Civil Servants (Training)

HC Deb 11 July 1996 vol 281 cc582-626

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Brandreth]

4.5 pm

The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Mr. Roger Freeman)

The House will welcome the chance to debate the training and development of the civil service. I am sure that the House would expect me also to comment on the press release issued yesterday by the Association of the First Division Civil Servants, which was referred to in the press this morning.

The Government do not accept the statement made by the Association of First Division Civil Servants in response to a survey, described as a political one, among its members. That press release states: The response we have already received suggests a continuing and widespread problem". that problem is an 'apparent retreat' from impartiality". That statement by the FDA is important. I must say that I am surprised at the timing of its release. I understand that my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister referred to it at Prime Minister's Question Time. Despite being surprised at the timing of that press release before today's debate, may I put on record that the Government entirely refute any implication that there is a loss of impartiality in the civil service? I am sure that the House would appreciate an explanation of the reasoning behind my refutation.

I am glad to welcome to the Chamber the hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr. Mandelson). I recognise his fingerprints all over the FDA press release, because I believe I am correct in saying that he used to advise it. The timing of that press release, of which I received news only fairly late last night, raises questions about why it had to be released before today's debate.

Mr. Peter Mandelson (Hartlepool)

rose—

Mr. Freeman

I will give way to the hon. Gentleman once I have made my point.

The press reports belie the increasingly typical behaviour of the hon. Member for Hartlepool to exaggerate and seek political advantage.

Mr. Mandelson

I am grateful to the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster for giving way. Will he take it from me as an hon. Member of the House that I had absolutely no foreknowledge of the FDA statement? I had no knowledge of its consideration of the matter at its executive in the morning. The only time I knew about the matter was when I was contacted by the press office of the Labour party with a request that I should comment on the statement made by the FDA. That was at 6 o'clock yesterday evening. Will he accept that?

Mr. Freeman

Entirely. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for making clear his involvement in the issuance of that press release, and I accept his comments. That does not invalidate my clear statement that the Government repudiate the allegation made in that press release, which refers to the "'apparent retreat' from impartiality" and I should like to give the House a reasoned justification for my statement.

Mr. Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow)

The Chancellor mentioned the First Division Association. I do not think that he can accuse Lord Bancroft of impartiality. His question of 8 March has still not been answered: what credible capability will remain … for ensuring the integrity of the systems used by the mass of departmental recruiters—the vital executive and clerical officers?"—[Official Report, House of Lords, 8 March 1996; Vol. 570, c. 544.] As far as I know, that, like a number of other questions, has never been answered. Not only my hon. Friend the Member for Hartlepool (Mr. Mandelson)—who was wrongly accused in this instance—but former heads of the civil service are asking questions.

Mr. Freeman

With respect, that is a different issue. With the House's permission, I shall be pleased to deal with it if the hon. Gentleman speaks a little later. The proposed privatisation of Recruitment and Assessment Services has nothing to do with political impartiality, which is questioned by the FDA. I do not consider it a matter for controversy, but I appreciate that some Members of both Houses may disagree.

Let me justify my earlier comment about the FDA's press release. I remind the House that the Government is committed to the maintenance of a permanent civil service, based on the values of integrity, political impartiality, objectivity, selection and promotion on merit and accountability through Ministers to Parliament. That is a quotation from paragraph 2.1 of "Taking Forward Continuity and Change", published in January 1995 as Cm 2748.

Let me give another quotation. All Ministers in the Government are under a duty not to use public resources for party political purposes, to uphold the political impartiality of the Civil Service, and not to ask civil servants to act in any way which would conflict with the Civil Service Code". That is in paragraph 3 of the code, issued on 1 January this year, which itself repeats "Questions of Procedure for Ministers". This Government introduced the civil service code, and we are determined to uphold it.

I refute the allegations for three reasons. Perhaps, in fact, they are not really allegations, but, as a result of innuendo, repetition and dramatisation in the press, amount to allegations. First, my own direct experience of working with civil servants after 11 years in the Government confirms their political impartiality. The FDA's reported findings do not match my experience. That means that I shall want to look very carefully at such evidence as the FDA is able to give us. Sir Robin Butler, head of the home civil service, will meet representatives of the association at an early date in order to understand what the allegations are about.

Secondly, I urge all civil servants to read the code. It states clearly that, when civil servants believe that they are being required to act in a way that is inconsistent with the code, they should follow due process, and report the matter within their own Department, up to permanent secretary level. If they are dissatisfied with the departmental response, they should report the matter to the independent civil service commissioners. It would be interesting to know how many of the 20 cases referred to in the press this morning have reached the commissioners.

I understand from the annual report of the civil service commissioners that only one case is still to be examined—an allegation of undue political interference with civil servants by the commissioners. It is certainly not true that, if there are 20 cases—as is claimed by the press release and supporting documents—they have not yet reached the commissioners. They should, if there is anything to allege.

Mrs. Gwyneth Dunwoody (Crewe and Nantwich)

Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that, if the union, which has no political affiliation with the Labour party—let there be no doubt about that—thinks that there is a problem, to the extent that it chooses to highlight it when it knows that the House of Commons is debating the matter, and chooses to refer to specific cases, that is enough evidence of real unease among a group of supporters of Government procedure who are not in any way political to warrant an answer very different from the one that he has just given?

Mr. Freeman

I hope that the First Division Association is behaving impartially and is politically neutral, and that it intends to continue to do that under Governments of whatever political colour. This is a sensitive area, and I hope that the FDA has no hidden political agenda. [Interruption.] I shall be happy to give way when I have finished the point.

The hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) asked about the cases that had been presented; but they have not been presented to the civil service commissioners. I have said that the press release and this morning's press comment relate to about 20 cases in a very generalised fashion. If those cases are serious, the people who are bringing them should follow the procedure set out in the code, and the cases should be examined by the commissioners.

Mr. Mandelson

If they dare to.

Mr. Freeman

The hon. Gentleman says, "If they dare to." We devised the code after long discussions with civil service representatives, to provide a mechanism that would enable civil servants to report any concerns to their permanent secretary through the command chain, not through Ministers, and then to the commissioners. For the hon. Gentleman to imply that somehow there would be ministerial, political interference in that process is unworthy.

Mr. Derek Foster (Bishop Auckland)

I detect the beginnings of taking this matter seriously, and that is in stark contrast to the reaction of the Deputy Prime Minister at Prime Minister's Question Time, when he said that there was not one shred of verifiable evidence. I understand that he has not yet seen the evidence, so how can he so dismiss it? The First Division Association—the mandarins' trade union if I may put it like that—consists of serious people. I am disturbed that a Minister who is known for his courtesy and consideration should cast aspersions on the FDA's motivations. I urge him to withdraw that, take the matter seriously, examine the evidence and return to the House to make a statement.

Mr. Freeman

I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will read the record. I regularly meet representatives of the trade unions for all civil servants, including the FDA. If the matter was of such dramatic and pressing importance, and if there were cases for which there was clear evidence, I would have expected to hear about them directly, not only from the FDA but from the other civil service unions.

The matter has been raised regularly by trade union representatives, including those of the FDA. To this specific, direct and dramatic issue, my only reaction, which I think is correct, is to say that the right procedure should be followed. I say that for the two reasons that I have already given, which are my direct personal experience and the fact that there is a correct procedure. I refute the allegations.

My third reason is contained in Lord Nolan's report. Paragraph 45 of Cmnd. 2850 states: We believe that standards of behaviour in the civil service as a whole remain very high … Nor have we received evidence that other important standards—political impartiality or the ideal of public service—are under systematic threat. More importantly, paragraph 57 of the document states: From time to time there have been allegations … that civil servants were being asked by Ministers to undertake duties which were not appropriate to their non-political status … No evidence was offered to us that these are other than isolated cases. The existing guidance offered both to Ministers and civil servants has always been clear on the point that there is a boundary beyond which a civil servant should not be asked, or volunteer, to go. I am taking this matter seriously, which is why I trespassed in the opening part of the debate by referring to it. I have put my position as clearly as possible. It will doubtless be referred to in the debate, and, if I am able to catch your eye later, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I will respond to the points not only of the right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Foster), but of the hon. Member for Hartlepool, if he is going to wind up for the Opposition.

Mr. Dalyell

rose—

Mr. Freeman

I give way to the hon. Gentleman, and then I must make progress.

Mr. Dalyell

I understand the need to make progress, but could we be clear what is being insinuated about the FDA? My right hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Foster) asked the Minister to withdraw his remark. If it was a slip of the tongue, one could understand it, but is something being insinuated about the FDA—or will the Minister say that it has behaved impeccably?

Mr. Freeman

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will reflect on my remarks when he reads Hansard. I have nothing to withdraw. [Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Hartlepool wishes me to refer again to the remarks, I said that I hope that the FDA does not have a hidden political agenda. That is a hope.

Mr. Dalyell

That is an insinuation.

Mr. Freeman

Let me explain further to the hon. Gentleman that both the timing and content of the press release are disturbing.

Mrs. Dunwoody

Nonsense.

Mr. Freeman

The hon. Lady says, "Nonsense." I look forward to her contribution to the debate.

Mr. Dalyell

It is deeply offensive to say of the FDA, "I hope that it does not have a hidden agenda". When a Minister comes to the Dispatch Box and expresses the hope that the FDA, which represents senior civil servants, does not have a hidden agenda, he owes it to the House of Commons to be a bit explicit about what he means.

Mr. Freeman

Perhaps some of those who contribute to the debate will allow my hope to be vindicated.

Mr. Robert Maclennan (Caithness and Sutherland)

I hope that the Minister understands that, just as civil servants do not speak politically for him, we do not speak politically for them, and any views that we may express in the debate will be our views.

Mr. Freeman

Of course I accept that. I am talking about the disclosure of fact, not opinion or anyone speaking on the FDA's behalf. I am not aware that anyone does speak on its behalf.

Mr. Derek Foster

I am sorry to intervene again, but it is clear that my hon. Friends are not satisfied, because the Minister is not prepared to clarify his remarks. The imputation of any hidden political agenda is a serious charge. which is totally uncharacteristic of the Minister. Will he either clarify that or withdraw it?

Mr. Freeman

I will certainly study the text of my remarks. I stick by both the spirit and the detailed letter of what I have said this afternoon. I drew the House's attention to a specific press release issued by the FDA. I will quote it again, and then perhaps hon. Members will allow me to move on: The response to a political survey of FDA members— we have already received"— hon. Members will know that that refers to about 20 cases— suggests a continuing and widespread problem. I have specifically rejected that conclusion in, I hope, crystal-clear language.

I welcome this opportunity to discuss the White Paper "Development and Training for Civil Servants: A Framework for Action", which I presented to Parliament on 1 July. This is the first White Paper devoted to the important issue of training and development of civil servants. Its White Paper status reflects the importance that the Government place on this subject.

This country has a world-class civil service. It is respected for the successful series of initiatives being carried through to improve efficiency and effectiveness. These initiatives are implemented, of course, by people. If the civil service is to meet the challenges of continuing improvement in a fast-changing environment, civil servants need the skills, knowledge and confidence to raise performance levels.

I need hardly say that the UK civil service has a long-standing and well-deserved reputation for its high standards of integrity and impartiality, and we mean to keep it that way. In the 1994 White Paper on the civil service, "The Civil Service: Continuity and Change", the Government made clear their commitment to maintaining those standards throughout our programmes of change. This January, we published the civil service code, which summarises the constitutional framework within which all civil servants work, and the values underpinning their role.

The new White Paper on training and development emphasises the importance of civil service core values, and stresses that they should be brought to the attention of new entrants to the civil service at all levels. All civil servants should understand the relevance of the core values to their particular responsibilities.

Overall, the new paper builds on both the recently published third White Paper on competitiveness and the continuity and change White Paper, and brings forward a policy on the development of civil servants. It is evolutionary, not revolutionary—but it concludes that there is a need for a step change in training and development, to raise the skill levels of civil servants.

The development and training White Paper is about the people who work in the civil service and their development needs, which is why I addressed a foreword in the White Paper to all civil servants, of whatever grade. I want them to feel that the paper is of real importance and relevance to them.

The White Paper does not underestimate or denigrate the current abilities and professionalism of civil servants—far from it: I have great admiration for their abilities and their dedication to public service—but the need to raise levels of skills and knowledge is a challenge facing all organisations and all the people who work in them. That applies to the public and private sectors, and it applies within the civil service to all Departments and agencies, large and small. It applies to civil servants at all levels.

I frequently hear concerns expressed by civil servants and those who speak for them that they feel that they no longer have a job for life, and feel threatened by insecurity and change. In this day and age, no jobs—whether in the private or public sector—can be guaranteed for life. All of us in this economy and society are subject to changes unrecognisable and unforecastable 20,30 or 40 years ago. As the Minister directly responsible for the civil service on a day-to-day basis, it is my job to make sure that civil servants can cope with that process of change and uncertainty, by improving their skills, training and development.

I will comment in outline on the main points of the White Paper. The programme for action has three main themes. They are: a strong commitment to the Investors in People standard; a drive to raise levels of skills and awareness; and giving civil servants greater responsibility for their own development and careers, within a supportive partnership.

I am sure that Opposition Members welcome the com-mitment to Investors in People, and that it will be approached on a bipartisan basis. It is the national standard for well managed organisations that develop employees to meet their overall objectives. Investors in People is a hard-nosed standard that, properly implemented, brings bottom-line benefits. The standard is about communication within organisations, with employees and managers understand-ing their roles and responsibilities.

Mr. Dalyell

Page 11 of the White Paper makes the point that there has been increasing recognition of the importance of effective communication"— the word "communication" appears in bold type— with staff—the promotion of genuine and productive dialogue within organisations. Is it not a question of practising rather than preaching? If the Minister had followed his own advice about communication, how on earth could he have got himself in a tangle with the First Division Association?

Mr. Freeman

I believe strongly in communication, which is why I have regular meetings with members of the FDA and other civil service unions—and will continue to do so.

The Government have set national targets for Investors in People. By the year 2000, we want 70 per cent. of all organisations employing 200 or more staff to be recognised as meeting the Investors in People standard.

Mr. Maclennan

I should be grateful if the Chancellor would bundle the business jargon and explain what he means by "bottom-line dividends", which is a phrase usually used more in respect of balance sheets than the performance of civil servants.

Mr. Freeman

I apologise for the jargon. It is sometimes easier to communicate by speaking directly without notes than by reading a speech. I do not intend to read all my speech.

Typically, the phrase "bottom-line benefits" means what happens in the organisation. It can be expressed financially, and it often is in the private sector. In the public sector, that is less possible, but not impossible. In the jargon, it means that results are delivered. People feel that they are part of an organisation. They are motivated, the managers communicate to them what is required, and they participate in setting their own targets. It is, in my view, common sense.

We believe that the civil service is ready for a more challenging target. Departments and agencies have been committed to carrying forward plans to become investors in people since 1994. We have had some real successes. A total of 12 per cent. of civil servants work in 58 organisations that have gained Investors in People status. I have been impressed by the enthusiasm and commitment within those organisations, and their evidence that it really does improve performance. These range from the Employment Service as a whole—which is an admirable achievement—many Benefits Agency offices, two prisons and five Ministry of Defence units, not to mention the Fire Service College.

Armed with that evidence, I have been encouraging Departments and agencies to give Investors in People a high priority. The response to the civil service-wide seminar I chaired in January, together with information on progress and target dates collected this year, has convinced Ministers in charge of Departments that the civil service has the overall commitment and momentum to go beyond the national target.

The civil service target is ambitious, but, I believe, realistic. It is that, by the year 2000, all civil servants will be employed in organisations which are investors in people. It is an important target, to which the Government are committed. We have also set interim milestones for 1997 and 1998, so that we can check on progress towards our millennium target.

The second main theme of the White Paper is skills and awareness. That is the drive to raise levels of skills throughout the civil service. Properly targeted investment in the training and development of civil servants, in line with the needs of the organisation, is an investment in Britain. Much of that investment will be particular to the needs of individual Departments and agencies, but the White Paper highlights four areas where action is needed across the civil service in support of Department and agency objectives.

The first is the continuing development of a stronger managerial culture. That is the key message of "Continuity and Change", and it carries through to this White Paper.

The nature of civil service work is changing. [Interruption.] Does the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich wish to intervene?

Mrs. Dunwoody

I was just wondering whether the Minister, who is, basically, an honourable person.. was going to refer to some great management triumph such as the Child Support Agency.

Mr. Freeman

I have experienced the failings of the Child Support Agency in my constituency. We are all responsible for that—Ministers, Parliament and those who work for the agency. We should all learn by our mistakes. [Interruption.] I am not sure whether the hon. Member for Hartlepool was a Member of the House when we debated the Child Support Agency. We all have a responsibility for the lack of scrutiny and the lack of foresight involved in the establishment of the agency. I do not pretend for one moment that everything provided by the public sector is right.

I pay tribute to the Child Support Agency for substantially improving its performance, but I am well aware from my constituents that it has created many problems, particularly of communication and management. However, as I have said, I am impressed by improvements. We shall see whether all the outstanding problems can be resolved.

The nature of civil service work is changing. Responsibilities are being devolved, and the emphasis is on achieving high quality and timely results. Successful management of resources and people at all levels is crucial as is clear communication. These changes require all managers, and all aspiring managers, to have new and better developed skills.

The Government want to see Departments and agencies moving towards linking the skills they need to nationally recognised qualifications such as national vocational qualifications and masters of business administration. We want to see the acquisition of those qualifications in the service. That will give organisations a greater confidence that staff have reached a particular level of competence and give individuals a clearer confidence in their own abilities. Such qualifications will also improve the currency of their curricula vitae as they take the initiative in applying for jobs, perhaps in the private sector as well as the public, and pursuing their careers.

The second area is a much freer emphasis on the use and development of civil servants with specialist expertise. The civil service has always been particularly strong on the flexibility and adaptability of staff. It is a quality that is vital to success as organisations change and move forward. Individuals have more responsibility. There is a greater need to get things right first time.

We cannot afford otherwise. We need real expertise in functional specialisms such as purchasing, resource accounting and information technology. We need skills such as project management and business planning. We need specialist and professional skills that can be deployed more widely—for instance, those of scientists and engineers. We have called such expertise "career anchors", and we look to Departments and agencies to encourage and recognise those who offer such in-depth skills.

Mr. Dalyell

On page 33 of the White Paper, the paragraph entitled "Science and Technology Training for the Senior Civil Service" outlines latest IT issues such as the Internet and electronic fraud, and says: A separate series of seminars will explore how the use of IT can improve business practices within the Civil Service. I ask this not as a hostile but as a factual question. What resources, and by what method, are the civil service devoting to on-going training, which is an increasingly complex subject?

Mr. Freeman

To answer that important intervention, I shall jump ahead a little and comment now, as this is a convenient point, on IT in the civil service.

We need to bring in skills from the private sector to work alongside those in the public sector to ensure that we can develop information technology that can be used by all citizens. I am delighted to make an announcement to the House concerning the work of the central IT unit, which recruits from both the public and the private sector.

I hope that it will be possible for the Government to produce, based on the work of CITU, a Green Paper in the autumn, charting the way forward on the use of information technology across the civil service. Two strands are involved, the first of which is the relationship between Departments.

I am talking not about systems but about services to the consumer. We must not seek to standardise across Government Departments the way in which services are developed using IT—the hardware and software. That, perhaps, is for each Department, or for experts—perhaps external consultants—to decide or advise on. The first strand is to ensure that the interchange of data between Departments is organised much more effectively and efficiently.

Mr. Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley)

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Freeman

I must finish this point, then I shall give way.

That is not something that the Government do as well as they should. I use as an example data interchange between the Crown Prosecution Service, the police, the Court Service, the courts themselves; or between the emergency services; or between the Inland Revenue, where it is appropriate, and other agencies—protecting, of course, the confidentiality of individuals; or ensuring that data that are required legitimately by one agency, which is passed in paper form, can be downloaded or transmitted by electronic mail between one Department and another.

The second strand involves serving the citizen. At the moment, if the hon. Member for Linlithgow wanted a tax disc for his car, or wanted to complete his tax form, he would deal, typically, with the civil service by mail, with the consequent delays and the enormous amount of paperwork. I pay tribute to the efficiency of the civil service in dealing with this great flood of documentation, but we need to transform that.

Literally, a revolution is required, so that the citizen can interrogate the Government directly, asking for information, for a self-assessment form for taxation purposes. The Government should respond directly to the citizen, by sending the forms required to be completed, or perhaps transmitting the tax disc. I use that example without any specific knowledge of whether it might be appropriate.

In the Green Paper, we want to see examples of where the private sector could play a crucial role with the public sector in developing pilot schemes, perhaps financing those schemes, perhaps even financing much of the investment in IT required in the future.

The civil service has a crucial role to play, and its skills must be upgraded. I am talking about the most junior civil servants as well as the most senior permanent secretaries. We must achieve that not only through the mechanisms I have described—and we must provide the resources for training and development—but by recruiting from outside.

Mr. Nigel Evans

My right hon. Friend may know that I am a bit of an IT junkie, if not a bit of an anorak. How much learning is there, not just from the sharing of information with other British civil servants, but through contacts with civil servants overseas? We can learn from them, as they can learn from us.

Mr. Freeman

My hon. Friend is right. I am glad to confirm that civil servants and those on secondment from the private sector in the central IT unit have been travelling around the world recently, looking in particular at north America and what is already available through information technology.

My personal wish—it is not yet a view expressed by the Government in the Green Paper—is that Britain should become the first major country in the world to use IT to the full, not only in improving the interrelationships between Departments but in serving the consumer—the citizen—electronically as opposed to doing so through written communication. There are tremendous challenges ahead, and we should grip them—

Mr. Bernard Jenkin (Colchester, North)

As any business man knows, the fastest way to implement new technology in a business is not necessarily to buy and own every piece of equipment and to employ every person necessary to the process. The Social Security Select Committee is concerned at the vast quantity of computing that is owned and employed directly by the Government. Is my right hon. Friend considering privatising what are in effect fantastically large businesses, and ensuring that we have faster and more effective technology transfer through the civil service as a result?

Mr. Freeman

I agree with my hon. Friend. I made the distinction between services and systems. Systems can be provided and financed by the private sector, but the Government must decide what services are to be provided to the citizen. Then we can either privatise, contract out or finance in the private sector the provision of the systems necessary to deliver those services.

Mr. Peter Bottomley (Eltham)

My right hon. Friend is coming towards the conclusion of a very interesting speech on an important subject. In the document, "Development and Training for Civil Servants", paragraph 1.15 on page 7 states: The Civil Service College will have a continuing role in the provision of training and development programmes". I speak for many people across the political spectrum and outside who recognise the central role of the Civil Service College in protecting the ethos as well as the continuity and improvement of civil service training. We must recognise that the civil service often gets ordinary people to do ordinary things, to achieve extraordinary results for the public. Can my right hon. Friend assure the House that there are no plans to privatise the college?

Mr. Freeman

I can so confirm. Indeed, I would like the college to develop further, and to train and develop more civil servants. For certain courses, it can do so with other bodies, such as universities here and abroad and other training organisations. We should not view the college as an isolated organisation entirely within the civil service, which has no connection or interchange with the private sector.

I pay tribute to Dr. Stephen Hickey and his staff for what they have achieved. My right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath), the former Prime Minister, launched the college almost 25 years ago. A great deal has been achieved, and there is a great deal more to be achieved.

I want to conclude by talking about recruitment. Staff development can provide many of the skills and much of the awareness needed. The reductions in the numbers of staff at all levels of the civil service is bound to have an effect on recruitment. However, the Government want to ensure that the movement towards wider use of open recruitment to meet staffing needs at all levels is maintained.

The White Paper includes several initiatives. One is a new push to increase external recruitment at middle management levels to bring in at least an additional 50 middle managers in the first year of an interdepartmental scheme to be launched this autumn, and 80 by March 1998.

Another is to broaden the appeal of the fast stream competition, increasing the proportion of such recruits with science qualifications, and improving the tests for numeracy. We would like to increase the total share of recruits with scientific backgrounds from 20 per cent. to 30 per cent. by the close of the 1998–99 competition. I announced that revised fast stream development programme to the House on 12 June, and we have set targets in key areas against which to measure progress.

Mr. Peter Bottomley

I welcome that statement. Some 45 per cent. of our graduates have qualifications in science, maths, engineering and medicine. Therefore, even if we achieve those interim targets, there will still be an arts bias that may not be justified by the responsibilities that those graduates will take on when they join the civil service.

Mr. Freeman

We should fall into the trap of developing an anti-arts bias. Several hon. Member; here today have arts degrees—I recognise at least three. There is nothing wrong with an arts degree. However, we want to recruit more scientists and specialists, who should be able to reach the top of the civil service and become permanent secretaries.

It is extremely important that we recognise that the old image of a double first in Greats at Oxford or Cambridge being the only passport to becoming a permanent secretary of a major Department is out of date, and should be out of date. We want to replace it with a meritocracy drawn from many different skills.

Mrs. Dunwoody

I am glad to hear such a sterling statement of a real revolutionary management future. The right hon. Gentleman was a Minister at the Department of Transport when large numbers of highly trained scientists in the research laboratories, who had spent their lifetimes working for the Government, were told in their middle years, "Thank you very much. We like you very much, but we think you are too expensive. If you cannot be sold off to someone who has a very specific commercial bias, we will throw you out on the streets." I do not mind the right hon. Gentleman believing that it is his view that specialists are welcome in the civil service; he just should not expect the House of Commons to believe him.

Mr. Freeman

I do not accept the argument that, simply because an agency or an organisation is privatised for good reason, somehow that is the end of life. It may be for the individual—

Mrs. Dunwoody

They lost their jobs.

Mr. Freeman

The hon. Lady may say that. The right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland and I have debated—and no doubt will do so again in due course—our privatisation programme in the Cabinet Office for parts of the Office of Public Service. I firmly believe that the careers of the civil servants affected will be improved rather than diminished by working in the private sector. It is one reason why the hon. Lady is sitting on the Opposition Benches, while I am sitting on the Government Front Bench.

Mr. Dalyell

In a debate in the House of Lords on 8 March, Lord Allen of Abbeydale—formerly Sir Philip Allen—raised a point about people getting back into the civil service after privatisation. Have the Government focused their mind on the way in which people who have left the civil service can get back into it, because I gather that often the door is shut?

Mr. Freeman

That is an important point. I have just referred to a specific recruitment programme of up to 80 middle managers. They could include those who have left the civil service but wish to return. They would not be part of the usual recruitment process, where we typically start at the bottom.

More importantly—I did not have time to refer to this in the White Paper—we want to extend the principle of advertising posts in the civil service. That does not mean that all posts will be open to external applicants, but we want to ensure that roughly one third of the senior grade posts are advertised, with about half being filled by people from the private sector. That means that one sixth of all the opportunities available are filled in that way.

If the hon. Gentleman is interested in the statistics, perhaps I could answer a parliamentary question on the subject and give him more details. I am interested in his question. There could be expertise, skill and experience that is worth re-recruiting back into the civil service, and under our reforms we are widening those opportunities.

I shall finish now, because I have troubled the House for far too long already. I commend the White Paper to the House; it is a serious attempt to raise a subject that has often been ignored both by the press and—dare I say it?—by politicians. Training and development is often regarded as a humdrum subject, although I exclude the two Members now on the Opposition Front Bench from that criticism, because both the right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland and the hon. Member for Hartlepool, to their credit, have taken an interest in training and development in the past. I hope that the House takes the White Paper seriously, and I commend it to hon. Members.

4.50 pm

Mr. Derek Foster (Bishop Auckland)

I am grateful to the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and to the usual channels, too, for making the debate possible. Obviously the Association of First Division Civil Servants—the FDA—has stung the Office of Public Service and its Ministers rather badly. Only a couple of lines in my speech refer to the findings in passing, yet the right hon. Gentleman devoted most of the first part of his speech to the subject. It is quite wrong for Ministers to assume that we have colluded with the FDA and that it issued its press release so that we could refer to it in the debate. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Mr. Bernard Jenkin

In fairness to my right hon. Friend, I should point out that only a few words at the beginning of his speech touched on that matter. What took up so much time was the fact that so many Opposition Members seemed stung by what he said. The interventions went on and on.

Mr. Foster

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that intervention, but I shall not stray down the path of giving even more time to that subject now.

There are half a million civil servants, who spend £20 billion in public expenditure. Clearly, development and training must be central to the effective management of those huge resources. In the first sentence of his foreword to the White Paper on development and training, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster says: The people who work in the Civil Service are special. I agree, and civil servants will be delighted to hear that the right hon. Gentleman says that. It stands in marked contrast to the way in which civil servants have been treated and spoken about over the past 17 years by Conservative Ministers. They have had to suffer continual denigration at the hands of Ministers; they have been told that they are second rate, and it has been implied that if they were any good they would be in the private sector making loads of money.

The Deputy Prime Minister was at it again when he gave evidence to the Public Service Select Committee on 28 February. My hon. Friend the Member for Morley and Leeds, South (Mr. Gunnell) had asked him: Under that you do take the view within that section"— that is, that section of his reply— that you have always believed that many tasks carried out by the public service would be better done in the private sector, do you not? The Deputy Prime Minister replied: Yes". My hon. Friend then asked: Do you believe that private sector practices are inherently better than public sector practices? The Deputy Prime Minister answered: in many cases, yes. His approach seems to send the message, "Until morale improves, the flogging will continue."

The private sector has continually been held up as being able to solve all the public sector's problems—although in my view the United Kingdom private sector does not have an outstanding record. The long-term rate of economic growth under the Conservatives has been well beneath the 2.5 per cent. per annum achieved by the United Kingdom since the industrial revolution, and certainly beneath the long-term rate of growth in the 1950s and 1960s, which were so despised by Lady Thatcher as the years of consensus.

The management of change is becoming the most important challenge facing government. The civil and public services have been subject to wave upon wave of change—a state of affairs sometimes described as "permanent revolution"—with the next steps agencies, privatisation, contracting out, delayering, downsizing and the private finance initiative.

The privatisation of Her Majesty's Stationery Office, of Recruitment and Assessment Services, the Occupational Health Service Agency and the Chessington Computer Centre have already been announced. The other day the privatisation of the custody service was announced. Just imagine—Group 4 in charge of the Crown jewels and No. 10 Downing street. In just over 12 months the custody service has spent £100,000 on training—money from the taxpayer, from which the private sector owners will benefit.

Much of the change has been very poorly managed and has resulted in widespread demoralisation and a feeling of insecurity. In an interview in The Observer of last November, Sir Robin Butler said that the revolution sweeping Whitehall had sapped morale and created a climate of insecurity. The recently published FDA MORI survey revealed that 40 per cent. of senior FDA members expected to leave the service shortly and that morale was at a low ebb. The much more recent survey of civil servants conducted by The Observer found that 92 per cent. believed that civil service morale was quite bad or very bad, and 73 per cent. would not advise the next generation to join the civil service.

Those findings were underlined by an article in The Guardian on 13 June, which reported a 35 per cent. fall in fast-stream applications to enter the civil service. Whenever and wherever I meet civil servants they speak of demoralisation and job insecurity. That will have to be tackled by a new Government from the outset, and development and training will be central to that task.

Permanent revolution will not be followed by permanent counter-revolution under Labour. There will be no return to 1979, to build a better yesterday. Indeed, for many reasons, the pace of change will not slacken. The first reason is that change is driven by international competitive forces. Secondly, the drive for efficient high-quality services will continue. Thirdly, Labour will inherit the electorate's wish for low taxes and better public services.

Fourthly, Labour will inherit very tight public expenditure plans. Fifthly, Labour will wish to abide by the Maastricht criteria for public expenditure and borrowing—

Mrs. Dunwoody

That would be a mistake.

Mr. Foster

I did not expect my hon. Friend to greet that idea with huge applause.

Sixthly, Labour will play a more constructive role at the heart of Europe. Seventhly, information technology will develop further, resulting in job losses and reorganisation of Government Departments and agencies.

In addition to all those pressures for change, Labour will vigorously pursue five culture changes to restore trust between people and government, and to reconnect citizens with their public services. Those culture changes will make further large demands on development and training.

The first culture change will be greater openness. Whitehall is reputedly the most secretive of all the developed democracies. The Government have taken some steps towards open government in the past four years, but the pace has been far too slow. Far greater momentum will be achieved when Labour assumes power, because of freedom of information legislation. Indeed, changes not requiring legislation will be introduced immediately upon our assuming power.

Mr. Bernard Jenkin

What information does the right hon. Gentleman consider should be freely available which is not currently available?

Mr. Foster

Again the hon. Gentleman invites me to stray from the main purpose of the debate. We shall debate that point with great pleasure on another occasion.

The second cultural change that Labour will introduce is devolution. Devolution to Scotland, Wales and the English regions may meet resistance in Whitehall despite the limited measure of decentralisation to regional Government offices.

Thirdly, we shall pursue another culture change—that of the user as stakeholder. The Minister touched upon that in his speech. Labour is determined to develop user-focused and user-friendly public services. That will involve deepening the charter initiative. For example, under Labour, users will be involved more in the design of targets. Public services will be encouraged to be less defensive about complaints. As in Marks and Spencer, complaints procedures will be used to improve the design and delivery of service. Such a culture change can succeed only with the enthusiastic co-operation of staff at all levels.

The fourth culture change that will place great demands on training and development will be the work force as stakeholders.

Mrs. Dunwoody

I am most impressed. I had not realised that the Labour party planned to follow the line of Marks and Spencer. Does that mean that we shall extend the privileges and facilities offered to all low-paid civil servants into the provision of hairdressing, chiropody and other assistance within their places of work? It is an excellent idea and I am delighted to hear it.

Mr. Foster

I am pleased to have such enthusiastic support from my hon. Friend. I shall consider her ideas carefully. They seem to be excellent suggestions.

Widespread demoralisation will be an enormous problem for Labour which must be addressed immediately upon assuming power. Labour is determined to involve staff at all levels in continual improvements in productivity and quality of service along the lines that proved so successful at Rover and Thorn Lighting where development and training is central. Labour aims to transform the morality of the workplace. Each member of staff has a crucial contribution to make and must be encouraged to make it in an atmosphere of partnership and teamwork.

The fifth culture change involves the citizen as stakeholder in an enabling state. For the first time, a Government will be elected seeking to share power with the British people. The present Government believe that the only power that citizens need is consumer power. To those without it they say, "Tough! Get some or remain powerless." Labour knows that it can pursue economic, constitutional and democratic renewal only by involving the people and drawing on their skill, experience and creativity.

Devolution of power to Scotland, Wales and the English regions is only a start. Those Parliaments and assemblies will be expected to share power with local authorities, which, in turn, must govern in partnership with villages and communities. Government at all levels will create partnerships with the private and voluntary sector, recreating a sense of pride in village, town, region and nation. Government will facilitate and enable action to be taken. Leadership within such a complex network of relationships will require different skills and qualities from those required by line management—again putting great demand on development and training.

With such an ambitious agenda, change under Labour is inevitable, but it does not have to be threatening. The test of the new Government will be the degree to which they prepare the country and civil servants to embrace change and manage it for the benefit of the many, not the few.

Labour had the courage to change itself and now it is poised to change the country. However, Labour will invite the British people—including civil servants—to join in partnership to manage change. Change does not have to be imposed from on high and used as a weapon to browbeat and intimidate staff into submission. The threat of unemployment and dismissal are blunt weapons in encouraging staff to change. Why should staff co-operate in doing themselves out of a job or preparing themselves to be pushed into the private sector when they clearly wish to remain in the public sector?

The rest of the private sector has abandoned macho management. Managers understand the importance of trust in the management of change, and they know that they must engage the commitment of staff to the organisation's objectives. They know that people are a company's most important resource and that, if the company can harness the skill, energy and creativity of the work force, productivity and the quality of the product can be transformed. They recognise the importance of teamwork. Above all, they know that training and development—investing in people at all levels—is central to creating a flexible and adaptable work force capable of responding constructively to change. Under such leadership, change is embraced and shaped for the benefit of all.

Trade unionists can and do join in enthusiastically. Partnership at the workplace can become a reality and the work force can become stakeholders in the enterprise.

In his foreword to the White Paper, the Chancellor of the Duchy described civil servants as special. I believe that they have been treated as special mushrooms—they have been kept in the dark and showered frequently with the genuine article. After 17 years of such treatment, it would not be surprising if civil servants regarded the White Paper as an afterthought or the sign of an approaching election. The Government have at the eleventh hour grasped the fact that 500,000 civil servants and their families might represent some 1.25 million voters, many living in marginal constituencies. In my view, no one represents middle England better. It will be a crucial battleground, on which the next election will be fought.

In my naivety, I would have expected any large organisation—certainly one of 500,000 people—to have been keen to discern staff morale, but Sir Robin Butler stopped the Treasury and Civil Service Committee carrying out a survey of civil servants. He also tried to prevent civil servants from responding to The Observer survey funded by the Public Service, Tax and Commerce Union—the PTC—and the Institution of Professionals, Managers and Specialists. Perhaps Sir Robin was trying to hide the uncomfortable truth from his political masters, knowing how much they have lost touch with reality. To do him justice, I suspect that he is the instigator of the White Paper, although it was first suggested by the Chancellor of the Duchy at a conference to celebrate the silver jubilee of the Civil Service College last November.

The right hon. Gentleman boasts that it is the first ever White Paper on development and training in the civil service. I welcome that, but if training and development are so crucial, why has it taken 17 years to produce a White Paper? Why have the Government issued a White Paper within 10 months of a general election? What has gone wrong with training to make a step change necessary now? Is it not true that departmental plans will not be drawn up until November 1996 to be incorporated into the annual budgets for implementation on 1 April 1997? Is it not also true that action cannot be taken on the White Paper until 1 April 1997? Therefore, is not the White Paper nothing more than a wish list for the next Government to implement?

I have dubbed the White Paper "the longest apology in history", for is it not an admission of widespread demoralisation? Is that not why it has been produced? The Government's stated aim is to ensure that the civil service is equipped and trained to meet the challenge of an increasingly competitive global environment, and, in the words of "Continuity and Change", to make better use of the Civil Service's most important resource—the staff of departments and agencies—by providing the prospect for a career with a good employer, offering challenge and reward; by developing their skills to meet the managerial, technical and competitive challenges they face; and by ensuring equality of opportunity for all members of staff, irrespective of background, gender, race and disability. Those fine words must stick in the craw of civil servants in view of their experience in recent years.

Paragraph 1.9 of an early draft of the White Paper says: the Government recognises that it is not an easy time to be calling for extra effort and investment in training and development in the Civil Service. Annual running costs are being reduced. Reductions in staff numbers across the Civil Service are inevitably giving rise to uncertainty and unease. Those reductions, combined with the action being taken to take out layers of management, also put additional pressure on staff—making it difficult to find time for training and development opportunities. Indeed the pressures that have led to the present difficult climate are exactly those that make it so important to motivate and develop staff to continue to raise levels of performance. That has been diluted in paragraphs 1.12 and 1.13 on pages 6 and 7, but, even so, it is the first public recognition by the Government that staff have been going through difficult times. Perhaps it is the Chancellor's way of saying to 500,000 civil servants that "It hurt but it didn't work". He must not be surprised if civil servants react to those fine words in the White Paper by referring to the recent leader in The Sun: same old Tories, same old claptrap". Is it not the truth that, after 17 years of privatisation, contracting out, delayering and downsizing, civil and public servants no longer have confidence in a career in the civil service, as the FDA-MORI and the Observer surveys show? That is why Labour's plans for training and development will be at the heart of renewal of the civil and public services—not an afterthought.

No one should be surprised that Labour places training at the centre of its approach to managing change. For many years, it has been central to Labour's crucial supply-side measures for economic renewal. In "New Labour, New Life for Britain", which I am sure Ministers carry with them all the time, the centrality of training and development is made plain. It says: this is the era of learning through life—adding economic value for improved skills. Technology and scientific change render our skills rapidly out of date. Many jobs are now computer orientated and an adaptable workforce requires a quite different approach. The Government have been hopelessly slow to recognise the potential of new technology in transforming the availability of high-quality learning. People can now learn at home and at work through the new interactive information super-highway. This new Labour approach is based on partnership, on stakeholding, rather than on old-fashioned war between bosses and workers. It recognises the value of co-operation as well as competition, but it is hard-headed, practical and geared to making us more successful in the global marketplace.

Development and training must be informed by the long-term influences on the shape of the civil service. When Lady Thatcher assumed power in 1979, the civil service was 750,000-strong. One of her objectives was to reduce the size of the state. That gathered momentum, driven by the Government's pursuit of low inflation and reduced public expenditure. The civil and public services were reshaped by privatisation and contracting out, and down-sized to 500,000—and further reductions are planned.

If the Chancellor's party remains in power, it will further hollow out government. It believes that individuals and businesses must be set free from the burdens of government. Some extreme interpretations of the minimalist state maintain that the Government should be responsible only for monetary policy and the defence of the realm.

If Labour takes control, it will create an enabling state. Labour expects the Government to be involved in a very wide range of problems in pursuit of economic efficiency and social justice, but the state will not be the monolithic state of wartime and early post-war years. Nor will it be the corporatist state of the 1970s. Labour will create an enabling state at national, regional and local levels. The Government will work in partnership with the people, the private and voluntary sectors and communities. That will do much to restore the trust between people and government, which is so badly fractured.

Further demands on training and development will arise because Labour will pursue a more constructive role at the heart of Europe—once the Prime Minister's objective. Europe will increasingly affect the workings of Whitehall. Brussels and Whitehall will increasingly co-operate, irrespective of whether economic and monetary union is delayed.

The Chancellor mentioned information technology. That, too, will make great demands on training and development. It has already had a major impact on private sector services, with individual banks, for example, losing 20,000 or 25,000 employees. Information technology is already making a major impact on Whitehall, but its biggest impact is yet to come. It will be enormously beneficial—the Chancellor made reference to this—in developing user-focused and user-friendly public services.

However, it would be surprising if information technology did not result in further job losses in the next five to 10 years. It may also result in major reorganisation of Government services. Labour recognises that the Government have a responsibility to prepare staff to embrace change and manage it for the benefit of the many. That, too, can be achieved only with development and training being central to the management of change.

If Labour assumes power within the next 12 months, the drive for efficient, high-quality, value-for-money public services will continue, because, for Christian socialists, the efficient use of scarce resources is a moral imperative. Moreover, the Labour Government may have to make a virtue out of necessity, inheriting the public expenditure planning totals for the following two years, the electorate's expectation of low taxation and the Maastricht criteria for public expenditure and borrowing. Against that unfriendly backcloth, however, Labour is determined to renew the civil and public services.

Civil servants may be sceptical about Labour's approach—

Mr. Bernard Jenkin

And how!

Mr. Foster

I expect the hon. Gentleman to be sceptical. Civil servants may be sceptical, despite my attempt to show that training and development will be central to the management of change, not an afterthought. That is why Labour will put in place several confidence-building measures immediately on assuming office to help restore trust between the Government and their work force.

First, new Labour will affirm its commitment to the public service and reassert the classic civil service values that were once shared by one-nation Conservatives, but are now elbowed aside by the right-wing ideologues who are calling the shots. Then we will make it clear that the British civil service is a national asset, which since the 1970s has been a permanent and impartial instrument for all Administrations. The new Government will recognise their duty to preserve the efficiency, honesty and impartiality of the service for their successors. That is why the Chancellor of the Duchy must be disturbed by the FDA press release, which we have debated. I do not wish to pursue it further, but I hope that, on reflection, he will take it seriously, examine the evidence and make a statement to the House.

Secondly, Labour will halt privatisation. Thirdly, Labour will put a moratorium on contracting out, while instituting a thorough and independent review.

Mr. Nigel Evans

Yes, let's have another review.

Mr. Foster

The hon. Gentleman's party would have been in a far less parlous state now had they considered more carefully some of the ill-judged and ill-considered reforms that they have made.

Under Labour, the motivation will not be a dogmatic wish to drive down public expenditure to fund tax handouts. Nor will Labour seek efficiency gains by driving down public servants' wages and conditions of service. Nor will we pursue downsizing as an end in itself. The motivation will be to obtain the greatest quantity of high-quality service from every pound spent, the need to divert resources from declining aspects of the service to expand others and to reallocate resources to front-line services.

Despite pressures from some trade unions and others, there will be no turning back to 1979 in an attempt to restore trust. No one should expect the permanent revolution of recent years to be followed by permanent counter-revolution under Labour. Labour will not try to build a better yesterday—what the country needs is a better tomorrow and a better future.

In conclusion, I have a number of specific questions arising from the White Paper. First, I wish to refer to cost. How much is currently spent on training and development in the civil service? I understand that no figures are collected, but that £260 million was spent in 1986–87, £295 million in 1987–88 and £356 million in 1988–89. Will the Office of Public Service now collect such statistics, as I cannot see how it can drive reform forward and monitor its progress without them? What additional fees are expected to be paid to Investors in People? What fees are currently paid to Investors in People? We know that civil service budgets are currently being reduced by 12 per cent. over three years.

Why has it taken 17 years to produce the White Paper if training and development is so important? Why has the White Paper been published within 10 months of a general election? Is it not true that the plans produced by Departments and agencies by November cannot be implemented until 1 April 1997? Therefore, is not the White Paper nothing more than a wish list for the Government's successors? The Chancellor of the Duchy referred to "a flexible approach to recruitment at all levels". Will not that substantially reduce promotion prospects at a time when recruitment is low? Will not more external recruitment at middle management level further damage morale and undermine career development for current staff?

The Chancellor of the Duchy mentioned the Civil Service College, and we deserve to have more information about it. Now that it has survived becoming a next steps agency and the threat of privatisation, it should be on the threshold of an important advance. Perhaps Labour should resurrect earlier plans to convert the college to match the Ecole Nationale d' Administration in France, which has an extremely high reputation.

I welcome the White Paper, which is based on sound principles. It is well argued, and has an action plan that deserves to succeed. But I regret that there is no celebration of public service values, and that it does not seek to resolve the clash of cultures of the 1980s and 1990s. There is no strategic vision of where the civil service should go during the next decade, and it fails to engage the commitment of civil servants. The White Paper comes from an exhausted Government who are lacking in direction and drifting to an end. If they are re-elected, further demoralisation and job insecurity must be in store for civil servants as the Government chase the old communist dream of the withering away of the state.

In contrast, Labour has had the confidence to change, and is now poised to invite the British people to join in partnership to change Britain. Civil servants have a crucial role in the management of change, which cannot succeed unless development and training of staff is central to the process. The success of the next Government will largely depend on how successfully they prepare the country, including civil servants, to embrace change and manage it for the benefit of the many and not the few.

The White Paper may have to await the next Government to be implemented. If so, Labour will have far greater credibility in doing so. We believe in the public service and we value civil servants. We are committed to staff training and development as central to the management of change, and we are determined to renew the civil and public service.

5.25 pm

Mr. Bernard Jenkin (Colchester, North)

I am grateful for the opportunity to follow the right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Foster), whose speech filled all of 36 minutes and was a mixture of the miraculous and the miserable. It was miraculous in that Labour now tells us that there will be "no turning back" to the 1970s—a phrase close to my heart and to the hearts of a number of my colleagues. We have been saying "no turning back" for many years in the teeth of the opposition from the right hon. Gentleman and his Labour colleagues. I am now glad that the Labour party has changed so much that it too can utter the words "no turning back". That is progress.

The speech was miraculous also in that the right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland unveiled his five new principles for the future of public administration, and gave us a great deal of what I might describe as "motherhood and apple pie" management. If the civil service manual could possibly be written in the jargonese of the hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr. Mandelson), we heard it this afternoon. There was one endless platitude after another—about change being "embraced" by a Labour Government instead of resisted, and about how training would be moved to the forefront and loved more than ever before.

Then we had the miserable. Labour would halt privatisation and contractorisation, as if it were possible to turn the clock back to the end of the 1970s. In his derision for anything to do with the private sector's increasing involvement in public administration, the right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland gave away the fact that the old resistance of the Labour party lives on in new Labour. The dangers of new Labour are as evident as ever.

If he thinks that it is possible to continue to manage an effective, efficient and evolving public service with bland policy statements such as "a halt to privatisation" and "an end to contractorisation", he is deluding himself and the House—although we do not believe him. He tried to offer a civil service nirvana to those civil servants who might study his words, but he would offer only sclerosis. He offered to embrace change, but he would halt change, and therein lies the danger.

The right hon. Gentleman was right about one aspect. The great challenge for every politician in every party in every country is how to help the people who work for the Governments of the world, and the citizens of the countries of the world, to adapt constructively and positively to an ever-faster pace of change. Politicians should use every means at their disposal, but they should not, as the right hon. Gentleman suggests, abjure privatisation and contractisation for dogmatic party reasons or to satisfy the cravings of outdated trade union interests.

I join my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and the right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland in paying tribute to the civil service. A picture is often drawn of a machine that is under pressure and under-performing, but I do not recognise that in the dealings that I have had with civil servants, in various Departments, since I joined the House in 1992. Civil servants are always willing to help, to serve Ministers impartially and to do their best for the public. The descriptions that one sometimes hears do not ring, true and I have nothing to complain of in the conduct of any civil servant that I have ever met.

Civil servants are doing their best to adapt to change, and the White Paper is a step in the right direction. It must be good to draw the attention of the decision makers in the civil service and of civil servants themselves to the need for permanent training and career renewal to ensure that the civil service is as adaptable as possible.

I wish to address my remarks especially to the civil service and the deregulation initiative. I am not sure that the White Paper addresses deregulation as one of the main concerns for the civil service. Deregulation has created a new pressure on civil servants: I ask the House to consider carefully the impact on the modern civil service of not only the huge volume of legislation that we generate, but that which we, here, expect civil servants to generate in the form of regulation which we consider only cursorily, if at all. Many regulations pass into law, sometimes when Parliament is in recess, without any direct scrutiny by Members.

The civil service is now in a peculiar position. Civil servants are not only implementers of ministerial decisions. So many decisions have to be made that they are authors, advocates, explainers and implementers of those decisions. The very professionalism that civil servants traditionally bring to implementation is also being brought to the creation of regulation, and that may be the source of the criticism that civil servants now invite from commentators, such as Christopher Booker in his book "The Mad Officials". We expect civil servants to act with pristine efficiency and effectiveness, so we can hardly be surprised if the regulations they produce tend to be of the Rolls-Royce variety and are implemented with the same zeal with which we expect them to attack any task. We must ask how those decisions can be tempered more effectively to avoid over-regulation.

We have presented civil servants with an entirely new challenge in the conflicts between the legal inheritance of this country, as enacted by Parliament and implemented by Ministers, and the entirely new raft of law that is gradually being imported into our constitution from the European Community. The two legal systems are not compatible and they leave our civil servants in a cleft stick.

Our law is drawn up in black and white and in fine detail so that officials know where they are, as do those individuals who are subject to the various regulations. Businesses and individuals can go to the law and find out where they stand and we expect to find ourselves either inside the law or outside the law. We do not have an administrative tradition that relies extensively on the discretion of individuals—politicians or bureaucrats—to decide, for example, the safe level of some compound in the working environment or the correct material for a chopping board in a butcher's shop. We expect those details to be specified in regulation, but that is not the way that European law works.

European law, as drawn up in directives and regulations, tends to deal with broad objectives, because it is based on the traditional administrative system of France, known colloquially as the "Code Napoleon". Under that code, legal instruments contain broad objectives and it is left to individual officials to fill in the gaps in the drafting by making a reasonable interpretation and to implement the law. That is why European Community law translates so uncomfortably into United Kingdom domestic law. The broad objectives set out in a directive are refined and defined in our regulations so that a directive of a few pages finishes up as hundreds of pages of United Kingdom regulation.

A further problem arises from the insistence in our tradition that someone is either inside the law or outside the law. We define the directives in our law to the very limits of their interpretation, and people then complain that we gold-plate our directives. We tend to gold-plate our directives because, if civil servants do not obey and implement the law to its fullest extent, in our tradition they are personally liable. The result is that we put civil servants in an intolerable position when we start to advise them that they should not fully implement European Community directives.

Ministers may take that political responsibility themselves—I note great caution about under-implementing directives that are completely against Government policy, such as the working time directive or the beef ban—but it is unreasonable to expect civil servants to exercise their discretion and to put themselves at variance with the law if they fail to fulfil the objectives of a directive, interpreted as it might be by the courts.

I invite my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, as he considers how our civil servants work, to consider also the interface between our civil service and European Community law, especially as he is also responsible for the Government's deregulation policy.

If Ministers start to shuffle off the responsibility for interpreting directives on to officials who are left at the front end of the regulatory process with the customer, it raises the question how our superb tradition of public administration can continue to exist. There is a simple answer. We do not need a system of European law with direct applicability and direct effect in order to have a single market. Let us have a court. Let us have rules for the single market. Let the court adjudicate on disputes between the member states. We do not need direct applicability and effect, which creates conflicts between our culture of administration and the culture of administration of the European Community.

If we continue down this road, we may well lose something in our civil service that is deeply precious—the accountability that it affords the House of Commons. I am not merely talking about the constitutional conflicts between Britain and Europe. Because we have black-and-white letter law which our civil servants follow, they are closely accountable to Parliament in carrying out the instructions that it has given them one way or the other. The danger is that we will lose that accountability by expecting civil servants to use more and more of their own discretion and judgment at the expense of a proper understanding of what we in the House intend them to do. At the very least, in the White Paper, that should be something about which we educate and for which we prepare civil servants, as we find ourselves ever more drawn into a closer relationship with our European partners.

5.41 pm

Mrs. Gwyneth Dunwoody (Crewe and Nantwich)

ft is important for the House to talk about the civil servants who provide the back-up system to the Government, because, unless the Government have working for them people who are neither corrupt nor dishonest and who are not open to disuasion of a venal kind, it becomes clear to the electorate over a period that they have in place a Government who cannot be trusted, who do not reflect the needs of a democratic society and who are, in effect, extremely dangerous. Therefore, when we talk about the British civil service and the training of civil servants, we must be aware that it is not an abstract subject but something of great importance.

I intended to criticise the civil service with some vigour. I shall hope to do so in a moment, but I must begin by saying that I am astonished at the behaviour of the Minister. I know him to be an upright man, but he chose—it obviously was not an accident because the Deputy Prime Minister said something along the same lines at Prime Minister's Question Time—to present the Association of First Division Civil Servants as a wholly political organisation that in some sense had used the occasion of this debate to pursue what he called a hidden agenda. I do not believe for one second that the Minister believes that, because he is not a stupid man. Unlike some of his colleagues, he is an intelligent Minister and he knows that it is not true.

One supposes that one of the problems of the Conservative party is that it thinks of the civil service as it thinks of the servants. The First Division is the housekeeper and the butler, who must be given proper facilities and their own dining room and be kept reasonably cheerful. The rest, the lower-paid civil servants, no matter what rank, are there to serve, to keep their mouths shut, to do what they are told and never to question the word of the master.

When people think like that, they get themselves into considerable difficulty, but to make the leap from that to the suggestion that the civil service trade unions are running some great political secret agenda to persuade Parliament of something which is neither acceptable nor reliable is so extraordinary that the Minister should simply get up and say, "In the heat of the moment I may have said something that was wrong, and I withdraw it."

Mr. Freeman

I certainly do not withdraw it. The hon. Lady listened with great care to the words that I chose to use. I drew specific attention to a statement in a press release issued yesterday by the Association of First Division of Civil Servants. It said: The response we have already received suggests a continuing and widespread problem. That is a very serious allegation. I gave clearly the reasons why I disputed it on behalf of the Government. I expressed the hope that there was no hidden political agenda. I make no allegations that the civil service unions with which I have dealt are waging a political campaign. I am very annoyed about the statement. I made it plain why I was annoyed, and I expect to see justification for such a serious statement taken forward in the manner which I set out.

Mrs. Dunwoody

I find it extraordinary that I should be put in the position of having to defend civil service unions. They are not affiliated to my political party and they have never at any point sought political representation in the House of Commons, which is the reason why trade unions go for supporting individual Members of Parliament. So I do not have any particular reason to defend or protect the interests of first division civil servants—heaven knows, I have rowed with them for most of my political career—or those of civil servants further down the scale, with whom I deal every day—sometimes, I have to say, in acrimonious terms, because I have a habit of explaining myself straightforwardly.

I cannot let it be said that the legitimate unease—that is what the press notice was about—of those who serve the state should not be expressed by their elected representatives. That is what their trade unions are. Their representatives are chosen by them, and they have the right to represent the views of civil servants. We know that the machinery exists for them to take various complaints through Government Departments. We also know that any low-paid civil servants who got beyond a certain level of complaint would find that they had an extraordinarily short career and that great pressures were put on them.

I am always horrified at the way in which in Britain we pick up particular words such as "civil servant" or "tax inspector" and use them in a pejorative sense as if those people have horns and tails and should be avoided in all circumstances and on all occasions. What are civil servants? They are coastguards. They are the scientists who developed the seat belt, although afterwards their expertise was dissipated. They are vehicle examiners who protect us on our motorway when we want to make sure that people are not driving sub-standard vehicles. They are people who administer our confidential documents in the health service and the Department of Social Security. They are people who, at every level of administration, hold important secrets about the business of government and do not make those secrets public but serve whomever they have as their political masters, willy-nilly and, in the case of most grades, for appalling rates of pay.

I recently visited the traffic commissioner's office in Manchester, which is one of the two traffic commissioners' offices that are at risk. I talked to those civil servants, many of whom were young and worked for rates that no one in the House of Commons would accept. No secretary in the House of Commons would work for that rate of pay. Many of those civil servants are women. Many have real problems which are never tackled by the provision of flexible working in a way that would transform their position.

What has happened to those young people in the past few years? They have been denigrated. They have been told that someone can be brought in from outside who could do a better job than the civil service. They are told that any middle manager from anywhere in the world could come in and do their job better than them. They are expected to be cheerful, charming and grateful. Oddly enough, they are not.

For the Government to produce a White Paper which contains astonishingly little of any importance and supposedly talks about the training of a group of people, male and female, who are fundamental to the business of government at a time when everyone knows that the Government could not implement any of it if they tried, is a positive insult.

It is something of which the right hon. Gentleman should be ashamed. He knows that the good management of people and their interests does not lie in constantly telling them that they do not have skills or ability and that they are not really very clever, because if they were they could go off to the private sector and get jobs at much better money. That is not management. It is not man management and, believe me, it is not woman management. It reveals the consistent view of the Government that there is something wrong with the business of government.

Here are Ministers who are wholly dependent on their Departments for the answers that they give to Parliament. When they stand at the Box, they are wholly dependent on the briefings that they get from their civil servants. When they come up to the Select Committees, they are wholly dependent on the people who work for them to give them accurate and unbiased information. All they do is respond by saying to those civil servants, "Oh, you're not really very good. Almost anybody else anywhere else in the private sector could do your job better than you do. But don't worry about it, we're going to retrain you, give you new skills and really give you an opportunity to do something much better in the future. Of course, we're not going to talk to you about pay and conditions." That would be embarrassing.

Is there anything that needs to be addressed within the civil service and about its training? My heavens, there is. Increasingly, the civil service is becoming the employer of a large number of women. Increasingly, it is taking on those who are laughingly called "of ethnic minorities". That means that they may be Britons, but they are black or Asian. What is the result?

I am specifically interested, and it will come as no particular surprise to the House, in what happens to the Department of Transport. I spend most of my time questioning it about all sorts of aspects of transport. I am totally dependent upon the civil servants at that Department and I am extremely grateful to them for the useful information that they consistently supply not just to me but to every other Member of Parliament about every aspect of our transport system. I therefore began to take an active interest in what those civil servants do in terms of their internal management. I discovered something that, frankly, I find extremely disquieting.

The central transport group of the Department of Transport consists of headquarters building in London and regionally based traffic area offices. Because it has a system of salary increases linked to the annual staff report performance markings, it is interesting to look at not only the results but the percentage of each grouping and the sort of demands that are made upon those civil servants.

When we analyse the annual staff report markings, what do we come up with? Consider those with box 2 performance markings at the administrative officer grade—AO. I apologise to the House for using such phrases but that is the way the civil service works and always has done, and if it is allowed to develop, such is the pattern to be followed. Of those administrative officers who received box 2 markings, white males accounted for 58.65 per cent. of them; ethnic minority males for 40 per cent; white females 48.35 per cent; and ethnic minority females 41.67 per cent. That is equivalent to 54.5 per cent. males and 44.5 per cent. females. One does not have to be too brilliant to work out that that represents quite a considerable difference.

When one looks at the higher grades and recruitment, one begins to suspect that the Government, for all their talk about training and their interest in the qualifications of the people in the civil service, are not prepared to tackle the questions of racism and of sexism. On the day when President Mandela came to the House and said that, to him, racism is a blight upon the human condition, the Government do not demonstrate at any level a strong commitment either to improving the lot of those who work in the civil service or even to examining in any great detail the problems that exist.

Last year, the central transport group asked the Civil Service College to carry out a detailed statistical analysis of the 1994 annual staff reporting results. The summaries provided were extremely interesting. Some of the language was sufficiently abstruse even to please the Conservative Government, but in the middle of the report there were some interesting bits. It stated: Taken together, these the statistics— appear to constitute significant achievements"— which means improvements— which indicate that solid hard work has been undertaken". That is the sort of thing that Ministers always want to come to the House and say, but the report also states: Within this context, however, there is a great deal of work to be done. Only 34 per cent. of Black respondents … expressed confidence in the Equal Opportunities Policy. Secondly, only 44 per cent. of all respondents thought the current reporting system was fair and bias free". Those are the people who have the machinery, according to the Minister, which will enable them to make their views known at every stage and, when need be, to blow the whistle on their political masters putting undue pressure on them.

That report also states: Only half the respondents reported on-going feedback about their performance from their line managers … there was a widespread view amongst respondents and interviewees that the organisational culture in the Department gave insufficient emphasis to human resources". Who has been in charge of such Departments for the past 17 years? Which Government, with all their management skills, have been in charge of those civil servants? Where have they been? Where is the expertise that they want to demonstrate, and which they now demand of other people? I find it sadly lacking.

That report states that the figures involved are small and that one should not assume that the findings are right or that there are sufficient problems to allow us to accept that there are difficulties, and that somehow or other people are victims of a racist or sexist system. That report also states, however: Ethnic minority staff are presently concentrated in more junior grades than white staff (48 per cent. of Black staff and 54 per cent. of Asian staff are at AO level compared to 27 per cent. of white staff), and are … less likely to get higher box markings in their annual reports … ethnic minority staff received a statistically significant lower proportion of higher … markings than other staff … across all grades Asian staff have a statistically significant higher proportion of 'not fitted' markings. So what is happening within the civil service? It recruits large numbers of low-paid women. Units like the Child Support Agency started off by making a virtue of the fact that they wanted not people who knew how the civil service worked, but new incomers to run a magnificent system. The resultant chaos was such that the Government are now madly searching for a way to get out from under the total and utter mess that they have created.

I know that other hon. Members want to speak, but I should just like to tell the House what concerns me. I have been a Minister and I have been knocking around this place for a few years, and I intend to be knocking around for few more with the permission of the electorate. I have watched the deterioration of the relationship between Ministers and civil servants with great interest.

When I entered the Board of Trade, the quality of people coming in was so high that for me, who spent most of my time arguing with those same first division civil servants, it was an education to encounter that quality of thought and ability. Now what has happened is simple. Morale is so low that if people can get out of the civil service at any level, they do so. They almost do not mind what they go on to. Those civil servants have a long tradition of commitment to their job.

That job is frequently uncomfortable, low-paid and extremely responsible. That tradition of commitment is being eroded by the attitude of the Government, who really do not think that the civil service is important. Within that set-up, there are real problems of racial discrimination and, in my view, sexism.

Instead of coming here with a beautiful pamphlet that neither addresses the problems of existing civil servants nor faces up to the cost and responsibility involved in future training, or the role that the civil service should be playing in a developing government system—have you noticed the new trend, Mr. Deputy Speaker, which dictates that the emptier the pamphlet, the more expensive the cover?—Ministers should be saying something very different from the Dispatch Box.

They should be saying, "We have been in charge for 17 years, and we have got almost everything wrong, because we are contemptuous of the people who work for us. We are not prepared to address their real problems relating to pay and conditions, or even to treat them as responsible human beings. We are now paying the price, in the form of a constant erosion not just of civil service morale but of work standards, and the constant bleeding away of people of quality."

That is a price that the entire United Kingdom will pay unless the process is stopped. Perhaps Ministers would like to move over and let another Government come in—a Government who appreciate that human beings work best when they are valued, understood and, certainly, properly paid.

6.1 pm

Mr. Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley)

I am not surprised that civil service morale is low. The speech of the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody), and the threat from the right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Foster) that a new Labour Government would be elected, were enough to send morale plunging to the depths. As my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester, North (Mr. Jenkin) observed, we heard both the miraculous and the miserable from the right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland, but we heard only the miserable from the hon. Lady.

Before my election in 1992, my experience of the civil service was limited to watching "Yes, Minister" on television and wondering whether it was a documentary or a comedy. Once elected, Members of Parliament find that there is a bit of truth in both: "Yes, Minister" is a comedy, but there is a strong vein of truth in it.

Shortly after my election, I became a parliamentary private secretary in the Department of Employment. After a year, I moved to the Department of the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, where I remained for a further year. I am currently with the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food.

Having worked in three Departments, I have formed the view that the calibre of most civil servants is extremely high. They work very long hours, and I think that the country would be poorer without them; but that does not mean that we should be complacent. We must ensure that our civil service can take the country into the 21st century, which means proper training for civil servants. That is what the White Paper is all about. We need to adapt not only to the need for continuity in regard to the independence of the civil service, but to the changes and extra demands that are being forced on it.

Last night, and for several days before that debate on Members' pay, many hon. Members spoke of the increase in the work load. If our work load has increased, that of civil servants has done so as well. We must ensure that they are given the training that they deserve and we need, so that the country can remain competitive. We must be given proper advice, so that we implement policies that maintain our status as the enterprise centre of Europe.

My hon. Friend the Member for Colchester, North mentioned a couple of aspects that he thought needed more attention, and I agree with him. As a small business man, I should like far more civil servants to be seconded to small or medium enterprises and to see at first hand the daily problems experienced by such enterprises. One problem is the amount of paperwork that businesses receive from civil servants seeking information. Some small and medium enterprises feel that they have merely been given the burden of extra form-filling, with no accompanying benefits.

We need more transference between the civil service and business, in both directions. Already, more people are able to move from industry—small, medium and even larger businesses—to the civil service, where they can use their wealth of experience to give Ministers better advice and thus improve their policies and legislation.

No one could say that we have not had problems in the past. When the Child Support Agency, which has been mentioned time and again, was introduced, there were appalling problems. It is certainly much better than it was, but I am not saying that further improvements could not be made. People are still coming to my surgeries saying that they have had problems with correspondence, and with inaccurate calculations of the payments that are due.

I also think that it would benefit members of Customs and Excise and the Inland Revenue to take more interest in business, so that they understand business people's problems and deal with them more compassionately. I am sure that some of the problems that I find in my mail bag, and hear about from constituents who are in business, could have been dealt with more sensitively had those in Customs and Excise and the Inland Revenue understood better how businesses work.

I am delighted that the Government have decided to throw open competition for more senior posts. That is a major start on the road that continues the principles first established in the Northcote-Trevelyan report. As for privatisation, which has been mentioned today, I see no reason why we should stop the process: privatisation and contracting out have been universally successful. That is demonstrated by the fact that the Labour party is scared to say that it would reverse any of the privatisations that have already taken place. All that Labour Members will say is that they will not introduce any further changes. I believe that we shall experience the benefits of privatisation in the future, such as the financial and efficiency savings that will result from the privatisation of the Recruitment and Assessment Service.

As the civil service flourishes, so does the Government's commitment to training, education and recruitment. As the White Paper explains, they plan to step up training and qualification levels. They intend to give all civil servants job-specific training, and to allow any wider development that they need to perform their current jobs to the best of their ability. That is absolutely right, and I hope that Labour has no objection to it. I have no doubt that standards in the civil service, high as they are now, will be improved still further by the plans for training and development outlined in the White Paper.

I am also delighted by the plan to invest in people. As my right hon. Friend the Chancellor explained, by the beginning of the 21st century every civil servant will be working in a Department that has been recognised as an investor in people. That will not only make the Government and the civil service more efficient, but help civil servants to develop and to reach targets, and to improve the morale about which we have heard so much today.

As I told my right hon. Friend earlier, I am extremely interested in information technology. We can learn a good deal from other countries, and other countries—the United States, among others—can learn from us. We should examine the way in which their civil services work, and the way in which they use information technology to get their message across. I have already put several pages on the Internet in an attempt to send a message to my electorate about the work that I do, and I also use e-mail so that they can contact me. A constituent working in Abu Dhabi has already contacted me with a problem. E-mail, which is being used increasingly, enables my constituents to contact me immediately and enables me to reply.

That is relatively new. I know that a number of hon. Members are using information technology and e-mail, but the system will expand. We have all been contacted by several companies that are climbing over each other to offer us free access to the Internet. I hope that hon. Members will take the opportunity to seek challenges so that they can use information technology to the best advantage. Many young people are tuning to the Internet and we can use it to get our message across to them.

Some departmental pages on the Internet are good, and I am delighted at the way in which information is being spread. I am sure that Departments could make some of the pages more user-friendly and readable for the people that they are trying to serve. Many children are completely computer literate; they can operate computers better than their parents and will seek to use technology for information. I hope that we shall try to put even more information on the Internet, and that far more people will be able to use it.

Businesses need information to help their enterprises to flourish. They could even use the Internet to get through to the Minister, who could provide suggestions on policy. In the context of deregulation, for which the Minister has responsibility, perhaps they could suggest where rules and regulations could be put to one side to help their businesses.

Training that is based on legislation or on the interpretation of legislation or Brussels directives by the civil service or by Whitehall, must be assured of transparency and fairness, so that businesses are given as many opportunities as possible and will know that rules are not interpreted differently in different parts of the country. Even worse is the fact that rules from Brussels that are being implemented here are being ignored or treated in a completely different way in other parts of the European Community, thus giving them an advantage.

I have great respect for civil servants. I applaud their work and trust that the White Paper will improve the training and development of our civil service, because it and the country will be the better for that.

6.12 pm

Mr. Robert Maclennan (Caithness and Sutherland)

Like all hon. Members, I greatly admire the high standards that are observable in the civil service. However, I regret that the debate started with a sharp exchange during which the Chancellor of the Duchy thought fit to refute, as he put it, the allegations by the First Division Association about pressure from Ministers on its political impartiality. That is such a serious matter that it merited the time that the Minister took to answer it. I do not object to the fact that he devoted 18 minutes to it and gave way several times. The Opposition spokesman devoted 15 minutes to the issue.

What did not come out of the exchanges was the precise nature of the charges, and there was certainly no detailed refutation. The reports that appeared today in some newspapers derive not only from the press release to which the Minister referred but from direct briefings of journalists. They included allegations that Ministers have asked officials to prepare material for election manifestos and to alter official reports to provide a party political slant, and that they have asked to be briefed on political responses to Opposition policies and speeches.

Ministers are alleged to have sought briefs for public relations events during conferences, and it is also alleged that civil servants were asked to supply material that was subsequently used in party election broadcasts. It is alleged that they were asked to write political speeches by absent political advisers who were not civil servants, and to work in support of regional visits organised by Conservative central office. Apparently, they were asked to cost programmes that were drawn up by the Labour party on employment, social security and law and order, and it is alleged that the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Robin Butler, gave instructions that those requests shoulcl be complied with.

The Minister's refutation did not apply to any of those individual allegations. He rested his case on a general assumption that standards were not declining and that the code was being observed. His case had three legs. First, he said that he had personal experience of the civil service and that it did not behave in that manner. That may be a reassuring view about the general behaviour of the civil service, but these are particular accusations, and one cannot take the generality of his acquittal as a refutation.

Secondly, the Minister said that there was no evidence that the due process for complaints that should properly be followed under the code of practice had been followed, or that such complaints had been brought to the notice of the responsible permanent secretaries and, ultimately, to the civil service commissioners. That may be true, but it is not even a prima facie refutation of the allegations: it simply means that they have not yet emerged at the top of the civil service.

The Minister also relied on the Nolan finding that there had been no systematic threat to politicise the civil service, and that no evidence had been laid to show that there were other than isolated cases of that kind. But Lord Nolan's committee sat some time ago and the allegations, generally and particularly, were that these instances of pressure on civil servants were made in the context of the run-up to the general election. I do not think that Lord Nolan's committee sat in the penumbra of the general election. The Nolan inquiry was stimulated in the first instance not so much by bad behaviour by civil servants or Ministers, as by dubious behaviour by hon. Members. The findings were certainly encouraging at the time, but have no bearing whatever upon the generality or the particularity of these allegations.

I was tempted to ask what the Minister thought his purpose was in coming to the House to speak in the way he did, offering a sort of knee-jerk rejection of such serious charges without telling the House how he proposed to investigate them. It is quite extraordinary that he should simply rely upon the process of the code when, according to the reports, the allegations form a pattern of behaviour by his colleagues which spreads across 11 Departments of State and includes 20 allegations of improper behaviour, with five serious ones being investigated. In such circumstances, the House has a right to look to the Chancellor of the Duchy for some idea of what he thinks would be the proper response.

What is to happen about this? I understand that the general secretary of the First Division Association requested a meeting with Sir Robin Butler. That seems a perfectly proper first step. Openness is now required. There have been too many important, but protracted, internal inquiries, the results of which are produced long after the allegations are made, when they have little relevance. Such an approach would not be sensible or satisfactory. The House requires the allegations to be made specifically and explicitly, for them to be dealt with in a quasi-judicial manner by Sir Robin Butler or someone appointed by him, and for the whole transcript to be made available, so that we can learn whether these serious charges are justified. If they are, it is a matter of the gravest import, and if they are not, they should not have been made.

I cannot even begin to accept the idea that there could be a hidden agenda when someone of the standing of Elizabeth Symons, the FDA general secretary, puts forward what she and her union clearly regard as a pattern of behaviour. It is up to the Minister responsible to take that seriously; not merely to say that he takes it seriously, but to demonstrate by action that the matter will be put to rest and that, if there is any truth in it, the people responsible will be dealt with appropriately.

I question whether the Chamber is the most ideal forum in which to discuss a paper that the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) described as rather thin and that deals with matters of detail that can be best examined in a Select Committee atmosphere, rather than in the adversarial atmosphere generated by the circumstances of the debate. It is an inflated document, without much value. It is less prescriptive than descriptive.

It is not entirely clear who is to take responsibility for the implementation of the proposals on development and training of civil servants. The paper says: it is for the hundreds of organisations that make up the Civil Service to carry forward their own plans to improve their investment in training and development in accordance with their own organisational needs", but I wonder who is responsible if those targets are not met. How will this all be presented? As it stands, the paper is flannelly.

A few yardsticks can already be gleaned from the progress report, which is more what it is like. It shows that, by 1 October last year, about 10 per cent. of the civil servant organisations covered had achieved the Investors in People standard, and that 16 per cent. were committed to it. Some six months later, the number achieving the standard had risen by 2 per cent., and 23 per cent. were committed to it. With such measures of progress, one must be a little sceptical about the Government's suggestion in the paper that it is possible to achieve 65 per cent. commitment in the next 10 months.

Not being greatly enthusiastic about the language of management consultancies and business schools that permeates the document, I felt inclined to ask whether such proposals are what the civil service needs most. I hope that, from what I say, I will not be thought to be questioning the importance of management and specialist skills, which are obviously of serious moment in increasing efficiency and effectiveness.

The paper, however, singularly lacks any sense that any training is required for public service qua public service. This document could apply to any large organisation. Nothing in it is peculiar to the civil service. The civil service requires qualities, characteristics and aptitudes that are, to some extent, peculiar and that have given this country's civil service its high repute, and deservedly so.

Those qualities, characteristics and aptitudes include the need for honesty, the duty of diligence, the appropriateness of courtesy, imaginative insight, toughness of intellect, generosity of spirit and readiness to co-operate. None of those is valued. They are certainly not so valued by the Government that they feel it necessary even to pay lip service to those things in the paper, which purports to be comprehensive in its discussion of civil service development and training.

That absence of attachment to those traditional civil service values has led to demoralisation in the civil service—to which the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich and others have referred—as those values have made the civil servant a person to whom the public look to deliver a response that is tailored to a particular need, not a churned-out, computerised reply that arrives late, is inaccurate and cannot be held to be the responsibility of an individual person. One finds in one's constituency that those are things that are changing the public's perception of the civil service. I hope that, in future documents on development and training, more than lip service will be paid to those characteristics.

The paper raises questions that are of questionable use to the civil service qua civil service. In some ways, it seems that the paper is more appropriate to commercial activity than to the provision of services in which the civil service is predominantly engaged, although I do not for one minute deny that serious and important commercial activities and the management of large sums of money are involved in the principles that the Investors in People standard seeks to cultivate: "commitment, planning, action and evaluation". Those are all, however, directed to improvements in business performance and, so far as it is necessary to say that is important, it is a statement of the obvious.

A survey by Investors in People Ltd. of 231 accredited organisations reported that the most common benefits included better business performance, sharper focus on training and development, a motivated work force, better customer services, effective communication, a better corporate image, a better appraisal strategy, a more skilled work force and higher productivity.

Interestingly, the number of respondents reporting higher productivity benefits appears to have been relatively low compared with the number reporting other benefits. That leads me to wonder whether we have reached nearer the peak in that sphere than in some of the other matters that were measured by IIP. I do not know that it tells us much about the benefits of the civil service's Investors in People standard, because it was not a survey specifically of the civil service.

The paper has been published some two years after the programme has begun and, as I have said, it is more a chronicle than a set of proposals for implementation. Perhaps some of that will come before the Select Committee on the Civil Service or, in time, before the Public Accounts Committee. Performance can be measured more accurately there on a question-and-answer basis than it can by dialogue across the Chamber.

What is not clear from the document is how the proposed improvements are to be paid for. It seems that, if money is to be spent on training, it will not be new money, but money that has been shifted around. That might have been brought out more clearly in the debate's opening speech.

Civil servants claim that there is a lack of commitment to training specialists—that the old training and administration course is virtually defunct. They claim also that there is inadequate investment in the Civil Service College, which was mentioned earlier, in contrast to the use of expensive management consultants for training—particularly IIP Ltd., which apparently charges anything up to £1,000 for a two-day course—although perhaps that is not excessive as the standards of commercial organisations.

The White Paper does little to tackle the fundamental problem of civil service morale, and the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich was not making a partisan point when she drew attention to that aspect. I have encountered in my constituency managers leaving their civil service roles early in their lives in search of new employment, not because they do not love the service but because they feel frustrated in their desire to serve the public through policies that do not enable them to operate as they believe is their duty.

I do not mean the spectacular, high-level, high-flying civil servants who seek pecuniary advantage by going into the City or some other place where, in the culture of the times, they will be more highly valued. That trend must be reversed. I am not able to say the extent to which that trend is due to under-remuneration. I doubt that that is the cause. My experience is that civil servants have a cast of mind that makes them ready to give service and accept lower levels of pay than people in other walks of life. It is a matter of valuation.

I am glad that the Chancellor of the Duchy used the warm language that he did in his foreword to the White Paper and speech. I am sure that he meant what he said from the bottom of his heart, for he is an honest man. The problem is that the Minister and his colleagues have moved into an ethos over the past decade, whereby old values are not even fashionably discussed but are considered so old hat that they are scarcely considered proper matters for observation. That attitude must change, but I do not believe that it will do so under the present Government. I hope that a successor Government will view matters differently.

6.32 pm

Mr. Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow)

I trust that I shall not be out of order if I refer to two meetings that are in progress at this time in different parts of the Palace of Westminster. The first is being held in the Robing Room of the other place—a commemoration for Douglas Houghton, later Lord Houghton of Sowerby. It can be safely said that, before Douglas Houghton became a Member of Parliament, he was the father of the civil service trade union movement. I am sure that the shade of Douglas Houghton would rather that my right hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Foster) and myself were here to argue the case for civil servants than attending his memorial.

The other meeting is taking place in the Grand Committee Room—a tribute to the late Brian Abel-Smith. I was Dick Crossman's parliamentary private secretary when Brian Abel-Smith was serving in his Department. My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) knows well the solace that Brian Abel-Smith gave successive Governments. He was one of the most conspicuously successful academics ever to enter the civil service.

It is the private and public view of Lothian region fire service that a real problem surrounds the rundown of the Fire Service College at Moreton-in-Marsh. It would not be right to say more now, because that matter is more appropriate to an Adjournment debate—but I put down a marker. To save time, I ask the appropriate Department to contact Colin Cranston, firemaster of the city of Edinburgh, to learn of his concerns. The House can return to that matter at a later stage. The training that successive generations of fire officers have received at Moreton-in-Marsh has been extremely valuable. It will be a matter of national concern if that college is seriously run down.

The question that I asked earlier derived from the concise remarks of Lord Bancroft in a debate on Recruitment and Assessment Services in the other place, when he asked: what credible capability will remain … for ensuring the integrity of the systems used by the mass of departmental recruiters—the vital executive and clerical officers?"—[Official Report, House of Lords, 18 March 1996; Vol. 570, c. 544.] The Chancellor of the Duchy said that he would address that question. Perhaps he will do so when he winds up.

I shall concentrate on the real concerns surrounding Recruitment and Assessment Services. Hon. Members who are acquainted with Lord Bancroft, whom I first knew as Reggie Maudling's private secretary in 1963, will know that he is not given to overstatement, yet he wrote in The Guardian: To put it bluntly, open competition, supervised by an independent body itself protected against interference from any quarter, has been the bedrock of civil standards for more than a century. With the sell-off of RAS, will the civil service ethos be maintained? That ethos is one of the last remaining safeguards. Lord Bancroft expressed the opinion that sooner or later the absence of an in-house public service selection organisation for graduate and fast-stream entrants will result in a dilution of public service attributes and standards. The full effect may not be known for 20 years or more, when the careers of the individuals selected under the new arrangement will have borne fruit.

In the RAS debate in the other place Lord Howe, the Under-Secretary of State for Defence, did not make any attempt to answer the succession of heavyweight speeches, by Lord Callaghan of Cardiff, Lord Allen of Abbeydale and even Lord Peyton—who is not exactly a socialist. When such people express concern, this House should be given answers.

This debate should not overrun because another important matter is to be discussed, but I shall conclude with another matter of concern. It is true that Labour Members have either had a brief ministerial career or, as in my case, experience of being a PPS to a senior Minister—while other of my colleagues have had not such experience because of this country's political history.

I wonder whether the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) and my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich agree that a significant problem will be created if civil servants do not have security of tenure—the feeling of certainty that, whatever happens, provided that they behave themselves, they will remain in their task until retirement. That way, they can give the most precious of gifts—unpalatable advice, in telling the Minister things that he does not want to hear.

I am thinking particularly of those who were with Brian Abel-Smith at the time, not least the chief medical officer, Sir George Godber, Sir Alan Marre and others. I was parliamentary private secretary to Mr. Crossman, and I was well disposed towards him, but he was not an easy man to advise. [laughter.] My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich laughs, because she knows what I am talking about.

One can understand the position with a number of Ministers over the years, Labour as well as Conservative, in that if awkward matters or important but inconvenient questions are constantly being raised—flies in the ointment, hassle and difficulties—I have a suspicion that those civil servants might be disadvantaged in their careers. However, whether or not they are disadvantaged is not the main point; it is the perception of being disadvantaged. They may say, "I have a mortgage to pay, children to educate and many other financial obligations. Is it worth sticking out my proverbial neck to give Ministers advice that they will not like?"

I will be personal and blunt. One particular Minister who became notorious in that respect was the former Prime Minister, Baroness Thatcher. Go no further than ask William Reid, the present ombudsman. He was turned down for the position of permanent secretary at the Scottish Office on a prime ministerial whim. He was put forward by the civil service and he was the man the Scottish Office wanted at the time, but his face did not fit in No. 10 Downing street. That is a matter of record and fact. It is a situation that could be repeated time and again if civil servants are not certain of their future.

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich that, in many respects, the Chancellor of the Duchy is an honest and caring Minister. My right hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland is nodding his head in agreement. I should like to know the Government's considered opinion on protecting the willingness of civil servants, in a completely new situation—there has been nothing like it since Northcote-Trevelyan—to give unpalatable advice. That is the issue to which I wish to return.

6.42 pm

Mr. Peter Mandelson (Hartlepool)

Those of us who have listened to the debate will have benefited enormously from the colossal experience of my hon. Friends the Members for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) and for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell). I should like to share in the tribute to our late noble Friend, Lord Houghton of Sowerby. I met him when I was a boy—not so long ago, although it seems like an age. He was a distinguished Minister with responsibility for the civil service and, with great distinction, he discharged the thoroughly unenviable task of chairman of the parliamentary Labour party. He did that extremely well.

It is hardly surprising that the debate has focused on the alleged corrupting of civil service standards and values.

Mr. Dalyell

Lord Houghton was a close friend of my hon. Friend's grandfather.

Mr. Mandelson

He was, indeed, a great friend and colleague of my grandfather.

It is noteworthy that the Chancellor of the Duchy addressed himself to the allegations made by the FDA. I shall return to that later. It is interesting that those remarks touched such a raw nerve with the right hon. Gentleman. It is not entirely clear why that is so. I think that he still has some explanation to offer to the House for his excited statements earlier.

I do not think that there is anything hidden about the FDA's agenda. It is perfectly open. Its responsibility, for which it commands enormous public respect, is to stand up for and protect the independence, integrity and political neutrality of the civil service. That is what it is there to do and it does it extremely well. It behoves all hon. Members to give the FDA the support it deserves in those objectives.

It would be churlish not to welcome the publication of the White Paper. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Foster) said in his eloquent speech, the Labour party has a strong commitment to education and training. The Chancellor of the Duchy acknowledged our commitment to training and development within the civil service. That commitment is reflected powerfully in the early manifesto that we launched last Thursday, "New Life for Britain".

We endorse the objectives of the White Paper and support the commitment to the Investors in People standard—100 per cent. of civil servants to be employed in organisations recognised as Investors in People by the year 2000. That is an ambitious target, but it is right that it has been set.

It is a step change. In fact, when one considers the Government's performance in this area to date, it requires not just a step but a giant leap of imagination from where we are now. Currently, only 58 organisations, covering 12 per cent. of the civil service, have achieved the standard and a mere 15 per cent. are formally committed to achieving it—a rise of just 4 per cent. in the past 12 months. That is a measure of how far we have to go if we are to realise that ambitious target.

It is a deeply disappointing but not surprising record. In their heart, the Government are no more committed to giving their own organisations the skills they need to do the job than they are to equipping the country, our firms and our work force to face the tough, internationally competitive world in which we need to trade and pay our way in the future.

That is why the White Paper, however welcome in principle, risks being judged not as a great leap forward, but as a rather disingenuous and cynical exercise, long on warm words and short on the measures and resources needed to carry it through. Ministers have tried to master the lingo of training, skills and personal development, and that is a start of sorts. However, coming from the lips of a member of the Government, the phrase "investment in people" sounds more like an exotic fruit or something lifted from a foreign language phrase book than vocabulary that is genuinely meant and understood. The words are mouthed, but the concept is not really grasped.

I acknowledge that it is nice to read the admiring statements in the White Paper about some of the personal training and development achievements demonstrated by individual Departments. It is nice, because it is rare for Ministers to utter a complimentary word about anything done in the public sector. Yet the depth of the Government's commitment remains very questionable indeed.

Paragraph 2.7 of the White Paper says: implementing IIP can mean a sizeable investment, not only in money terms, but also in time and resources. But there is no hint of how those demands will be met or how the Government intend to pay for their wish list of targets, and no explanation of how the aims of the White Paper will be fulfilled, in the light of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's insistence on freezing the running cost of the civil service.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, apparently, has become a recent expert in Houdini economics, or so he claims. It behoves Ministers to say—I hope that the Chancellor of the Duchy will do so in his reply—how much the White Paper will cost and how it will be paid for. At the expense of which other worthwhile training activities will it be paid for, in view of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's desire to drive down civil service costs?

Many will draw the conclusion that, if Ministers have, an agenda of contracting out government, as is constantly proclaimed, they are unlikely to commit resources to investing in it first. As the saying goes, one does not feed a pig in the morning intending to have it for lunch that afternoon.

One has only to contrast Ministers' attitude to in-house training with the Government's increased use of private training programmes, run at great expense by outside consultants. I say "outside" consultants, but in fact groups of civil servants are paying through the nose, with taxpayers' money, to hear other civil servants lecture them on effective strategies for career management in the civil service, on courses whose only novelty is that the private sector organisers get their rake-off at the same time.

I have seen the course brochure to which the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) referred. It is about how an individual civil servant can protect his interests, even though the organisation for which he works faces a bleak future. Its appeal to Tory Members of Parliament is obvious, but if I were in the senior civil service, given that I now have one quarter of the chance that I had in 1992 of getting a better job following all the senior management review cuts, I am not sure that I would be interested in paying £1,056 to the so-called Institute for International Research plc for the privilege of listening to a colleague from the Contributions Agency tell me about preparing employees' career development plans to enable them to feel more secure within the new civil service career reality". Some security. Some career. I think that I would already know quite enough about this new reality not to waste my money, and would prefer to go straight off to the headhunters instead, where I suspect that I would get a readier and more helpful welcome. That is precisely what too many civil servants are doing, to the great detriment of the Departments from which they are fleeing.

Far from investing in people, Government policies have systematically driven good people out of the civil service and out of the Government machine. Indeed, I understand that compulsory redundancies are imminent in the Department of the Environment, in grades 3 to 5. That will add to the 24 per cent. —nearly one quarter—of senior civil servants who lost their jobs between January 1994 and January 1996.

It is highly questionable whether many Departments, weakened by the endless stream of fundamental expenditure reviews, senior management reviews and all the rest of the Government's carry-on, retain the expertise and quality of staff to service the policy functions required by Ministers. That may not matter much to the current crop of Ministers, judging by their performance and the quality of their policies. They may not be fussy about the policy advice they receive, judging by the extent to which they are happy to ignore policy advice from their civil servants.

This week, the Chancellor of the Exchequer had to acknowledge that the Treasury, which has suffered excessively from staff cuts—I believe that that is widely acknowledged in the Treasury itself, following its "delayering" exercise—had lost £12.5 billion from public finances.

Future Labour Ministers will be more demanding of their Departments. They will expect more. They will certainly be a darn sight more careful about public finances. They will want to draw on a first-rate civil service, capable of handling the more complex policy issues that tomorrow's problems will pose. I stress policy problems and issues: the legitimate matters for Government; the things that civil servants should really be concerned about in their daily business, and what they are paid to do, not what some Ministers increasingly involve them in, if the claims and the revelations supplied to the House by the FDA are anything to go by.

I make no apology for returning to that important subject. Some very serious allegations have been made about the way in which public officials, publicly funded civil servants, are being drawn by Ministers into party political activities in their Departments. Every hon. Member should be appalled by the findings of the FDA: that civil servants are being asked by Tory Ministers to work not for the nation's good or for the public's benefit, but for the party political advantage of the Conservative party. That misuse of civil servants is a disgraceful attack on their neutrality and impartiality, and it is right for their association to blow the whistle.

The FDA survey makes alarming reading. Twenty members—those who were daring enough, some might say conscientious enough, to respond to the survey—is a large number to have complained of being asked to do work that compromised their neutrality, and that is in addition to the four or five serious cases with which the association is already dealing. It is intolerable for such demands to be made. The hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland referred to that.

I do not know how the Chancellor of the Duchy can possibly defend civil servants being asked to prepare material for election manifestos—that is what is happening, under the auspices and guidance of the No. 10 policy unit. Or they are asked to alter official reports to provide a party political slant; or to provide briefing on the political response to Opposition policies and speeches made by Opposition politicians. By all accounts, civil servants are working overtime, with enormous pressure being put on certain officials in certain Departments, to examine the proposals in the Labour party's manifesto, "New Life for Britain", issued last week.

In the vast majority of cases, requests for political work come from the Minister directly or from his or her political adviser—a fast-expanding species of political operator in Conservative-controlled Whitehall. That is an abuse of the civil service, of ministerial position and of taxpayers' money.

It is no secret that government is being closed down in readiness for the election, and that Departments are being turned into one big propaganda machine. [Interruption.] Conservative Members scoff at what I am saying. Was it not the Deputy Prime Minister who was reported in the Financial Times on 11 January 1996 as saying: The Conservative party will increasingly become a fighting machine as opposed to a Government administering the country."? Ministers and civil servants are being openly orchestrated by Whitehall political advisers and Conservative central office officials—although sometimes we could be forgiven for not noticing, for all the good their orchestration does them. When I drive along Whitehall early in the morning, on the way to my office, I see central office officials scurrying down Whitehall and into the office of the Deputy Prime Minister. It is not to play tennis; it is to organize—with the Deputy Prime Minister, civil servants, Government press officers and the like—the orchestration of so-called Government information. It is a thinly veiled exercise to orchestrate what is not Government information, but Conservative party propaganda.

Ministers, civil servants and central office staff meet every day. Indeed, the Prime Minister has had to admit that in parliamentary answers.

Mr. Bernard Jenkin

The hon. Gentleman is the propagandist.

Mr. Mandelson

I have no problem with admitting that I am a propagandist for my party—but I do not involve publicly paid civil servants in the propaganda organised by the Labour party. But that is the charge being levelled at Ministers and Conservative Members. They are concerned with publicising not the truth about Government policies, but distortions about the Government's record and black propaganda about Labour.

Mr. Jenkin

Where is the evidence?

Mr. Mandelson

The hon. Gentleman is shouting at me about evidence. I suggest that he looks carefully at the statement made by the FDA. Perhaps he wants to hide behind the Deputy Prime Minister's words. The right hon. Gentleman said this afternoon that there is not one shred of verifiable evidence. The hon. Member for Colchester, North (Mr. Jenkin) should think carefully about the word "verifiable", which was a convenient word for the Deputy Prime Minister to hide behind.

According to central office legend and its notorious lie machine, all is fair in love, war and politics. That may be good enough for the Government; if they want to engage in non-stop negative campaigning, that is their political choice—but the civil service should be left out of their political chicanery.

I gather that Sir Robin Butler, the head of the home civil service, is alert to same old Tories, same old dangers as election preparations gather pace. I hope that he will personally lay it on the line to Ministers that the civil service is not the property of any single Administration. It does not exist to aid the re-election of this or any other Government. If the civil service will not stand up for itself, Parliament assuredly will. The Labour party will ensure that it does.

There is widespread anxiety about the condition and morale of the civil service. My right hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland spoke extensively about that, and I do not need to repeat the points that he made—other than to say that it is the culmination of a decade and a half of dogmatic belief that everything public is bad and everything private is good.

Just five months ago, the Deputy Prime Minister told the Treasury and Civil Service Select Committee that private sector practices are inherently better than public sector practices". The most startling quotation of all from the Deputy Prime Minister is: the paraphernalia of so-called public accountability is nothing better than a bureaucratic overhead". That speaks volumes for the contempt in which Ministers hold public service and the democratic process in which we are engaged in this House.

That is the context in which we are considering the White Paper. At best, it is a set of platitudinous aspirations designed, very belatedly, to put the stamp of managerial correctness on this Government in their fading months in office. At worst, it is a cynical exercise that will change little and impress no one.

In less than a year, a new Government with a very different philosophy of training and development will replace this Government, to the benefit of the civil service and the country as a whole.

7.5 pm

Mr. Freeman

I shall confine my remarks to answering the specific points raised, as I am aware that we need to move on to the next debate. I join in the tributes to Lord Houghton, who was a predecessor of mine as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and was well respected in that post.

I note the decision of the right hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Foster) to proceed, if the Labour party is ever in government, with a moratorium on the competing for quality programme, including market testing and other initiatives. I shall draw his comments to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, because the right hon. Gentleman has, in effect, made a spending pledge. The amount of money that the Government save each year through those initiatives will be jeopardised. In due course, we will return to an honourable but tough political debate on that specific Labour commitment.

The right hon. Gentleman asked me three questions. The first related to the cost of the White Paper. I have asked Departments to respond by the autumn, so that we can see how they intend precisely to implement the policies. Frankly, it must be a question of re-prioritising certain programmes so that Departments can accommodate whatever costs there may be within their existing public expenditure survey headlines. I shall look carefully at what the Departments say.

Secondly, the right hon. Gentleman asked about timing. It was not Sir Robin Butler who initiated this exercise—I take full responsibility for the White Paper. My right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister is closely associated with it. Indeed, he foreshadowed many of the proposals in a speech earlier this year.

Thirdly, the right hon. Gentleman referred to promotion and interchange. I do not regard advertising and open competition for posts as a threat. I regard the training and development of civil servants and the improvement of their skills as an opportunity for them to compete in those circumstances—and it will be a minority of circumstances—where there is competition from outside for a particular post. I believe that to be good for the civil service. If the right hon. Gentleman were ever put in a position of responsibility, I do not think that he would lightly jeopardise that interchange.

My hon. Friend the Member for Colchester, North (Mr. Jenkin) referred to deregulation and the civil service. He has set me firmly on the course of developing a training course, at the Civil Service College, on cost-benefit analysis, which is crucial and central to the control of regulations—primary and secondary—coming out of the civil service. I thank him for the thought, which I shall pursue.

The hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) alleged that I and other Ministers believe that the civil service is not important. I never said that; it is a travesty of the truth, and the hon. Lady knows it full well. I take this opportunity to congratulate not only those civil servants who were responsible for preparing the White Paper, but others throughout the civil service, for all the work they do. I have been consistently impressed by the quality, dedication and impartiality of all the civil servants I have met over the past 11 years, in four Departments.

The hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) asked who is responsible for progressing the White Paper. I am the responsible Minister, and the OPS will take responsibility for implementation. The hon. Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell) asked me three questions. I shall certainly take action on his point about the fire service. I shall read Hansard in the morning and ensure that the proper inquiries are made. He referred to Lord Bancroft and the Recruitment and Assessment Service. Frankly, we are arguing at cross purposes. Last summer we removed from RAS responsibility for control over the criteria for recruitment, and placed it firmly and squarely with the civil service commissioners. RAS performs a mechanical role of recruitment and exercises no discretion; it does not control the quality of or the criteria for selection.

I suggest that the hon. Gentleman reads the report by the House of Lords Public Service Select Committee, which will be placed before the House of Lords in advance of a debate which I understand may take place before that House rises for the recess. The Government would certainly respond to any criticisms by their Lordships about the privatisation of RAS.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly—

Mr. Dalyell

rose—

Mr. Freeman

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will forgive me if I do not give way, because another debate must start very soon.

Mr. Dalyell

In column 287 of the Official Report of the proceedings of the House of Lords yesterday, 10 July, there appears an exchange between Lord Bancroft and Viscount Cranborne. If the Minister reads that, he will see that those experienced peers are obviously less than satisfied with what has happened already.

Mr. Freeman

I do not doubt those people's experience, but I have doubts about the dissemination of information, which is very current, about what the Government plan to do. It is my responsibility to ensure that the Government respond quickly to the House of Lords Public Service Select Committee report on RAS. That will enlighten and, I hope, inform their Lordships.

Finally, the hon. Gentleman asked me the crucial question: what is the Minister's reaction to inconvenient advice? That is the test of the impartiality of the civil service, and of the competence of Ministers and the Government. In all sincerity, I can say that not only I but the Government as a whole believe that one must listen to inconvenient advice. Indeed, if it is argued properly, one must act upon it. If one is offered rational advice, one must take rational action. That is the test of government. I do not accept everything that the hon. Gentleman said, but I accept his test with regard to inconvenient advice.

The hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr. Mandelson) made a political speech, so he will expect me to conclude with a political remark. Yes, perhaps—unusually—I got a bit excited about the FDA, but that was because it has made serious allegations, which I take seriously. I give a commitment to the House that not only the head of the home civil service but I myself will take early, serious, comprehensive and conclusive action.

Mr. James Couchman (Gillingham)

Does my right hon. Friend agreed that the hon. Member for Hartlepool appears to have learnt a great deal about the Association of First Division Civil Servants, probably from the time that he spent as its parliamentary adviser?

Mr. Freeman

The hon. Member for Hartlepool must speak for himself. To be fair to him, I must say that he obviously had a typed speech making copious reference to the FDA press release. Doubtless he took the same attitude as I did long before the debate began—that the issue is important. It is an issue that we must take seriously, and that is what the Government will do.

I commend the White Paper to the House, and I am grateful for all the contributions, both serious and otherwise, to the debate.