News

A lack of planning, a breakdown of cabinet government, the sidelining of civil service advice – the parallels between the Iraq debacle and the aftermath of the Brexit vote are striking, argues Sue Cameron

New research from the Civil Service Commission finds that while BME civil servants represented more than a tenth of all applicants to senior jobs, they made up less than 5% of those chosen for interview

Department creates new unit at Marsham Street under stewardship of former chief technology officer Sarah Wilkinson

Spending watchdog says bosses failure to declare National Insurance Fund payments kept departmental revenue spending in the black

Major speech by the head of the public spending watchdog warns ministers to stop asking the civil service to run on "perpetual overload"

Commercial Standards are getting an overhaul, the Cabinet Office confirms, but wider "Blueprints" are still not finished

Machinery of government change shifts Office for Civil Society functions to Department for Culture, Media and Sport

Watchdog says "less transactional" process is required and criticises Single Departmental Plans for failing to meet transparency goals

DfE says introduction of the new Schools Funding Formula will now start in 2018-19 to allow for further consultation

National Audit Office says HMRC must not make taxpayers "underwrite the risk of failure through service breakdowns" – as tax expert tells CSW the timetable for Making Tax Digital may need to be reset

Britain's new prime minister Theresa May has vowed to "make a success" of Britain's historic decision to quit the European Union. But as Sir Nigel Sheinwald – the UK's former permanent representative to the European Union – tells Sam Macrory, that will no easy task

Foreign Affairs Committee lays into decision not to let departments plan for a vote to leave the European Union – and warns that the new Brexit department must not deprive the Foreign Office of resources

 Former head of the Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure, which reports to MI5, is drafted in to replace Home Office void left by departure of Olly Robbins

"Senior cadre" of specialists will sit outside of the familiar Whitehall hierarchy as part of efforts to give them a more clearly-defined career structure

New report praises cross-government progress since 2010 but questions the value of Single Departmental Plans

Jo Hopkins, chair of the Home Office women’s network and senior sponsor of the Gender Equality Network, welcomes the steps being taken to encourage women from all backgrounds to join the civil service – and says the barriers women face are not just around gender but also race, ethnicity, sexuality, faith, age and background

The civil service "lost self-confidence" as a result of the coalition's reform, the former Defra and Home Office perm sec tells Sam Macrory, as the pair take tea in Sutton House

Advisory Committee on Business Appointments gives the nod to unpaid Birmingham University role for the former HMRC chief

Theresa May arrives at Number 10 with years of experience on the government's key decision-making body on security. Dr Joe Devanny of the International Centre for Security Analysis takes a look at what the new government will mean for the way departments support prime ministers on national security issues

In the first of his occasional opinion pieces on issues that matter to officials, former permanent secretary Sir Leigh Lewis takes aim at the  civil service grading system 

Former Department for Work and Pensions permanent secretary Sir Leigh Lewis calls for rethink of the "crazy" civil service grading structure

Former minister for the Cabinet Office takes on the digital and culture brief in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

Brexit secretary David Davis says "the most brilliant people in Whitehall" are looking to work for his new department

Common Agricultural Policy fines continue to hamper Defra accounts, while National Audit Office also points to the Ministry of Defence's non-compliance with international accounting standards