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The Big Society
This report, which builds on previous reports by PASC, warns that the Big Society project is hampered by the lack of a clear implementation plan, leading to public confusion about the policy agenda, eighteen months into this administration. PASC has yet to see how the government will engage these charities and voluntary groups who wish to do so to deliver public services: the 'little society' rather than big business and 'Tesco' charities. Government must address the barriers such bodies experience in the contracting and commissioning system, which means developing a plan to address roles, tasks, responsibilities and skills in Whitehall departments. PASC concludes there are two major practic...
Accountability for public money
This Public Accounts Committee report addresses an issue at the core of the relationship between Parliament and government - accountability for public spending. The Committee is interested in the implications for accountability of two recent developments: the governance reforms which include Ministers chairing departmental boards and greater non-executive involvement in those boards; and the reform and localism proposals which envisage a significant devolution of responsibility for service delivery to a wide range of new bodies, in some cases independent of both central and local government. The reform and localism proposals raised fundamental points about the current model of accountability...
The Prime Ministerial Court
Court politics is about who in British government did what to whom, when, how, why, and with what consequences. In The Prime Ministerial Court Rod Rhodes provides a thorough depiction of the court politics of the Conservative governments of the twenty-first century, namely the courts of David Cameron, Theresa May, and Boris Johnson. Exploring specific topics, including the courtiers, the prime minister's craft, reshuffles, resignations, and leadership challenges, and the political games and feuds in the court between ministers, advisers, and civil servants, Rhodes concludes that the British government has a new Establishment in which the skills of 'knavery' abound. He finds evidence of betra...
Government and IT - "a recipe for rip-offs"
Additional written evidence is available in Volume 3, available on the Committee website www.parliament.uk/pasc
House of Commons - Public Administration Select Committee: Trith to Power: How Civil Service Reforem Can Succeed - HC 74
The Public Administration Select Committee (PASC) has concluded a year-long inquiry into the future of the Civil Service with only one recommendation: that Parliament should establish a Joint Committee of both Houses to sit as a Commission on the future of the Civil Service. It should be constituted within the next few months and report before the end of the Parliament with a comprehensive change programme for Whitehall with a timetable to be implemented over the lifetime of the next Parliament. The Report considers the increased tensions between ministers and officials which have become widely reported, and places the problems in Whitehall in a wider context of a Civil Service built on the ...
Central Bank Independence
In December 1999, prior to the forming of a Stockholm Centre for Commercial Law, an international symposium entitled Central Bank Independence was held at the Department of Law at Stockholm University in co-operation with the Swedish Central Bank (The Riksbank) and Queen Mary and Westfield College, London University. The participants were principally political, economic and legal specialists in the field, all with considerable international experience. This led to the topic being examined in detail from many different perspectives. This publication includes contributions by the participants and contains many important facts for those readers who wish to study and understand the different consequences of the yielding of control over financial policymaking by the traditional political organisations to a body of experts. For readers in some countries, who realise that the subject will revolutionise traditional Constitutional and Administrative Law, the topic and therefore this publication, cannot be ignored.
Business appointment rules
The current Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (ACoBA) lacks adequate powers and resources; does not have appropriate membership for its function; and should be abolished. Instead, the Committee says, Government should legislate to establish statutory ethics regulation with a code of conduct and enforceable statutory penalties, overseen by an independent ethics Commissioner. The new Commissioner would also take over the role of the Prime Minister's Adviser on Ministers' Interests - who advises on ministerial conduct. PASC also renews their call for the power to initiate investigations into the Ministerial Code on his or her own initiative. Enforceable statutory penalties should be i...
Smaller government
The Government review of public bodies focused on whether a body's functions were necessary, and if it thought they were, whether it had to be delivered at arm's length from Government. The review was poorly managed: no meaningful consultation; the tests used were not clearly defined; and no proper procedure for departments to follow. The Bill giving the power to bring about these changes was equally badly drafted. Now the Government faces the much larger challenge of successfully implementing these reforms. The Cabinet Office should issue clear guidance on how to manage this transition. The Committee has developed, with the National Audit Office, its own guidance which departments could use...
Select Committees and public appointments
This report considers the experience of some three years of holding 'pre-appointment' hearings by select committees to examine the 'preferred candidate' for certain public appointments before that appointment is confirmed. Whilst the committee considers the experiment a success they do recommend a number of changes. They propose a three tier list: Posts in the first tier are those considered to be of sufficient constitutional significance as to require a process which is effectively a joint appointment by Government and the House of Commons. Posts in the second tier are those which the committee proposes should be subject to an enhanced an improved version of the current process, and which should be subject to an 'effective veto' by the House of Commons or its committees. For posts in the third tier, pre-appointment hearings should be at the discretion of committees.
