HC Deb 23 March 1987 vol 113 cc33-4W
Mr. Williams

asked the Minister for Civil Service in what circumstances regulation 11 of the Civil Service Commission General Regulations 1986 permits the requirement for open competition to be waived in making an appointment; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Luce

The Civil Service Commissioners have discretion to waive open competition in the circumstances specified in regulation 11 of the Civil Service General Regulations. These can be summarised as follows:

  1. (a) where the commissioners are satisfied that this is for special and exceptional means justified by the needs of the public service and the proved merits of the candidate;
  2. (b) to enable staff to be transferred into the Civil Service with their work following a machinery of government change;
  3. (c) to enable staff to be transferred from elsewhere in the public service to the Civil Service;
  4. (d) to offer appointments in shortage grades to candidates who have demonstrated their suitability in competing for equivalent or high level appointments for which they have been narrowly unsuccessful;
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  5. (e) to facilitate inward secondments to the Civil Service; and
  6. (f) to enable former civil servants to be reinstated in their former grade or re-employed in a lower grade.

The commissioners use these discretionary powers sparingly. Each appointment under (a) is recorded in the commissioners' annual report; there are typically one or two such cases a year. Appointments under (b)-(d) are made infrequently. Under (e) 52 inward secondments were approved from 1 May 1986 to 31 December 1986. There are approximately 400 cases a year under (f).