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New Zealand is reforming its government structures to promote cross-departmental working. Dr Jonathan Coleman explains how.
Chief vet Nigel Gibbens wants his colleagues to enjoy a variety of opportunities inside the civil service, but admits the spending climate may mean a fall in numbers. Matthew O’Toole reports
When John Beddington became the government’s chief scientific adviser, many departments didn’t employ an influential science champion. But now, he tells Colin Marrs, the quality of science is on the rise across Whitehall
It should transform procurement, says Chris Chant, not just shave a bit off prices
The Cabinet Office responds to Chris Chant’s article:
The information commissioner, Christopher Graham, has slammed the “crazy” system of funding for the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), and claimed that the body is in danger of becoming overloaded with work.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) should set out an explicit industrial strategy for defence procurement, the Commons’ Defence Committee said in a report published yesterday. Such a strategy would ensure that procurement decisions take account of their likely impact on British businesses, rather than simply pursuing value for money.
Commissioners from across the public sector can now apply to join a virtual Commissioning Academy, launched last week.
In a bid to reduce costs, complexity and confusion, the Cabinet Office is launching a new pan-Whitehall ‘protective marking’ system. Stuart Watson listens in at a round table convened to explain and examine the changes
A council’s education expert explains to Philip Bevan the impact of recent reforms to the schools system.
The chair of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, Sir Christopher Kelly, has warned in an article written for Civil Service World that new ways of providing services – including academies, clinical commissioning groups, and increasing delivery by the private and voluntary sectors – will place extra pressures on ethics in public service delivery.
I think most civil servants would say that they are pretty sensitised to the public service values that are supposed to govern their behaviour. I suspect few would be able to recite word for word the seven Nolan principles of public life – but that is hardly surprising. For civil service purposes, they have been condensed into four: integrity, honesty, objectivity, and impartiality. The last Civil Service People Survey showed 88 per cent of civil servants were aware of the Civil Service Code.
Less than a tenth of civil servants questioned by CSW believe the current model of financing trading funds is the best way to realise the coalition’s open data goals.
Stephen Lovegrove, chief executive at the Shareholder Executive since 2007, has been appointed permanent secretary at the Department of Energy and Climate Change. He will take up his new post on 4 February. The role was originally set to be taken by David Kennedy, the chief executive of the Committee on Climate Change, but prime minister David Cameron vetoed Kennedy’s appointment last year.
The civil service must make the most of expertise built up whilst preparing for the Olympics, according to a report published yesterday by the Institute for Government (IfG).
As the British task force neared the Falkland Islands in 1982, cabinet secretary Sir Robert Armstrong sent prime minister Margaret Thatcher a briefing note raising the question of whether the UK should consider ceding some British territory in the south Atlantic to the Argentinians, documents released under the 30 year rule reveal.
Most Whitehall departments will have to move their transaction services – meaning HR, payroll, and accounts processes – into a shared service project by 2014, according to the Cabinet Office’s shared services strategy, published in December.
Jonathan Rees Director General, Government Equalities Office
Philip Rutnam Permanent Secretary, Department for Transport
David Pitchford Executive Director, Major Projects Authority
Ministry of Justice CIO and Chief Information Officer, Government
As the National Security Council (NSC) has been evolving, the Home Office has been “looking at the types of subjects it has been taking”, home secretary Teresa May told the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy on Monday.
The lack of a senior responsible owner for the West Coast Rail franchise project was the “biggest problem” behind the failure of the bidding process, Sam Laidlaw told the House of Commons Transport Committee yesterday.
The Ministry of Defence is struggling to build a financial management system that determines a “single version of the financial truth” and there is a “high risk to delivery” of the department’s strategy for setting out clear management information (MI), according to the Defence Review Annual Report published yesterday by Lord Levene.
A set of new ‘masterclasses’ that aim to help the voluntary and community sector (VCS) to secure public sector contracts were announced by the Cabinet Office last week.
Nearly £50m was saved in 2011-12 compared to 2009-10 by cutting the use of fossil fuels and reducing waste and water consumption across Whitehall, the Cabinet Office announced last week.