Operational Delivery

By chance, two service delivery heavyweights have shared a single message. Ministers and officials alike should listen up

HM Passport Office will be abolished and its operations absorbed by the Home Office from 1 October, it has been announced today, and the organisation’s chief executive Paul Pugh will be replaced by a newly-appointed director general.

There is “unfinished business” in civil service reform, former head of the civil service Sir Bob Kerslake said yesterday – including devolving powers away from Whitehall, and breaking down departmental structures. 

Paul Pugh, chief executive of the Passport Office, has been accused of a “complete management failure” by the Home Affairs Select Committee. In a report published today, the committee calls for the office to be abolished and its functions to be returned to the direct control of ministers.

The Public Accounts Committee has warned the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) that it lacks the data to ensure that local authorities are receiving “value for money with their funding” in some targeted grant schemes.

The Home Office has managed to absorb the former UK Border Agency back into the Department without a significant fall in performance, according to a National Audit Office (NAO) report published today.

In the first of a series of articles examining digital services, Tim Gibson explains online voter registration – a new IT system lying at the very heart of our democracy.

Robert Devereux, permanent secretary at the Department for Work and Pensions, has rejected the National Audit Office's conclusion that the Work Programme is no more effective than its predecessors.

Top New Zealand official Iain Rennie is reforming a system often lauded in the UK. Suzannah Brecknell reports

A whip round June's interesting committee reports and hearings, with Winnie Agbonlahor

The government’s controversial patient record-sharing programme care.data, paused in February after noisy opposition, will be restarted as a pilot this autumn, according to NHS England’s national director for patients and information Tim Kelsey.

The UK Border Agency (UKBA), which was this year abolished by home secretary Theresa May, was “never going to work”, its former chief Rob Whiteman told the Public Administration Select Committee on 17 June.

The civil service is “one of the key players in resisting the devolution” of powers from Whitehall to local authorities, Clive Betts, chair of the Communities and Local Government Select Committee, has told CSW. 

An official responsible for an IT contracting error which cost the Ministry of Defence (MoD) £70m is no longer working for the department, its permanent secretary Jon Thompson told the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on 16 June​.

The government’s reluctance to devolve powers away from London has given a boost to the campaign for Scottish independence, Graham Allen, chair of the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee, has said.

The Department for Work and Pensions’ failure to pilot its Personal Independence Payment (PIP) programme has led to delays, backlogs and “unnecessary distress for claimants”, according to a report published today by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC).

The former UK Border Agency (UKBA) was doomed to fail due to its sheer scale and constant media attention, its former chief executive Rob Whiteman has said.

Civil service policymakers still need to improve their focus on outcomes and policy implementation, two top officials have said

The civil service has launched a new range of qualifications for people in the Operations profession.

Inadequate defences and complacency led to the 2012 attack on Camp Bastion, the Commons’ Defence Committee said yesterday.

The Major Projects Authority (MPA) is extending its range to cover 100 more projects from next year, CSW has learnt.

This week’s interviewee is a biomedical technician looking after ward-based medical equipment in an urban area hospital.

Challenge must be encouraged, no matter what the project.

The government must improve “basic housekeeping” of its published data to ensure that the public can assess its overall effectiveness, a report by the Institute for Government (IfG) says today.