Instead of continually taxing us citizens, why has the government not sought to REDUCE the numbers of civil servants on ‘our’ payroll? It’s the way it is done in the Private Sector to cut costs, so why are these socialists so adverse to the same?
Is it just a case of not biting the hand that feeds you, or that the blind Chancellor has not even considered it?
November 6, 2024
Precisely, that is why we need to make 400,000 Civil Servants redundant. Then, freeze all recruitment for 12 months and make the 130,000 left do the work.
We are past the point of no return, so tinkering around the edges will not work.
The Civil Service needs root and branch reform before the cost of it, plus the cost of the NHS bankrupts the UK, and they will!
November 6, 2024
+1
My post yesterday said almost exactly the same, accept new terms, conditions, working arrangements, and new pension arrangements, or take minimum allowed redundancy.
Time has run out do do things slowly.
November 6, 2024
The NHS as well.
The recent Lucy Letby enquiry revealed that there countless committees/boards, some with overlapping responsibilities.
Not only did they not effectively tackle the issue that was the subject of the enquiry, they showed us that we are spending a lot of money on people sitting on their backsides talking. I suspect many were at home on a video link.
Much of this resource should have been spent on caring for patients!
If this behaviour is happening throughout the civil service, the taxpayer is being ripped off.
November 6, 2024
This is all deliberate.
Robert Conquestâs 2nd and 3rd laws of politics :
– âAny organization not explicitly right-wing sooner or later becomes left-wing.â
– âThe simplest way to explain the behaviour of any bureaucratic organization is to assume that it led by a cabal of its enemies.â
November 6, 2024
Big defeat for the Globalists in the USA. If there was a âBook of Rulesâ for the ârules based orderâ it would be shredded today, but there is no such document. Just the edict that the elitists canât be opposed.
Massive landslide with all demographics buying into Capitalism because they want comfort, security and hope!
Musk in charge of cutting the State. He will demonstrate how to do it. He will release plenty of people into the marketplace to become productive. I dont know whether it will be enough. The US almost USD 37 Trillion of debt!
November 6, 2024
I believe the EU will have to pay itâs own Defence costs, end of NATO.
I believe the UN can forget about living off the US – itâs a force for harm anyway.
I believe the âGlobal Warming Scamâ will have the light of reason shon on it. How can our political class survive being outed as fools at best?
I believe the War in Ukraine will end pdq. Ukrainians in the west are already thanking God publicly. They donât want to be conscripted and sent to the front lines to fight their relations.
I believe the Islamic world will know that they have no right to obliterate the Jewish State.
There is a God!
November 6, 2024
In Navada and some other states there is a ânone of the aboveâ option on the Presidential ballot paper. So far 1.2% have voted for ânone of the aboveâ.
Complete waste of time. Just donât vote.
November 6, 2024
But all sorts of reasons are involved in the missing turnout votes.
If you do turn up and state essentially ‘ no person or Party is worthy for my vote’ a very clear message is passed.
November 6, 2024
Lynn
Do not agree, as it shows you do care about democracy, have voted, but you do not agree with what is on offer.
Your protest has been counted and is officially recorded as such.
“None of the above” came second in the Republican Presidential Primaries in one State.which surely must show some feedback to the one that came third !
Trump came first in that one.
November 6, 2024
One never can overcome the inertia and resistance to change employed by the civil service. Many years ago in the days of Maggie, I was working as an RAF engineer within the MOD procurement executive (MOD PE). What was known back then as a âMaggie handbag jobâ came down the line demanding, so far as I recall, a 12% reduction in the number of civil servants within the PE.
It caused immediate consternation but within a relatively short time they swung into action. A significant number of those nearing retirement suddenly retired, taking their gratuity and pension with them and then reappearing back in their office the next week, hired in as âconsultantsâ and thus off the civil service lists.
And then we noticed that some new sub-departments came into being and were somehow staffed by others shuffled around in the system. The overall result that although numbers of people came off the civil service list, they were still in place as consultants and that, overall, not much had really changed.
The point at which I realised that the civil service has become a powerful, unmovable and probably un-reformable entity was when Jacob Rees Mog tried to get them back into office post-Covid. They refused to and still do to this day and it seems to me that elected Ministers of government can be rendered almost impotent in confronting their respective civil service departments. âYes Ministerâ and âYes Prime Ministerâ really does say it all.
November 6, 2024
Dear Sir John,
This ratchet effect, so well explained by C Northcote Parkinson, is not confined to the Civil Service, the NHS and to local authorities, where the need for departments to keep justifying their existence causes so much waste and annoyance to the citizenry. It applies equally to the private sector.
In business, there there are well rehearsed remedies. It is almost a cliche for dynamic new chief executives to make a cull of middle management and a slew of early retirements. One company I am familiar with hired a marketing guru to help steer a big expansion of its product range. The task was successfully completed within five years but the guru had created an empire that was still expanding. When eventually axed in toto it had a staff of 60.
The better way to respond to new initiatives , more suited to the ways of the public sector, is to second one of your upcoming brightest and best for a year or two, with if necessary a small hand-picked task force, on the understanding that successful completion will lead to rapid promotion. If it is really necessary to bring in an outside expert, for instance for a new technology, it should be on a fixed term contract.
November 6, 2024
The Spanish Government appears to be demanding ÂŁ300million from the UK Taxpayer after which they will takeover Harland Wolff and then be paid taxpayer money for producing vessels for the UK Royal Navy. While Babcock a more than capable UK Company is sidelined.
What say will the UK taxpayer get in electing those responsible for taking their money to Spain?
November 6, 2024
Ian B
Would not surprise me if some Clown in the UK Government actually supported this, probably on the grounds that any emissions would be by a foreign owned Company, and thus the UK would not be responsible.
November 7, 2024
I joined the CS in middle age in about 2004 having only ever worked in the private sector. I was gobsmacked by the levels of bureaucracy; the empire building; the continual “reorganisations;” the number of people, some in fairly “exposed” positions, who would have been unemployable in the private sector and the number of lazy lumps and jobsworths who were never given the kick up the backside they very badly needed.
It was fairly chaotic when I joined and it only got worse. Half, maybe as many as 60%, were decent, hard-working and competent or at least reasonably efficient considering the processes they had to follow. They were carrying the rest and trying to keep the wheels on the wagon.
My final position (Team Leader) was an “exposed” one. I continually raised concerns with my line management about the vulnerability of the processes and lack of resilience (not the individuals in my team, who were all very good) but was continually patronised and ignored. I was seen as “difficult.” In the end I gave up and resigned – and very shortly before it took effect one of the process failures I had predicted and warned about for over a year occurred. My Dept Head did at least have the grace to admit that he had been warned.
The CS needs a complete overhaul. It needs private sector management to do it.