Civil Service in the news
New Civil Service diversity and equality strategy launched
The strategy sets out a clear commitment from the Government to promote equality and diversity across its workforce.
Promoting equality, valuing diversity: a strategy for the Civil Service builds on the first Civil Service strategy to improve diversity, the 10-Point Plan on Delivering a Diverse Civil Service launched in 2005.
The initial strategy set out ambitious targets to increase the diversity of the Civil Service, from which government departments developed their own action plans in partnership with the Cabinet Office, particularly to increase accountability for diversity at leadership level.
The new strategy supports this continuing work and aims to go further and embed diversity into every aspect of Civil Service business, to create a Civil Service that contains the richest mix of talents and is truly representative of the public it serves.
Sir Gus O'Donnell, Head of the Civil Service said:
‘I want the Civil Service to lead the way, among employers, in the way we value our people, invest in their development and create an inclusive culture. A diverse Civil Service which reflects the society we serve will enable us to deliver better public services.
‘We genuinely want to be a meritocratic organisation, which will give us a competitive advantage over other organisations because we'll be employing the best people.’
The Civil Service Diversity Champions' Network will guide the strategy forward by bringing together board-level diversity champions to support departmental action plans. Sir Bill Jeffrey, the Civil Service Diversity Champion and Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Defence said:
‘Whether we succeed in this has a lot to do with leadership. Organisations won't change unless people know that their leaders believe in it. It's our job to lead not follow society.’
The new strategy will focus on:
- Culture change and behaviours – creating a fully inclusive culture and effectively measuring progress.
- Leadership and accountability – including continuing to hold Permanent Secretaries to account for their department's performance on diversity.
- Talent management - recruiting and progressing the most talented people from all different backgrounds.
- A diverse workforce at all levels – setting out our aspirations for representation in the longer term through service-wide targets and departmental targets that widen the focus beyond only the Senior Civil Service.
