Urgent reform needed to UK government, says group of former senior civil servants
The way the UK is governed needs to be reformed urgently, a group of 14 former senior civil servants claimed this week.
In its Good Government: Reforming Parliament and the Executive report, the Better Government Initiative said: “The world financial crisis and the threats posed by climate change provide a global context with grave implications, not yet fully understood, for the United Kingdom. The expenses scandal has increased public suspicion and disillusion with both government and Parliament. Decline in voting levels and in membership of political parties provides clear evidence of loss of confidence in the instruments of government.”
The BGI also said the media’s increasing appetite for policy initiatives had been a prime source of the high volume of often ill-thought out legislation. “A short distance sometimes separates a media release from a policy statement that triggers the preparation of a Bill. A consequence has been that a higher proportion of Bills now enter Parliament incomplete, poorly explained, and requiring substantial amendment,” it argued.
The BGI report made a number of specific proposals for reform in Parliament, in relations between Parliament and the executive, and in the executive’s policy-making and delivery. Its key recommendations include:
- basing policy on evidence and front-line experience
- reducing the involvement of the centre of government in departments’ operations to the necessary minimum
- minimising and justifying changes in machinery of government, delivery structures and appointments
- checks by the relevant Cabinet committees that proposals for legislation meet required standards
- a legislative programme no bigger than Parliament can scrutinise
- implementing the main recommendations of the Committee on Reform of the House of Commons from the beginning of the next Parliament
- setting explicit standards for preparation of Bills and other major proposals
- parliamentary oversight of compliance with such standards
- better opportunities for select committees to present reports and propose substantive motions
- reinforcing skills for the commissioning and performance management of services
- strengthening departmental governance
- management of the processes of decision-making by impartial civil servants who have an opportunity to provide advice which receives fair consideration by ministers
- implementing the Professional Skills for Government programme.
The BGI argued that a programme of reform implementing the full range of proposals in the report would be more effective than introducing a few of them piecemeal. It said: “They are closely connected and some of them are interdependent. The restoration of public confidence in both Parliament and government requires a comprehensive transformation on the broader lines this report describes.”
