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The evolution of the United Kingdom Civil Service 1848-1997
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7. Four C’s: Citizen’s charter, Continuity and Change
It is not always the case that the most recent events are the most significant, even though they may bulk larger in our memory than more distant ones. There is therefore a need to be more selective about the many initiatives and reforms of the 1990s, and this paper shall concentrate on just two of the Civil Service reforms of recent years. There is regrettably not space to cover many others.50
Perhaps the most typical programme of the years since 1990 has been the Citizen’s Charter launched by John Major in July 1991. Mr Major, brought up in Brixton, with a non-university background and as much outside the Whitehall club as his predecessor, regarded this as his own personal programme, aimed at least as much at local government, and the privatised utilities, as at the Civil Service. In his introduction to the first publication on the subject he wrote51
to make public services answer better to the wishes of their users, and to raise their quality overall, have been ambitions of mine ever since I was a local councillor in Lambeth over 20 years ago... I want the Citizen’s Charter to be one of the central themes of public life in the 1990s...we will, for example, be introducing guaranteed maximum waiting times for hospital operations...
and in perhaps the most significant phrase he wrote
There is a well-spring of talent, energy, care and commitment in our public services. The aim of the Citizen’s Charter is to release these qualities.
There is a very clear echo here of the Next Steps programme’s desire to release energy, but Mr Major added care and commitment to the qualities that were needed. The Citizen’s Charter has followed the precedent of previous reforms in being run by a small committed team at the centre relying heavily upon their support from the top of government. But it has not worked through making machinery of government changes; instead it has aimed at changing attitudes within a very clear framework of service delivery. The emphasis has been upon improving public servants’ efforts to fulfil their duties rather than upon creating new rights for citizens.52 In the original Citizen’s Charter white paper the following principles of public service were laid down:
- standards - set., monitored and published so that users can know what they can reasonably expect
- openness - full, accurate information in plain language and clear indication of who is in charge, how services are run and how much they cost
- choice - wherever possible, and offering consultation with those who use services, whose views should be taken into account in final decisions on standards
- courtesy and helpfulness - services available equally to all and run for their customers and implying the wearing of name badges for officials that deal directly with the public
- putting things right - apologies for mistakes and clear complaints procedures
- value for money - efficient delivery of services within affordable resources and independent validation of performance against standards.
After having been in progress now for over six years, the Citizen’s Charter programme has seen a whole series of different mechanisms put in place to deliver the basic principles. These have included Charters for most government Departments that deliver services directly. These will state what is to be delivered and what customers can expect. Some examples:53
| Department | Charter |
|---|---|
| Health | Patient’s Charter |
| Inland Revenue | Taxpayer’s Charter |
| Contributions Agency | Contributor’s Charter |
| Education | Parent’s Charter |
| Employment Service | Jobseeker’s Charter |
| Home Office | The Victim’s Charter |
There are now 41 published charters, including also many non-Civil Service activities. Organisations may apply for a Charter Mark Award, which is given to public services that demonstrate that they are providing an excellent service to the public. It is held for three years after which holders must re-apply. The first 36 awards were made in 1992; in December 1996, 323 Charter mark awards were made. At present around 90 of the Next Steps Agencies hold one of these awards. The Citizen’s Charter Unit also publishes a free quarterly magazine. It is difficult to convey the flavour of the Citizen’s Charter successes. They are very practical. Examples might include:
- the Post Office delivers 91.9% of first class mail the day after posting
- United Kingdom Passport Agency average turn-round time now under 9 days
- Employment Service states that 98% of clients are seen within 10 minutes
- Hertfordshire County Council have now a 24-hour pothole repair service
- Benefits Agency, clearance times for Income Support Claims have reduced from 5 days to 3.5
The Citizen’s Charter has had less impact upon the machinery of government than many other reforms but it has changed the mentality and the language of government service-delivery. It has also received the accolade of praise from the Public Services Committee of the House of Commons, who judged that it had made a valuable contribution to improving public services. The new Labour Government shares similar opinions of the value of public service.
In the course of the years 1994-5 the Office of Public Service, which is the current group at the centre of the Cabinet Office dealing with these matters, and which shares management of the civil service with the Treasury, published two reports that sum up and in a sense have stabilised (not stopped) the process of continuous change in the civil service. The titles of the two reports, over which top management in the OPS spent much time, were:54
- The Civil Service: Continuity and Change
- The Civil Service: Taking Forward Continuity and Change
What is important about these texts is the recognition of the fact that the civil service has changed and will need to continue to change but that in part of its function there has been no change and there should be none, instead a continuity. The former is stated as follows55
it has carried through a wide range of reforms to improve its efficiency, effectiveness and quality of service to the public. New organisational structures and management techniques have been introduced...The Government recognises the commitment that departments, agencies and their staff at all levels have shown in bringing about these changes.
But
The Government, like its predecessors, is wholeheartedly committed to sustaining the key principles on which the British civil service is based: integrity, political impartiality, objectivity, selection and promotion on merit and accountability through Ministers to Parliament.
In the second report the next major changes are also set out. These included
- the establishment of a senior civil service - "a highly professional group of senior advisers and managers to work closely with Ministers" starting at the old Grade 5 level and employed on written but without-term contracts
- the First Civil Service Commissioner not to be a civil servant to reinforce the principle of selection on the basis of merit
- the promulgation of a new Civil Service Code to set out the framework and values required
- the ending of centrally-defined grades as from 1996.
These two reports have both reshaped the civil service and placed it in a position to evolve further. Pay and grading was delegated to departments and so by spring 1997 there were no more service-wide grades - apart from the new Senior Civil Service at old Grade 5 and above. Sir Michael Betts, from the private sector, became the new First Civil Service Commissioner. The Civil Service Commission, part of whose functions had been taken over by an Executive Agency - Recruitment and Assessment Services - saw those elements privatised in 1996, while the Commissioners, so core a part of the Northcote-Trevelyan settlement, have been retained and their position re-asserted. The Civil Service Code was published. At the time of writing the changes set in train are still working through.
All of the achievements from 1979 to 1997, and on, have been achieved with a civil service that, as the objective record of its size shows, has been growing ever smaller, down-sized, but with tasks as large or larger than before. It has had to deliver "more for less"; the hard motto stencilled on its briefcases and burned into its laptops.
Notes
50 Investors in People, Competing for Quality, the Private Finance Initiative, Open Government, Fundamental Expenditure Reviews, Training and Development White Paper and government direct have been among the areas of continuing activity to May 1997.
51 ‘The Citizen’s Charter : Raising the Standard’, HMSO, July 1991, Cm 1599.
52 The term "rights" is perhaps difficult here. In some areas the Charter arguably has created new rights - as in the Patient’s Charter. But "service standard" is better.
53 ‘Charters and how to obtain them’, Citizen’s Charter Unit March 1997
54 Cm 2627, London, HMSO, 1994 and Cm 2748, London, HMSO, 1995.
55 Cm 2627, page 1, paragraphs 1.1 and 1.3.