A Bonus Conspiracy Theory – Goodbye to your local council

 

A common sense suggestion to merge civil servants and council officers could be the start of cuts to local authorities.

Baron Bichard, writing in the latest Civil Service World suggests scrapping distinctions between civil servants, council officers and NHS staff and creating a unified public service. The argument, on behalf of “the Commission for Smart Government” makes sense. 

If you have one public service, it will smash the bureaucratic boxes which make it hard to solve real-life problems. Michael Bichard hints that last year’s PPE crisis would have had a happier ending if – instead of lots of agencies around the country – there had been just one public service.

https://www.civilserviceworld.com/in-depth/article/time-to-end-the-great-divide-lets-scrap-distinctions-between-civil-servants-council-officers-and-nhs-staff

And of course, Michael Bichard was the first chief executive of a county council to be put in charge of a government agency (the Benefits Agency).  So he knows how much easier it would be for staff to flit between jobs – sorry, share expertise – if there was just one public service.

But I can’t help seeing some shrink-the-state cost saving behind this.  The biggest public sector costs are people and property. The 2014 paper, “Efficiency and Reform in the next Parliament” had a section on property and land which talked about “reforming how the state uses property…(removing) artificial boundaries between departments, Local Authorities and other public bodies..” 

This would be done by “the common sense principle of bringing different parts of the public sector together into a single building.” The example given in 2014 was Temple Quay Campus in Bristol, which is now, of course home to the HMRC regional centre. The only HMRC office in the South West of England, following the Building the Future closure programme.

Some local councils have already “privatised” themselves. They use service provider companies to do most of their work. Others share facilities with neighbouring councils.  If councils were part of a single public service, where would that go? 

Would the next question be – do you need a town council? Can’t the county council – based in one of those “common sense hubs” provide all the services? And if it’s all one public service, maybe some of that work doesn’t even have to be done by someone in your county? Or am I just being paranoid?


Popular posts from this blog

CONFESSIONS OF A VAT INSPECTOR

Image
 CONFESSIONS OF A VAT INSPECTOR by Dawn Fallon (ISBN 9 798445 671640) If the title makes you expect Liz Fraser and Robin Asquith having a clothing malfunction while arguing over tax points you’ll be disappointed. But Dawn Fallon’s CONFESSIONS OF A VAT INSPECTOR does give a lively account of what it was like to be a VAT Control Officer in HM Customs and Excise from 1986 to 1995.  While some of the detail of the pre-computer era may surprise a modern day HM Revenue and Customs VAT officer, they will probably feel a shock of recognition at most of Dawn’s experiences. She vividly captures the despair of sitting in a traders premises and realising that none of it matches what you were told in training. Another abiding truth is the pay. In May 2024 Jim Harra told the Public Accounts Committee that almost a third of HMRC staff had to be given a pay increase to ensure the department complied with the National Living Wage. Back in the 1980’s, Dawn is forced to take on extra work (as a ...
Read more

Confessions of a Jobsworth

Image
  In the past few weeks, as refugees are turned away and charity shipments to the Ukraine get stalled at the borders because they don’t have customs paperwork, the term “jobsworth” has been slung around at the Home Office, Border Force and HMRC (and private contractors).  Now that things have calmed down a bit, it’s made me look back at being a “jobsworth”. I’ve just done a bit of research and found that the term became popular in the 1970’s when Esther Rantzen used to present a “Jobsworth of the Week” award on her TV show, That’s Life. The idea seems to be that a “jobsworth” is not just someone who rigidly applies the rules (as their contract of employment requires) but that they gleefully take the most rigid and obstructive interpretation of those rules, just to make life difficult. A lot of the folk who shout “jobsworth” do it when they’re wound up. Give them five minutes to calm down, and they’d admit it was unreasonable. But there are others who seem to have a Donald Trum...
Read more

Best of British to the HMRC Surge Team

Image
Reading HMRC’s advert for enthusiastic team players to join its Surge and Rapid Response Team, my response is to wish them a sincere Best of British.  When I started this blog, I warned myself that my experience of HMRC was time-limited and would soon become outdated. Even so, I can only hope their enthusiasm is rewarded. When I joined HM Customs and Excise as a Band 1 (50% of an Admin Assistant) my goals and targets were easy: make it to the first week, make it to the first month, follow the rules, do what you were told and get past my probationary period.  In my first month I witnessed a retirement speech in which a bearded old exciseman told everyone that the wheels were coming off the wagon and management didn’t have a clue. I watched it with indifference because (as I said) I was focussed on following the rules and doing what I was told. I never dreamed that one day I’d be taking the same jaundiced view – or even that I’d give a damn. Looking back at the internal structur...
Read more