“I felt very strongly that we were conducting a strategy that was not following the prime minister’s goals.
So the government was following a very clear two-tier strategy where the clinically vulnerable, immunocompromised patients were being deprioritised in favour of those who were able to receive vaccines.
And I felt that was manifestly wrong, both ethically and morally, but also did not follow the goals that we’d been set, which was to protect the entire population.”
Dame Kate Bingham
Bingham also revealed frustrations with Whitehall, noting no one within BEIS had relevant expertise when she arrived, and criticised “groupthink” within government.
“And, more importantly, no one’s ever done anything. They’re all busy writing policy papers and sending each other stuff to review. None of that actually gets to the heart of what it is they’re trying to do. What are they trying to achieve? And are they measured against the delivery of their goals? And the answer is no”
I believe we need a civil service, but what Bingham says about BEIS rings very true in my experience of it from a completely different field of #retrofit, for which it also had responsibility.
How do we get the civil service we actually need?
This is an important question because it really matters at times of crisis…and climate breakdown is just as bigger crisis as #Covid, if not more so.
I think part of the problem is the make up of the senior civil service. It’s historically been privately and Oxbridge educated white men, with many entering as fresh graduates and is very London centric.
Where is the diversity or life experience?
I don’t think the private sector is the solution to all of government’s problems - often it’s really not, because working for the benefit of share holders and profit skews government objectives and policy away from delivering in the public interest.
But I think there is value in having people who have worked in both the private and public sector entering the civil service…and perhaps there should be more opportunities to enter into it therefore mid-career.
@JugglingWithEggs I worked in the Civil Service from 2002-2006. They only really have diversity at frontline/lower grades (maybe up to HEO/SEO) and a lot of the work is casual and fixed term contracts (they even wanted to keep me at Defra but were thwarted due to the fixed term and the only way I could have stayed in the service was transferring to Border Force, which I didn't want to do (as they would only have sent me up North to spy on Chinese restaurants)
I remember looking at who had been accepted into the civil service in 2000. In terms of the fast-track scheme it was incredibly white, male and elitist. I knew I didn’t stand a chance! But it’s interesting to hear how you found it from within.
@JugglingWithEggs its surprisingly easy to get in at lower grades and from minorities *if* you are willing to do unpleasant jobs (/particularly/ various kinds of surveillance/enforcement work), which also feeds a lot of the anger and conspiracy theories about "government overreach" (as white folk are not happy when they encounter a brown/black person who has the authority to stop them doing something or make life difficult for them/their business)
Are you glad you had the experience? If the short term contract issue could have been resolved, would you have stayed? Do you think there would be any more opportunities for more attractive internal progression today than in the 00’s?
I say this as someone who found myself in some unexpected places in my 20’s and they all added to my life experience even if on reflection, I don’t know what I was thinking!
@JugglingWithEggs I'd maybe have stayed at Defra for another few years, but wouldn't have wanted to remain with a Tory government. There are likely opportunities for internal progression up to SEO level in most departments, but again its for those who do shitty jobs at the frontline (for instance Ofcom have published a lot about a young female British Asian engineer who is now in a senior position, but gloss over the fact she had to work with the Police closing down pirate radio stations..
The glass ceiling and forcing people from diverse backgrounds to prove they’re willing to snitch on their own feels like being set up in a game where the old establishment still dictate the rules.
If we were in the US I guess the phrase ‘drain the swamp’ would crop up. I kind of feel that, but from an ideologically opposite perspective.
I believe that genuine diversity at all levels of decision making and delivery is what needs to happen if we are to survive.
@JugglingWithEggs My last decade in Office Job was spent working across a range of major civil service contracts as a private sector contractor.
It left me with admiration for the majority of civil servants I worked with, who were all too often caught between what actually needed done, the budget, and the latest rotation of political office holders.
I now work for a private contractor, having previously worked for a council. The way in which government funding is now overseen by private consultants means that everything seems to be at arm’s length from government departments. I don’t doubt there are good people in there somewhere, but too often there is silence and a complete absence of reality in how programmes are set up, while there appears to be an inherent class based distrust of those delivering the work.
@JugglingWithEggs That seems massively disjointed.
I can’t speak for how funding is overseen here now, but in my day it was very much driven by the political side with the civil service having to justify their bids.
The absence of reality in how programmes are set up strikes a chord though. Thinking of ones I worked on that were created without proper input from end users, and how much change was needed to crowbar in something useful.