A Cabinet Office minister has described reported plans from Reform UK to dismiss and replace every permanent secretary if it wins power as “for the birds”.
Speaking in a House of Lords debate, Baroness Ruth Anderson, who parliamentary secretary for the Cabinet Office, was asked by fellow Labour peer Philip Hunt about reports over the weekend that a Reform UK government would dismiss the top civil servants in every government department and replace them with people “more likely to implement” the party’s priorities.
The reports, in The Observer and The Guardian, suggested perm secs would be replaced wholesale by outsiders or existing officials considered more suitable.
Lord Hunt asked Anderson if she agreed that going down this path would “undermine the integrity of the civil service and do this country a great disservice”.
The minister responded: “My noble friend is absolutely right, and it suggests quite how unserious Reform UK is about governing. We have an independent civil service for a reason. It acts without fear or favour; it is subject to a stringent code of conduct, and it is there to make sure that our public services are delivered. Any suggestion otherwise is for the birds.”
The reports also drew scorn from Dave Penman, general secretary of the FDA union, which represents senior civil servants.
“An ideological purge does not make for good government,” Penman said. “You would lose experience and institutional memory, but you would also send a message to the rest of the civil service that they are not trusted.”
Penman said such a plan would “attract believers, but not necessarily the best people”.
“Another problem is that as soon as you have political picks, when you change the minister they will want their own pick as well,” he added. “In the last 10 years we have had whole football teams of secretaries of state. If you changed the permanent secretary every time, it would be a massive churn, and very disruptive.”
Penman also said there is “no real evidence that the civil service would get in the way”.
“Every civil servant knows they have to serve the government of the day,” he said. “It’s absolutely clear – you serve or you go.”
The reports of a wholesale removal of the perm sec cadre follow on from comments by Reform UK efficiency tsar Danny Kruger, who said in December that he anticipates "quite significant change at the top of the civil service".
Kruger said it was “seriously unacceptable the way the civil service has been run for decades” and that a Reform UK government would bring “real change” at the perm sec level, “bringing in people from outside to take those roles and to give ministers more authority to appoint and dismiss the people that advise them”.
The perm sec cadre has not lacked for significant change under the current Labour government.
Of the original core 21 perm secs when Labour came to power in July 2024, eleven have since left the civil service.
Early departures included Simon Case and Philip Barton,who were heads of the civil service and the diplomatic service respectively. Both left within six months of Labour's general election win.
Sir Chris Wormald, who was picked by Keir Starmer as his new cabinet secretary in December 2024 having led the Department of Health and Social Care for eight years, was ousted after just 14 months in the role.
Three perm secs have moved around but remained in government, including Dame Antonia Romeo, who has gone from leading the Ministry of Justice to being named Home Office perm sec in April 2025 to becoming cab sec last month.
That leaves seven departmental leaders who have not moved or announced an impending move – Cat Little (CO); James Bowler (HMT); Sarah Healey (MHCLG); Susan Acland-Hood (DfE); Gareth Davies (DBT); Susannah Storey (DCMS); Julie Harrison (NIO); and Andrew Goodall (WG).
New additions to the cadre during Labour’s 20 months in power have been a mix of appointments from outside the civil service who have significant previous experience within government such as Jo Farrar (MoJ) and Paul Kissack (Defra) – who joined from NHS Blood and Transplant and the Joseph Roundtree Foundation respectively – and promotions from within such as Emran Mian (DSIT) and Jo Shanmugalingam (DfT).
The most recent addition is Ofgem boss Jonathan Brearley as perm sec at the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero.
There will be more moves in the coming months, with a new Home Office perm sec yet to be named (second perm sec Simon Ridley has stepped in as acting perm sec) and replacements for Government Legal Department perm sec Susanna McGibbon and Department for Work and Pensions perm sec Sir Peter Schofield , who will depart in the spring and summer respectively, also yet to be announced.