King's Speech: Government will introduce duty of candour for public servants

Plan confirmed in King's Speech as one of several "steps to help rebuild trust and foster respect"
King Charles III reads King's Speech. Photo: PA/Alamy

By Tevye Markson

17 Jul 2024

The government will introduce a duty of candour for public servants, the King has confirmed. 

In the King’s Speech at the state opening of parliament this morning, King Charles III confirmed the long-demanded reform to standards in public life would be established in law. 

“My government will take steps to help rebuild trust and foster respect. Legislation will be brought forward to introduce a duty of candour for public servants,” he said.

NHS staff are currently the only public servants who have a professional duty of candour. This duty, introduced in 2014, requires them to be open and honest with patients and families when something go wrong with their treatment or care that causes, or has potential to cause, harm or distress.

Labour pledge in its general election manifesto to introduce a "Hillsborough Law", placing a legal duty of candour on public servants and authorities, and to provide legal aid for victims of disasters or staterelated deaths. 

The duty of candour “will address the unacceptable defensive culture prevalent across too much of the public sector” highlighted in recent reports on the Hillsborough disaster and infected blood scandal, according to a briefing document published alongside the speech.

The document says that the bill “will be the catalyst for a changed culture in the public sector" by: 

  • Improving transparency and accountability where failure in the provision and delivery of public services is the subject of public investigation and scrutiny
  • Reducing the culture of defensiveness in the public sector
  • Helping ensure that the lack of candour uncovered in recent reports is not repeated, such as in the case of the Hillsborough and Infected Blood Inquiries

“It is part out our wider efforts to create a politics of public service,” the document adds.

In an introduction to the document, Keir Starmer wrote that it "not enough to deliver justice on outrages like the infected blood scandal and the Horizon scandal – we must take on the work of prevention to make sure this behaviour can never happen again".

The prime minister said the "Hillsborough Law" will "change the culture of defensiveness in the public sector that has denied families the justice they deserve and contributed to their suffering". 

"By improving transparency and accountability, we will make sure the public is truly at the heart of the public sector," he added.

Campaigners called for the introduction of such a law in the wake of the Hillsborough disaster, in which 97 football fans died in a crush at Hillsborough stadium in Sheffield in 1989. In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, police officers were told to blame "drunken, ticketless Liverpool supporters". An inquest in 2016 found the victims had been unlawfully killed and that their deaths were down to failures by police, the ambulance service and defects in the stadium.

In March, as leader of the opposition, Keir Starmer urged the government to bring in a statutory duty of candour for public servants following the publication of the final Infected Blood Inquiry report, which found major failings in advice given to ministers and top civil servants. “I have read that the government have called for evidence on the duty of candour in health, but I cannot think of a single example where that duty of candour should not apply to all public servants across the board,” Starmer said in the House of Commons. 

Starmer said the absence of a statutory duty of candour for officials had been "a failing in scandal after scandal and injustice after injustice from Grenfell to Horizon, Hillsborough and now the infected blood scandal".

“The story is familiar: concerns raised but ignored; reports written but not acted on; victims and their families campaigning for years just to be heard,” he said.

“I do not think it is possible for any of us to stand at these dispatch boxes and honestly say ‘never again’ unless we address that.”

The final report of the Infected Blood Inquiry called on ministers to introduce statutory duties of candour for civil servants and ministers in their day-to-day work that would be in line with the legal duties expected in evidence to courts, effectively strengthening non-statutory duties in the civil service code.

Inquiry chair Sir Brian Langstaff said departments' responses to the infected blood scandal had seen civil servants and ministers adopting "lines to take" without enough thought.

The background briefing for the King's Speech states that, alongside the duty of candour, the government will improve assistance for bereaved persons and core participants at inquests and public inquiries to ensure families are able to fully participate, including providing legal aid for victims of disasters or state-related death.

Fresh bills

The King’s Speech, delivered by the monarch but written by the UK government, contained 40 bills in total, including legislation to establish Great British Railways, Great British Energy, a Border Security Command, an Industrial Strategy Council and a new football regulator.

Charles kicked off the speech by saying the government’s legislative programme would be "mission-led" and based upon the principles of "security, fairness and opportunity for all".

He added that "securing economic growth will be a fundamental mission".

He also confirmed Labour’s plans to increase devolution, including setting up a Council of the Nations and Regions to strengthen the government’s work with governments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and the introduction an English devolution bill, which will give new powers to help metro mayors and combined authorities support local growth plans and allow local leaders to take control of their bus services.

The King also confirmed that all significant tax and spending changes will be subject to an independent assessment by Office for Budget Responsibility and Labour’s plans for a Modernisation Committee in the House of Commons tasked with driving up standards.

The speech also included a cyber security and resilience Bill to strengthen the UK's cyber defences.

The background briefing document mentioned recent cyber attacks affecting the Ministry of Defence and NHS as examples of essential services being "vulnerable to hostile actors".

"We need to take swift action to address vulnerabilities and protect our digital economy to deliver growth," the document said. 

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