GOVERNANCE AND PUBLIC POLICY
Diploma stage examination
7 June 2007
From 2.00pm to 5.00pm
plus ten minutes reading time from 1.50pm to 2.00pm
Instructions to candidates
There are five questions on this question paper
Answer four questions in total
Two compulsory questions from Section A
Two of the three questions from Section B
Question 1 in Section A carries a total of 50 marks
Question 2 in Section A carries a total of 20 marks
The questions in Section B each carry a total of 15 marks
Where a question asks for a specific format or style, such as a letter, report or layout of
accounts, marks will be awarded for presentation and written communication.
(Copyright)
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
PRE-SEEN MATERIAL
Extracts from:
Whitehalls Black Box: Accountability and Performance in the Senior Civil
Service
A report by Guy Lodge and Ben Rogers (August 2006)
SUMMARY: TWELVE PROPOSITIONS ON CIVIL SERVICE REFORM
1. The senior civil service is one of the most important institutions in the United
Kingdom. No government of any colour will be able to achieve its aims without a highperforming civil service. This is particularly true of a government, like the present, that
has made public service reform a priority.
2. The British civil service is admired throughout the world. It attracts an exceptionally
high calibre of entrants; it has high standards of probity; the public it serves largely
trusts it.
3. If an institution is under-performing, this is usually largely because of the way it is
managed and governed, rather than because of any inadequacy in the people working
for it.
4. Despite its qualities, the civil service is under-performing in key respects. It is often
ineffective in carrying out its core functions of policy design and operational delivery. Too
much Whitehall activity is undermined by its inability to work effectively across
departmental boundaries; by a narrow skills-base; and under-developed leadership. It
lacks a strong centre able to think strategically, manage civil service wide change or
drive standards up. Performance is poorly managed, and poor performance too often
goes unchecked.
5. These weaknesses are not new and have long been recognised. Indeed, the civil
service has been subject to a long succession of reforms, intended, but frequently failing,
to address them.
6. The constitutional conventions governing the civil service and regulating its
relationship with ministers, Parliament and the public are now anachronistic and severely
inadequate. This is particularly true of the most important of these: the convention of
ministerial responsibility. Together, these conventions entail that relations between
ministers and civil servants are ill-defined, and their respective roles and responsibilities
unclear. As a result, there is a governance vacuum at the top of Whitehall: lines of
accountability are confused and leadership is weak.
7. Many of the civil services weaknesses are traceable to its inadequate system of
governance and confused lines of accountability. They could be remedied by a better
system.
8. Previous reform efforts have not addressed the inadequacy in the civil services
governance arrangements. Instead of seeking to reform the way the civil service is
governed, they have focused on second order problems and left its constitutional
conventions, and so its basic accountability structure, in place. That is why many of the
problems that they were meant to address persist.
GPPXQ5
Page 2 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
9. Government should reform the governance system of the civil service as a priority. It
needs, in particular, to recast the doctrine of ministerial responsibility.
10. There are, broadly, two options for reforming the way that Whitehall is held to
account:
Ministers could, as in the United States, make a reality of ministerial responsibility by
appointing senior civil servants. Ministers would then be responsible to Parliament,
and ultimately the electorate, for every aspect of civil service performance.
The convention of ministerial responsibility could be reformulated, making politicians
responsible for policy decisions and civil servants responsible for clearly defined
operational ones. Means would then have to be found to ensure that both were made
properly accountable to Parliament and the public for the way in which they handle
their responsibilities.
11. It is possible to combine elements of these two options. Nevertheless, the second is
generally preferable. Britain already has a strong executive, and giving it further powers
to appoint and dismiss civil servants would risk strengthening it further. Introducing a
clearer division of responsibilities between ministers and mandarins and improving the
arrangement by which both are held to account would improve government
performance.
12. Both ministers and civil servants stand to gain from a greater demarcation of
responsibilities. Civil servants will gain new responsibilities and a higher public profile.
Ministers will get a professional, better managed, more strategic and outward-looking
civil service. They will also get more support in making policy.
INTRODUCTION AND OVERVIEW
There is no more important organisation in the UK than the civil service. It is the engine
of the British state. No government, of any political persuasion, can hope to achieve its
aims without a well-run, high-performing civil service. This is perhaps particularly true of
a government, like the present one, which has made public service reform a defining
priority. But it is not just ministers who rely on the civil service. Local government, the
National Health Service, schools, the police service, universities, the armed forces, the
railway system, and the voluntary and private sectors all depend on it too. It shapes our
lives and life chances in countless ways.
Yet, surprisingly, the civil service is often neglected and overlooked by politicians,
commentators and the broader policy community. Though headlines are, as we write,
dominated by crises at the Home Office and elsewhere in Whitehall, it is rare for
Whitehall to get serious, constructive attention from the political class. Two examples
illustrate the point. In nine years as Prime Minister, Tony Blair has made just two
speeches on the civil service, though he has made dozens of speeches on public service
reform (Blair 1998; 2004). Labours lengthy 2005 manifesto failed to mention the civil
service once (Labour Party 2005).
This report explores some of the civil services strengths and weaknesses and makes
suggestions as to how it needs to change if it is to meet the challenges it faces.
Our research focused on the senior civil service the Whitehall Village and the senior
civil servants who work in it (Heclo and Wildavsky 1981). Whitehall is by no means the
same thing as the civil service. Indeed, if we define senior civil servants as grade 5 and
above, then the senior civil service (SCS) comprises just 3,900 employees out of a total
of half a million less than one per cent of the civil service. Some critics might question
whether we need another focus on this cadre of mandarin. They have a point. The
Whitehall esprits de corps have been the subjects of a disproportionate number of
GPPXQ5
Page 3 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
reports over the years, and there is need for research on the junior and middle ranking
parts of the service and especially on the agencies. These have been seriously neglected.
Nevertheless, we feel justified in focusing on the upper parts of the organisation,
principally because of their importance in making the rest of the civil service and
beyond work effectively. There are two further reasons. In many respects, the senior
civil servants working at the heart of government have largely escaped systemic reform
in the post-war period (Jenkins 2004). The Next Steps reforms, for instance, focused on
the periphery, not the core (Talbot 2005). We also believe that changes within the
operating environment of government have created new tensions and challenges for
senior civil servants especially in their relationship with ministers. In short there is
trouble at the top.
Our argument
The argument of this report, in essence, is that, while the civil service remains one of the
best in the world on many measures, it suffers from a number of weaknesses. It is, of
course, hard to make generalisations about an institution as complex and varied as
Whitehall. But, our research (above all the evidence emerging from our interviews)
suggests that, while civil servants are often dedicated, impartial and talented, Whitehall
is poor at reflecting on its purpose, strategic thinking, dealing with inadequate
performance, managing change effectively, learning from mistakes or working across
departments. Corporate leadership is lacking.
Despite the drives over recent decades to recruit a wider range of specialists into the
service and improve training within it, amateurism still too often prevails, reflecting a
skills gene pool that is too narrow management and delivery expertise, in particular,
are still lacking. Though Whitehall has opened up in recent years, the degree of mobility
in and out remains limited, with many outsiders complaining of the difficulty they have in
penetrating the core of the civil service. Civil servants tend to look upwards, rather than
outwards, in a culture that still values proximity to ministers above all else. The focus
upwards also means that the civil service often lacks an understanding of the public it
serves.
We acknowledge that we are not the first to have levelled many of these criticisms. Most
of the shortcomings we point to are of a long-standing nature and they have been the
subject of many articles and publications over the years (for example, Balogh (1959),
Fabian Society (1967), Barnett (1986), Ponting (1986), Bichard (2004; 2005), Straw
(2004) and Darwell (2006)), as well as of official reports and associated reform efforts
(including the Fulton Report (1968), Next Steps (1988), Continuity and Change (1994),
Modernising Government (1999), and Delivery and Values (2003)).
We contend, however, that past reforms have not got to the root of the problem.
Whitehalls weaknesses flow from the way it is governed from the constitutional
conventions that dictate who is responsible for what, who gets appointed to run the top
echelons of the service and how, and what they are expected, allowed or encouraged to
do. Yet, as we suggest in Chapter 5, past efforts to reform Whitehall have treated
Whitehalls governance arrangements as sacrosanct, and instead focused on what are,
according to our analysis, second order matters.
The governance arrangements of an institution, we argue, play a vital role in shaping its
culture, its sense of purpose, its capacities and capabilities in short, its effectiveness.
And Whitehall is no exception. Its governing conventions foster the culture, incentives
and outlook of the service, shape and regulate the pivotal relationship between ministers
and mandarins, and ultimately determine how and why the civil service behaves as it
GPPXQ5
Page 4 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
does. Yet the conventions governing Whitehall are seriously inadequate and out of date.
In particular, we argue that the central convention of ministerial responsibility, while
once, perhaps, effective, needs recasting. As it works now, the respective responsibilities
of ministers and civil servants are unclear and lines of accountability confused.
Some might suggest that they did not need this report to tell them that civil service
governance is a live issue. Hardly a week goes by without some news item raising
questions about the politicisation of the civil service and government assaults on its
traditions of integrity and impartiality. But, our argument is that the debate about
politicisation a debate that is by no means new is something of a diversion. Were
special advisers or other political appointees the main agents of politicisation to be
abolished tomorrow, the basic problems with the way the civil service is governed would
still exist. Rather than see politicisation as the core problem or key solution facing
Whitehall, we understand it as a response, perhaps short-sighted, to the fundamental
shortcoming in the way Whitehall is governed.
The governance vacuum
What, then, is precisely wrong with the way Whitehall is governed? This is best put by
saying that lines of accountability are weak and confused. There is a governance
vacuum at the heart of Whitehall. It is surprisingly hard to find an official
characterisation of existing governance arrangements roles and responsibilities remain
largely uncodified. Nevertheless, a number of doctrines and conventions laid down in the
19th century are key.
The most important of these, ministerial responsibility, dictates that civil servants are
accountable to ministers for their actions, and ministers are, in turn, accountable to
Parliament. According to this doctrine, civil servants exist to assist ministers in advising
on and executing government policy. But, ministers, and ministers alone, are answerable
to Parliament, and ultimately to the electorate, for both the policies they instruct the civil
service to execute and for their execution or operationalisation. Indeed, a second,
related convention that of the anonymity of civil servants denies Parliament, or any
other public body, the opportunity to interrogate civil servants or otherwise hold them to
account in a meaningful way. As Turpin writes: the ancillary to ministerial accountability
is the non-accountability of civil servants (Turpin 1994).
If the convention of ministerial responsibility appears to give ministers power and
responsibility over the civil service, others severely limit their space for manoeuvre.
Jealously guarded conventions of recruitment and promotion by merit, permanence and
impartiality prevent ministers from appointing, promoting, sanctioning or dismissing
their staff, seeking independent advice, or forcing change on an unwilling service.
Indeed, these conventions underpin an understanding of the civil service still very
powerful in Whitehall as an autonomous profession, accountable to no one but itself.
These arrangements, which evolved throughout the mid 19th century, might have
worked well in their early days, when government was small, Whitehall departments still
smaller, and the job of managing both relatively simple. But they work less well now.
Indeed, our contention is that they have become a recipe for ambiguity, confusion, weak
leadership and buck-passing. Civil servants and ministers prerogatives and
responsibilities are ill-defined, and relations between them inadequately regulated or
managed. We suggest, indeed, that the tensions induced by Whitehalls governance
vacuum are becoming more pressing by the day, with mandarins and ministers
recognising that roles and responsibilities urgently need recasting a view most recently
acknowledged by ministers and officials in the Home Office, following a fundamental
review of the department (Home Office 2006).
GPPXQ5
Page 5 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
We will return to explore the problems with the civil services governance arrangements
and the constitutional conventions that underpin them in greater detail in Chapter 4, but
as our claims in this area form the lynchpin around which the rest of our arguments
revolve, we here lay out what we think are the main problems in more detail:
Lack of civil service accountability
External accountability: The doctrine of ministerial responsibility means that civil
servants are not subject to external or direct accountability for the roles and functions
they perform. (The exception is that Permanent Secretaries are directly accountable to
Parliament, through the Public Accounts Committee, for financial probity.) Parliament
and the outside world have very limited powers to interrogate or scrutinise civil
servants.
Internal accountability: Ministerial responsibility rests on the understanding that civil
servants are accountable to ministers, who are directly and exclusively accountable to
Parliament. In fact, ministers cannot effectively hold civil servants to account. To do so
would violate the conventions around recruitment and promotion on merit, and civil
service impartiality. Ministers have very limited powers to choose their civil servants,
promote them or dismiss them or to seek redress when they feel that they are being
poorly served. Consequently, internal accountability is weak.
Lack of ministerial accountability
The ambiguities in the civil services governing conventions mean that ministers are
also insufficiently accountable for their performance. Despite the conventions
supposedly guarding civil service independence, and protecting civil servants right to
speak truth unto power, civil servants are not in a good position to resist improper
demands, challenge ministerial amateurism or prejudice, or object to the hiring or
conduct of special advisers and other political appointees. The convention of ministerial
responsibility dictates that civil servants exist to serve the government of the day, and
that, by and large, means doing as ministers wish. If ministers insist on pursuing poorly
worked out or attention-grabbing policies, so be it. It is the job of civil servants to
support ministers in everything they do. And, when criticised by ministers, civil
servants have very little opportunity to defend themselves. Civil servants, the theory
goes, work directly for ministers, and have no constitutional personality of their own.
Lack of clarity in Cabinet SecretaryPermanent Secretary relations
Relations between Permanent Secretaries (the heads of departments) and the Cabinet
Secretary (nominally the head of the civil service) are ill-defined. Permanent
Secretaries are said to answer to their ministers, and, in their role as accounting
officers, to Parliament. At the same time, the centre, in the form of Cabinet Secretary,
Prime Minister and Treasury, make increasing demands on them, and exercise a
growing, if mainly informal, authority over them. Too often, responsibility and
accountability falls between the gaps in this arrangement.
It is our contention that these shortcomings in the governance arrangements at the top
of the civil service have serious negative effects on civil service performance overall.
Among other consequences, they:
lead to an absence of clear corporate leadership, so detracting from the services ability
to think and act strategically or drive change.
ensure that civil servants have a weak sense of individual responsibility; there is no
tradition of feeling accountable for outcomes too often there is no price for failure in
Whitehall.
militate against root and branch change as a self-governing institution the civil
service can, and in the past always has, avoided fundamental reform; there is no
external pressure to change.
GPPXQ5
Page 6 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
allow ministers and civil servants to duck and dive behind one another when things go
wrong.
encourage civil servants to focus upwards on ministers, rather than outwards on civil
society organisations and citizens.
result in a neglect of managerial and operational matters the doctrine of ministerial
responsibility dictates that ministers are responsible not only for developing and
applying policies, but for the strategic management and operations of their
departments; yet, most ministers have little interest and even less capacity in issues of
strategic management and operations.
promote ministerial overload by drawing ministers into operational details.
Put more positively, we argue that a clear accountability system one that clearly
identifies the responsibilities of ministers and civil servants and ensures that they are
held to account in executing these responsibilities will force a step change in the civil
service as a whole. With improved governance arrangements in place, the civil service
will be able to be relied upon to innovate from within (Leadbeater 2002).
Our recommendations
But how should relations between ministers and mandarins be divided up, and to whom
should they be accountable? We end our report with some brief recommendations. We
argue against one possible reaction to the problems that we have identified greater
politicisation of Whitehall. This, we argue, would result in a further transfer of power to
Britains already mighty executive, and might further discourage the civil service from
looking outwards and engaging with citizens, local agencies and civil society.
Instead, we favour measures that would preserve the civil services traditions of
neutrality and objectivity, but ensure that civil servants and ministers are properly
held to account for their performance. To this end, we argue that the convention of
ministerial responsibility should be revised, so that, while ministers remain accountable
for policy, resources and strategic decisions including decisions about the role and
structure of the civil service civil servants become externally accountable for clearly
defined operational matters.
Revising the doctrine of ministerial responsibility will only prove productive, however, if
we can find ways of adequately supporting ministers and civil servants in their new roles
and ensuring that they really are held to account for the way they handle their new
responsibilities. This demands, in our view, a radical overhaul in the way the civil service
is governed. Among other reforms, we recommend:
The creation of a stronger, more centralised civil service executive, led by a civil
service Head. The Head of the Civil Service would, in consultation with the Prime
Minister and individual ministers, appoint and line manage Permanent Secretaries. He
or she would have the power to reward high performers and remove under-performers.
He or she would also be responsible for strategic management of core corporate
functions and services, like human resources, knowledge management, information and
communication technology, and financial management. Ministers, of course, would not
only retain control over resources, they would have a power of veto over senior
appointments and would be actively involved in informing the performance assessment
of Permanent Secretaries. And they would, most importantly, remain responsible for
setting policy.
The establishment of a new governing body for the civil service. Appointed by
Parliament, this would be responsible for setting the strategic direction for the service,
appointing a civil service head, scrutinising performance, and laying out what is
expected of civil servants and ministers and, where necessary, managing
disagreements between them.
GPPXQ5
Page 7 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
The enhancement of Parliaments powers to hold ministers to account, and the creation
of new powers to do the same for civil servants.
The introduction of external performance assessment for all Whitehall departments.
The creation of a Department for the Prime Minister and Cabinet, with the Cabinet
Secretary becoming, in effect, the Permanent Secretary of the new department. This
department would be responsible for running the Prime Ministers Office and serving the
Cabinet and cabinet committees.
The enshrinement of these reforms in a new Civil Service Act. The traditional doctrine
of ministerial responsibility, though vague and contested, remains powerful, and it will
be very difficult to establish new and clearer lines of accountability, unless ministerial
responsibility is reformulated in statute.
A number of caveats: first, we willingly acknowledge that Whitehall has very real
strengths. International surveys show that the British civil service remains one of the
most admired in the world (Kaufman et al 2005). Competition for entry into the civil
service is intense, ensuring that recruits are exceptionally able and qualified: the civil
service came first in the Top 100 Graduate Employers Survey conducted for The Times in
2003, and second in 2004 and 2005 (The Times 2003, 2004, 2005). Training and
support for senior civil servants is now much stronger than it was, and Whitehall is now
much more open to outsiders. Objectives are more clearly defined than they were and
most officials say they understand their goals. Old and invaluable traditions of hard work,
public-mindedness and integrity are alive and well. Moreover, the weaknesses that
remain are weaknesses not of individuals but of culture, system and, ultimately,
governance.
Second, disagreements over the future of the civil service are often depicted as pitting
advocates of increased politicisation against those loyal to the traditional values of
anonymity, permanence and impartiality or, more emotively, as pitting ministers
against civil servants. We dont argue that the debate does sometimes take this form.
But our report cannot be fitted into this framework.
We maintain that the existing arrangements serve both mandarins and ministers poorly.
A clearer articulation of the prerogatives and responsibilities of civil servants and
ministers, and more rigorous scrutiny of both will benefit all. Ministers will get a more
effective civil service and be in a position to focus on making policy. Civil servants will
get greater freedom and greater responsibility for delivering on government objectives.
In fact, we think, were there better governance arrangements, politicisation would
become less of an issue. Ministers are less likely to feel driven to make political
appointments to drive change and improve standards. Civil servants will be less inclined
to view political appointments as a threat.
GPPXQ5
Page 8 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
SECTION A (Compulsory answer both questions)
Requirement for question 1 based on the pre-seen material
(a)
The pre-seen material asserts that constitutional conventions governing the civil
service are now anachronistic and inadequate; and that, as a result, the
relationship between ministers and the civil service is ill-defined. It contends that
although the civil service has been subjected to a long succession of reforms, the
reforms have focused on second order problems (such as introducing measures
aimed at marketising the civil service) rather than addressing the key problems of
governance and accountability.
(i)
Explain what is meant by marketisation of the civil service and outline the
principal objectives of marketisation.
5
(ii)
Identify and describe the models that attempt to explain the relationship
between ministers and their senior civil servants in the decision making
process.
10
(iii)
Assess the extent to which you believe that each model identified in (a) (ii)
above has, since 1997, adequately explained the actual relationship between
ministers and their senior civil servants.
6
(b)
An alternative approach towards analysing the power relationship between civil
servants and ministers, and the governance of the civil service, was suggested by
the sociologist, Max Weber. Outline Webers views on this issue and assess the
validity of his views.
10
(c)
The Civil Service Code (revised 1999) and the Ministerial Code (2001) show,
amongst other things, the desired relationship between civil servants and their
ministers. Outline the content of the parts of these two codes that relate to this
relationship.
6
(d)
The pre-seen material makes frequent reference to the convention of ministerial
responsibility. Explain the meaning of this convention and evaluate the extent to
which the convention works in practice.
7
(e)
The pre-seen material makes reference to the politicisation of the civil service and
to associated government assaults on civil servants traditions of integrity and
impartiality. To what extent is there evidence that civil servants have been
politicised?
6
(50)
GPPXQ5
Page 9 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
Since 1945, the UK has experienced government shaped by a number of different
economic and political ideologies. At the same time, official attitudes towards key policy
areas have varied according to which party has been in government.
Requirement for question 2
(a)
Explain what is meant by the economic and political ideology known as the Third
Way that was introduced into the UK in 1997.
5
(b)
Describe the UKs other major post-World War Two economic and political
ideologies, and explain how the Third Way differs from them.
7
(c)
Outline the key differences in attitude of the two main UK political parties towards
the key policy areas of the economy and social welfare.
8
(20)
GPPXQ5
Page 10 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
SECTION B (Answer two from three questions)
The policy-making process in the European Union is dominated by four principal
governmental institutions.
Requirement for question 3
(a)
Outline the principal roles and functions of each of the EUs four principal
institutions.
8
(b)
To what extent do the EUs four principal institutions suffer from a democratic
deficit?
3
(c)
Outline the arguments for and against the view that UK parliamentary sovereignty
has been impaired by its membership of the European Union.
4
(15)
GPPXQ5
Page 11 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
One of the most important tasks of government is to exert some degree of intervention
over the national economy in order to promote economic stability.
Requirement for question 4
(a)
Outline the major economic problems that governments have, over time, sought to
influence in order to promote stability.
6
(b)
Since 1979, the UK government has been pursuing supply-side economic policies.
Explain the meaning of supply-side policies.
2
(c)
(i)
Which one of the problems outlined in (a) above does the present UK
government prioritise in its supply-side policy regime?
1
(ii)
Why is the problem identified in (c) (i) above given policy priority?
(iii)
(iv)
How do the authorities seek to influence this problem?
How may the resolution of this problem impact on the other major economic
problems?
2
(15)
GPPXQ5
Page 12 of 13
Diploma
Governance and Public Policy
June 2007
Since 1979, the creation of a new form of public management has been based on supply
side policies and notions of a free market involving the rolling back of state regulation
and intervention. Ironically, this approach to public management has engendered a
whole new area of state regulation and intervention.
Requirement for question 5
(a)
Outline the main types of situation in which regulation by the state may occur.
(b)
Explain why, with examples, there has been an increased need for regulation and
self-regulation since 1979.
5
(c)
Outline the major arguments that are typically put forward against regulation.
6
(15)
GPPXQ5
Page 13 of 13
