Ministerial Staff College
The Army learnt, over two hundred years ago, that before officers were given charge of major units, they attended Staff College. Yet our ministers are given charge of departments employing thousands of people without any training at all. No wonder the government cocks things up so regularly. At our Ministerial Staff College, they would be taught, on day one: “Central Government: includes Government Departments and their ALBs: Executive Agencies, Non-Departmental Public Bodies, Non Ministerial Departments, and any other non-market bodies controlled and mainly financed by them.” They would soon discover that Executive Agencies and Executive Non-Departmental Public Bodies (ENDPBs) are almost the same, i.e. the parts of their parent department that implement policy, except that Agencies are part of their parent departments whereas in theory, but not in practice, ENDPBs are independent. We do not need ENDPBs.
If the Ministerial Staff College is to stand a chance of success, civil servants, no matter how charming, experienced and persuasive, should not be allowed near the place. Yes Minister may be amusing but it is also a dire warning. Teachers should be drawn from top business schools and retired ministers who achieved success in their day. Potential PMs should be taught not to move a minister who is just getting the hang of the job.
Students of best ministerial practice would also learn that Public Corporations, such as the BBC, which are supposed to be independent, should not be considered integral by their parent departments – the DCMS in this case. It would not take the first Staff College intake long to work out that the Executive Agency is the only form of ALB that any department needs. Advisory NDPBs are merely committees and ministers can invite advisers to advise without such formal trappings. Non Ministerial Departments should not continue unsupervised but be assigned to the most relevant ministers.
Executive agencies are excellent. Carrying out departmental policy requires a different mindset, and usually many more people, than devising policy and framing legislation. They will have, or should have, clear objectives and are required by law to publish annual reports on their achievements, costs, headcount, and the matters normally contained in any corporate report. The DWP is a flagrant example of a department that fails to understand this. According to its latest annual report, 75,368 of its 80,250 staff occupy its HQ, an unusual Chiefs to Indians ratio.
Governments wage war, from time to time, on ALBS, usually known as quangos, but then their numbers creep back up. In 2019, there were 295; according to the latest departmental annual reports, their number has grown back to 371. The DCMS sports no less than 45 of them, although its latest annual report claims only 38, including the BBC which is not an ALB at all. 15 are museums. The idea that we are governed by a museum culture may indeed have some merit. Certainly, the DCMS is not governed by numbers: in their annual report, the BBC headcount is 18,977, whereas according to the BBC’s annual report for the same period (p.262) it is 20,279.
Ministers are busy people with many claims on their time. Ministerial Staff College should teach them how to prioritise and how to focus. One key to how woeful this is at present is the length and dreariness of content of departmental annual reports. At 300 or more pages each, one wonders if ministers have even read their own department’s, never mind anyone else’s. Instead of clarification of priorities and quantified performance indicators (though there are some of those) we have fascinating things like half the workforce being female (as they are every year). 50 pages would be better than 300 if they provided learning as distinct from varnishing reality.