Case for a Civil Service Bill

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:40 pm on 21 January 2004.

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Photo of Kenneth Clarke Kenneth Clarke Chair, Tax Law Rewrite Bills (Joint Committee), Chair, Tax Law Rewrite Bills (Joint Committee) 12:40, 21 January 2004

I have just reminded myself that I have only half a day, so I want to make a little progress. I apologise to the Father of the House, who has just risen, but I do not want to give way for a short while.

I am trying to make Labour Members understand that it is their parliamentary duty to put some pressure on their Front Benchers to take some action on this matter. Let me help the House, including Labour Members, to judge the ministerial response that we shall hear from the Minister responsible for the civil service. He will ask why we are making such a fuss and say that the Government agree with the motion in principle and are about to consult on the matter. He will tell us that the Government will take into account the necessity to protect the integrity of the civil service. I shall not give the full record, but just touch on it.

The Labour party first committed itself to introducing new legislation on the civil service before 1997, when it set up a joint commission with the Liberal Democrat party. The commitment was to give

"legal force to the code which should be tightened up to underline the political neutrality of the civil service . . . to clarify lines of civil service and ministerial responsibility".

That was when the Labour party had joint commissions with the Liberal Democrats: alas, poor Paddy, we remember him well. I remember Lord Ashdown's remark to me that the trouble with dealing with the Prime Minister was that Tony always believed something when he said it. However, that was Labour's commitment before 1997.

When the Labour Government took office, they confirmed their commitment in their July 1998 response to a House of Lords report. By 2000, we had reports from the Committee on Standards in Public Life, which was chaired first by Lord Nolan and then by Lord Neill. Nothing had happened by that time, except the steady emergence of Mr. Campbell and Mr. Powell and the other special advisers in Whitehall.

In its sixth report, the Committee on Standards in Public Life wanted a timetable for the implementation of the Government's commitment to a new civil service Bill. The Committee wanted a target date to be set for the introduction of such a Bill. One would have thought that, to a target-obsessed Government, that should have been attractive.

The Government responded to that report in July 2000. They confirmed their commitment to proceeding along those lines. The same commitment will be repeated today.

By November 2001, Sir Richard Wilson, the then Cabinet Secretary, was getting impatient. He told the Select Committee on Public Administration, presumably with the authorisation of Ministers, that consultation on a civil service Bill would start in the new year—that is, in 2002. By the time of his valedictory speech to the public service in 2002, Sir Richard was still repeating that the Government were publicly committed to a public service Bill. Shortly thereafter, an issues paper was promised by the Government.

The same process has been repeated ever since. In 2001, the Under-Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs, who will wind up today's debate, gave evidence to the Committee on Standards in Public Life. The Committee by that time was into its third Chairman, Sir Nigel Wicks, who is just about to leave that post. The Minister assured the Committee that the Government remained committed to a civil service Bill. In its ninth Report published in April last year, the Committee recommended that an early process of public consultation on the contents of a draft Bill should begin, and that the Bill should receive pre-legislative scrutiny by a Joint Committee of both Houses of Parliament.

Time and again, the Government have given in-principle commitments to such a Bill but have done nothing about it. I shall not give a full list of examples, but that is the background to the latest step by the Public Administration Committee, which the Opposition are simply commending and adopting. That all-party Committee, in its first report of this Session, published a draft civil service Bill. That draft has been approved by Sir Nigel Wicks and his Committee on Standards in Public Life, and it has been accepted by leading retired public servants outside the House. The Government have responded by saying that their own draft Bill will soon be going out to consultation.

In my opinion, the Minister for the Cabinet Office will say, when he responds to my remarks, that the Government will of course go out to consult.