“The civil service serves the government of the day... it is the duty of civil servants to serve their ministers with integrity and to the best of their ability…[and] to give to the minister honest and impartial advice, without fear or favour.”
Former cabinet Secretary Robert Armstrong’s 1985 memorandum was the first effective code of conduct for the civil service that we would recognise today. Its core principles are still reflected in the modern version of the civil service code which was published in 2006 by Gus O’Donnell and amended in 2010 when it was put on a statutory footing – the same copy of the code I signed on my first day in the civil service in 2015.
But timeless though the principles are, they aren’t enough. The modern code reads as a list of things that that civil servants shouldn’t do – that they shouldn’t be politically partial, they shouldn’t be dishonest, they shouldn’t produce biased advice, and they shouldn’t break the law (the last of which you would hope could go unsaid). On the kinds of positive behaviour and action that the civil service would reward, the code is silent.
It’s hard to imagine any high-performing organisation only setting the bare minimum legal expectations as their values, but that’s what Whitehall has done. Yes, many companies say they value things which they don’t in practice – lofty ideals are one thing, but they only really count if they are the basis for key decisions: who gets hired, who gets promoted, and who gets fired to start.
But the civil service could practice its values exactly like that, because the code is a key part of the terms and conditions for civil servants – these values are concrete expectations of how officials conduct themselves in their work. So the absence of any meaningful values makes compliance with the code a box-ticking exercise, not something it can set stretch goals with or usefully hold staff to. So it is little wonder that Whitehall has such a chronic problem addressing poor performance.
The current code is insufficient, and doesn't set positive values of how the civil service should work. The absence of those values creates a vacuum for other behaviours to fill – the kind you get if all you have is a list of things you can’t do. Risk-aversion, a closed and insular culture to outsiders and new ideas, and a focus on complying with process (including satisfying the code) over getting the best outcomes for the public.
It doesn’t have to be this way. Every major party wants civil service reform. Civil servants themselves are frustrated with the system: of the 1,265 civil servants we surveyed in partnership with Civil Service World, 79% believed the civil service didn't manage poor performance well, and 70% agreed that processes get in the way of their work.
Cultural change starts at the top, and it should start with a new code for a new kind of civil service – one which isn’t afraid to be direct about the kind of people who should join it and how they should work.
It isn’t without precedent to expect more from civil servants. When he refreshed the code in 2006, Gus O’Donnell also said that he wanted new values too: those like “pace, pride, passion and professionalism”. Why they were never included in the formal code, I don’t know. But it’s high time we took up the challenge of amending it along broader lines.
Antonia Romeo has already set reviewing the code as one of her objectives. So my colleagues and I at Re:State have published our own draft, calling for the inclusion of additional civil service values including excellence, ownership, courage and openness. Together these lay the groundwork for a modern, high-performing civil service, which sets high standards for its staff in the place where they can be best measured against them – their code of conduct.
Every year, thousands of people join the civil service to serve their country. Like I did, we make them go through the ritual of signing up to the values of a professional code. We should make it a code that they would be proud to live up to.
Joe Hill is director of strategy at Re:State and co-author of Plan for government: A new civil service code