Thursday, March 20, 2025
Enough red tape to wrap around the world 15 times
The paper says that the Institute found that if all the bits of paper were laid end to end they would also reach to the moon and half way back again:
Lib Dem trade spokesperson Clive Jones said it showed the scale of red tape plaguing British businesses since the UK’s withdrawal from Europe.
He said: “The Conservatives’ botched Brexit deal is suffocating businesses, tying them up in a Gordian Knot of red tape, as they try to export our fantastic British products and produce across the world. These figures are mind blowing.”
The party is calling on the government to negotiate a bespoke UK-EU customs union to free businesses from the bureaucracy – which has pushed up prices on the high street.
Marks and Spencer recently revealed that it has had to rent a warehouse just to store its piles of Brexit paperwork, that the retailer’s chairman said “nobody looked at in the first place”.
Archie Norman said “it is quite extraordinary… you wouldn’t believe it” that the retailer has to store thousands of pages of documents in a warehouse in the Republic of Ireland for six years after taking food across the border.
The official Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) also estimates that the size of the economy over the long term will be four per cent smaller than it would have been without Brexit.
The Chartered Institute of Export and International Trade found an estimated 2 billion additional pieces of paper had been used by those exporting to the EU since the UK left the bloc.
The Liberal Democrat analysis also calculated that those extra pieces of paper would reach the height of Mount Everest 66,751 times over, have to be extracted from 248,603 trees and be worth £19.5 million in A4 paper alone.
But the party said the true cost could be higher as its analysis assumed that each piece of paper was printed just once.
This red tape is holding back the economy and it is impacting on the government's growth agenda. Surely, it is time to put an end to it through a proper trade deal with the EU that sees the UK becoming part of the single market once more.
Wednesday, March 19, 2025
Labour no longer stand up for the sick and vulnerable
Building on the failure to abolish the two-child benefit cap and forcing thousands of pensioners to choose between heating and eating with the abolition of the winter fuel allowance, yesterday the work and pensions secretary, Liz Kendall, laid out her long-awaited changes to the benefits system, announcing a set of measures that will save £5bn by cutting disability payments.
The paper says that experts have warned that the plans will reduce the incomes of more than 1 million people, leaving ministers braced for the biggest rebellion yet of the Labour government, with as many as 30 MPs expected to vote against the plans within weeks. It's just that 30 rebels will prove insufficient to stop these cuts going ahead.
Debbie Abrahams, the Labour chair of the Commons work and pensions committee, is right when she warned against “balancing the books on the backs of sick and disabled people”:
Much of Kendall’s package of measures is aimed at reducing incentives to stay out of work. The work and pensions secretary is scrapping the system of giving higher incapacity payments for those unable to work than to those who can, in a bid to make sure as many people as possible are looking for work.
There will also be a new “right to work” scheme for those on incapacity benefits so they can try to return to work without risking losing their entitlements.
People under the age of 22 wanting the health top-up to universal credit will no longer qualify under plans being consulted on, with the savings being reinvested in work and training schemes to help get them into the workplace.
But the most financially significant decision is Kendall’s plan to introduce drastically tighter limits for who can claim personal independence payments (Pips), which are intended to help people with their quality of life and are not connected to employment. The Pip savings will help the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, stick to her fiscal rules when she announces her spring statement next week.
Under the new system, people who cannot cook a simple meal for themselves but can heat food up in a microwave would not be eligible for the payments unless they have other needs to be taken into account. Needing assistance to wash their hair or their body below the waist would also be judged as insufficient to claim the payments, which are currently worth up to £185 a week.
Ministers will not lay out where exactly the £5bn savings are coming from until next week, though officials indicated most would come from reduced Pip spending. The Resolution Foundation thinktank said the plan would see between 800,000 and 1.2 million people losing support of between £4,200 and £6,300 a year by 2029-30.
Louise Murphy, a senior economist at the Resolution Foundation, said: “Around 1 million people are potentially at risk of losing support from tighter restrictions on Pip, while young people and those who fall ill in the future will lose support from a huge scaling back of incapacity benefits.
“While it includes some sensible reforms, too many of the proposals have been driven by the need for short-term savings to meet fiscal rules, rather than long-term reform. The result risks being a major income shock for millions of low-income households.”
The Institute for Fiscal Studies warned a further 600,000 people would lose £2,400 a year in universal credit payments because of plans to replace the work capability assessment with the much tighter assessment for Pips.
Sarah Hughes, the chief executive of the mental health charity Mind, said: “Mental health problems are not a choice – but it is a political choice to make it harder for people to access the support they need to live with dignity and independence. These reforms will only serve to deepen the nation’s mental health crisis.”
What is clear from this announcement is that Labour no longer stands for supporting the sick and vulnerable. Now it is all about balancing the books and to hell with the consequences.
Much of Kendall’s package of measures is aimed at reducing incentives to stay out of work. The work and pensions secretary is scrapping the system of giving higher incapacity payments for those unable to work than to those who can, in a bid to make sure as many people as possible are looking for work.
There will also be a new “right to work” scheme for those on incapacity benefits so they can try to return to work without risking losing their entitlements.
People under the age of 22 wanting the health top-up to universal credit will no longer qualify under plans being consulted on, with the savings being reinvested in work and training schemes to help get them into the workplace.
But the most financially significant decision is Kendall’s plan to introduce drastically tighter limits for who can claim personal independence payments (Pips), which are intended to help people with their quality of life and are not connected to employment. The Pip savings will help the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, stick to her fiscal rules when she announces her spring statement next week.
Under the new system, people who cannot cook a simple meal for themselves but can heat food up in a microwave would not be eligible for the payments unless they have other needs to be taken into account. Needing assistance to wash their hair or their body below the waist would also be judged as insufficient to claim the payments, which are currently worth up to £185 a week.
Ministers will not lay out where exactly the £5bn savings are coming from until next week, though officials indicated most would come from reduced Pip spending. The Resolution Foundation thinktank said the plan would see between 800,000 and 1.2 million people losing support of between £4,200 and £6,300 a year by 2029-30.
Louise Murphy, a senior economist at the Resolution Foundation, said: “Around 1 million people are potentially at risk of losing support from tighter restrictions on Pip, while young people and those who fall ill in the future will lose support from a huge scaling back of incapacity benefits.
“While it includes some sensible reforms, too many of the proposals have been driven by the need for short-term savings to meet fiscal rules, rather than long-term reform. The result risks being a major income shock for millions of low-income households.”
The Institute for Fiscal Studies warned a further 600,000 people would lose £2,400 a year in universal credit payments because of plans to replace the work capability assessment with the much tighter assessment for Pips.
Sarah Hughes, the chief executive of the mental health charity Mind, said: “Mental health problems are not a choice – but it is a political choice to make it harder for people to access the support they need to live with dignity and independence. These reforms will only serve to deepen the nation’s mental health crisis.”
What is clear from this announcement is that Labour no longer stands for supporting the sick and vulnerable. Now it is all about balancing the books and to hell with the consequences.
Tuesday, March 18, 2025
Speculation over Labour's benefit cuts
The paper says that the analysis by the respected Institute for Fiscal Studies comes as work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall will unveil plans to slash benefits by around £5bn:
The government has already indicated that it will focus on working-age welfare claimants, particularly those claiming disability and incapacity welfare payments, with fears that the annual bill for these benefits will hit £70bn by 2030.
The concerns come as the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) downgraded the UK’s already low growth forecasts in the wake of the impact of Donald Trump’s tariffs around the world.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves met with regulators on Monday to discuss ways of cutting red tape to boost growth in a bid to kickstart the economy (PA Wire) The government insisted that its hand is not being forced into making benefits cuts to balance the books as Ms Reeves met with regulators to hear their ideas on boosting growth.
But IFS director Paul Johnson warned that Ms Reeves already had “no room for manoeuvre” in her spring statement next week, which is already being dubbed “an emergency Budget”.
According to the IFS, hitting this target will mean a potential cut of 16 per cent for claimants.
It noted: “Suppose they looked to save £5bn – a widely quoted number – from disability benefits alone by end of the parliament. To do it entirely through cutting benefit values would require a 16 per cent real-terms cut – £1,150 per year on average for the 4.3 million people expected to be on them by 2029.”
It added: “A 16 per cent cut in the value of incapacity benefits – £1,200 on average per year from 4.1 million people – would save £5bn.
“To make that saving through the caseload would require stopping it rising almost entirely. This would be a big break from post-pandemic trends (though not pre-pandemic).”
While the government indicated over the weekend that it would abandon plans to freeze personal independence payments (PIPs) following anger from within Labour, the thrust of the policy to reduce the benefits bill is being pushed ahead.
In particular, ministers are alarmed that 2.8 million adults of working age are stuck on sickness and disability benefits out of work. That number is set to increase to 4 million by 2030, costing the taxpayer £70bn a year.
Mr Johnson warned that the good news for Ms Reeves is that things cannot get worse.
He told Times Radio: “It’s a funny kind of good news ... in the sense that in some respects, things are so bad that hopefully they can only get better.
“So the chancellor’s got no room for manoeuvre in terms of money to spend in the spring statement or forecast or Budget or whatever we’re getting in 10 days’ time.”
He noted that the UK is spending about £20bn more on incapacity and disability benefits than it did five years ago.
He said: “We’re spending so much money on disability and incapacity benefits that surely there must be a way of getting that cut back. Our public services are so inefficient and their productivity has collapsed so much, again, surely that if they can be made to get better.”
He added: “But of course, the fiscal numbers, the Budget numbers, are based on the assumption that things basically carry on as badly as they have been. So if they can get a bit better there, maybe there’s a bit more room for manoeuvre.”
Of course Reeves may not go as far as all this, but the fact that many people think she will do so is clearly causing jitters amongst Labour MPs. Things could get very stormy indeed.
Monday, March 17, 2025
The other face of Reform
The paper says that Jack Aaron’s comments about the Nazi leader and Syrian dictator came to light last year when he stood for Reform in the Welwyn Hatfield constituency. He also claimed Vladimir Putin’s use of force in Ukraine was “legitimate”:
Aaron made the comments as part of a pseudoscientific theory of personality types. He is the president of the self-styled World Socionics Society – a group promoting the idea that there are 16 personality types.
However, while he was one of many Reform candidates whose comments caused controversy and led to many being sacked, he is now head of vetting at Reform UK.
The role includes scouring prospective candidates’ social media outputs and advising them on what should be deleted.
Reform UK’s leader, Nigel Farage, told his party conference in September that it would be vetting candidates “rigorously at all levels” in future after more than 100 were removed before the general election, with many sacked after offensive and racist comments were revealed.
A spokesperson for Reform UK said: “Mr Aaron is Jewish, and sits on his local synagogue council. His grandfather came to this country as a refugee from Vienna and much of his family on that side were murdered by Hitler’s regime.
“Reform UK does not disclose details of our internal vetting process and nor staff members involved.”
The party said socionomics was not part of its candidate vetting process.
There was criticism from Josh Simons, the Labour MP for Makerfield, who said: “Reform are in a tailspin. First, they don’t vet candidates at all. Then they put an apologist for Putin and Assad in charge of vetting.
“If you can’t vet your vetter, you can’t run the country. If they can’t take themselves seriously, why should the public?
“You couldn’t make it up. ‘He can’t be racist because he’s a Jew.’ Out of touch and out of ideas.”
Aaron came third in Welwyn Hatfield with just over 13% of the vote and finished behind the defeated Tory minister, Grant Shapps. Aaron has been approached for comment.
His LinkedIn page describes him as a business psychologist, consultant, YouTuber, coach, relationship counsellor and matchmaker. It adds that he set up the World Socionics Society, which has grown from a Facebook group.
A Reform UK profile page states he “would like to reconfigure the principles of immigration, so that we continue to invite, welcome and assimilate the best of the world, but not allow our way of life to be compromised or threatened by ghettoes of counter-culture”.
When contacted last year by the Times about his remarks on Hitler and other figures, he said he stood by many of the comments and that there was context and “nuances” in which he was viewing them through a psychological perspective.
This is the real face of Nigel Farage's party.
Sunday, March 16, 2025
Urgent action needed on Welsh rivers
The broadcaster says that environmental groups are calling for "urgent action" to tackle what they call "unacceptable" phosphate pollution in networks classed as Special Areas of Conservation (SACs):
Environment watchdog, Natural Resources Wales (NRW), says two river systems in north west Wales, Afon Gwyrfai and Afon Eden, both previously met phosphate targets but will now face further interventions to improve water quality.
The five other rivers missing the phosphate target are the Teifi, Cleddau, Dee, Usk and Wye.
Phosphates are naturally occurring minerals found in human and animal waste.
They aid growth of plants but can lead to a dramatic growth in algae and deplete oxygen levels when they enter water courses in large quantities.
NRW says the Afon Gwyrfai system will be subject to housing development restrictions to prevent further phosphates impacting water quality.
In 2021 NRW set new targets for phosphate pollution in Special Areas of Conservation across Wales.
The article quotes Tim Birch from Wildlife Trusts Wales who has called for "urgent action":
"Despite public outcry and political promises, today's evidence shows worsening river pollution in seven of nine of our most protected natural rivers in Wales," he said.
"These special rivers are officially recognised for their high importance for wildlife, yet two more are now showing significant deterioration since their last assessment in 2021, putting water quality and even more wildlife at risk.
"At a time when our rivers should be improving, not worsening, these levels of phosphorous pollution are unacceptable," he added.
The Welsh Government need to get a grip on this environmental crisis.
Saturday, March 15, 2025
Potential job losses multiply from NHS England
However, the initial estimate of 10,000 job losses as a result of Labour's decision now looks to be an underestimate. The Guardian reports that the jobs cull from the government’s radical restructuring of the NHS will be at least twice as big as previously thought, with other parts of the health service now being downsized too.
The paper says that the staff shakeout caused by NHS England’s abolition and unprecedented cost-cutting elsewhere will mean the number of lost posts will soar from the 10,000 expected to between 20,000 and 30,000:
Many thousands more people who work for the NHS’s 42 integrated care boards (ICBs) in England will see their roles axed, as well as the 10,000 working for NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) who have already been earmarked to go. ICBs, regional health service bodies which oversee groupings of NHS trusts, employ 25,000 people between them.
Sir Jim Mackey, NHS England’s incoming new chief executive, has told the ICBs to cut their running costs by 50% by the end of the year. “Given ICBs employ 25,000 people, that means that half of them are going to go,” a senior NHS official said. That could lead to 12,500 posts being lost.
In addition, Mackey has also ordered the 220 NHS trusts that provide care across England to cut the number of people working in corporate services, such as HR, finance and communications. That could lead to thousands more officials losing their jobs, insiders say.
Mackey passed on the grim news to ICB and trust leaders in phone calls and meetings this week. He outlined the NHS’s need to undertake budget cuts on a huge scale as part of a “reset” of the service’s finances to help it avoid overspending by the £6.6bn in 2025-26 that initial estimates said was likely.
Mackey, who is succeeding Amanda Pritchard on 1 April but already making key decisions about the NHS’s future, told service bosses that the prospect of such a massive deficit had “scared the living daylights” out of government ministers, the Health Service Journal (HSJ) reported.
Senior figures running ICBs say the order to halve their running costs will make it impossible for them to undertake the full range of their activities, which include funding vaccination programmes, offering blood pressure checks and improving children’s dental health. ICBs have recently finished reducing their budgets by 20% as part of a previous round of cost-saving.
“Operationally, this could be a disaster – 50% on top of what some ICBs have already done is huge. There will definitely be job losses,” said one ICB official.
“In our ICB we have no more ‘fat’ to trim. It’s very difficult to see how, if implemented in a blanket way, this doesn’t lead to service cuts.”
Julian Kelly, NHS England’s outgoing deputy chief executive, told the Commons public accounts committee on Thursday that ICB staff being cut by half was part of the wide-ranging reorganisation of NHS England that Keir Starmer and Wes Streeting, the health secretary, unveiled on Thursday in an announcement that few insiders knew was coming.
Kelly told the cross-party committee, which scrutinises government spending, that reducing NHS England’s staffing by 50% would save £400m a year and that if the staff budget for the 42 ICBs was subjected to a similarly brutal cut that would save a further £750m a year, once the programme of job losses was complete. He did not indicate how many posts could go.
The sheer scale of budget cuts Mackey is pursuing is causing consternation across the NHS. One leader told the HSJ that the size and speed of the cut to ICB running costs was “terrifying” and would cause chaos for the service.
It is not entirely clear is how these cuts will impact on services and on people's health care, especially with the government once more ignoring the need to invest in social care to relive the pressure on hospitals, accident and emergency and the ambulance service.
What is certain is that when Labour won the general election the last thing anybody expected was them laying off 30,000 people in the health service.
Friday, March 14, 2025
Is the UK hobbled by Brexit in its response to US tariffs?
The paper says that the PM's diplomacy comes after the White House imposed 25 per cent tariffs on steel and aluminium imports on Wednesday, signalling that last-ditch efforts to persuade Trump to spare British industry from his global tariffs have failed:
While the European Union responded by announcing trade counter-measures and hitting American goods with retaliatory tariffs, the prime minister resisted calls for the UK to immediately hit back.
Instead, British officials are already working at pace with their US counterparts to get an economic agreement over the line, which would exempt Britain from the 25 per cent tariffs announced by Mr Trump on Wednesday.
A minister on Thursday told MPs business secretary Jonathan Reynolds is in talks with the US and is “standing up” for British industry.
Business minister Sarah Jones said: “Of course, we will continue talking with the US, as the secretary of state has been doing, and make sure we are standing up for British industry and doing the right thing."
It comes after the prime minister insisted “all options are on the table” when it comes to responding to Mr Trump’s tariffs, but promised to take a “pragmatic approach”.
While he said he was disappointed by the decision, he reminded MPs at PMQs that the UK is “negotiating an economic deal which covers and will include tariffs if we succeed”.
The Independent understands conversations have already started taking place between trade teams on either side of the Atlantic, with the UK government hopeful it can get a deal over the line as quickly as possible.
And next week, business secretary Jonathan Reynolds will travel to Washington for talks as part of the government’s ramped-up effort to come to an agreement.
However, well-placed sources within the Trump White House on Wednesday told The Independent that the UK can get “a quick trade deal”, but free speech issues raised by vice-president JD Vance with Sir Keir are likely to get in the way.
Mr Vance will be in charge of the US side of the talks, and The Independent has been told he will be “prioritising” free speech amid anger over people being arrested for posting on social media and proposed online safety legislation, which he sees as an assault on US tech companies.
The fact remains that having left the EU, the UK doesnt have the clout to resist Trump's tariff regime successfully, and if the government's free trade negotiations are at the mercy of Vance's rather bizarre agenda and his obsession with what he thinks is freedom, then it sounds like the talks are hobbled from the very start.
Thursday, March 13, 2025
Welsh Water redefine performance rewards
Perry was being questioned at UK Parliament's environment committee by Mid and South Pembrokeshire MP Henry Tufnell:
Mr Tufnell said: "In 2021, Peter, your total remuneration was £892,000 and last year you took a bonus of £91,000. I wonder whether, if you take into consideration what we've talked about with water security, environmental performance, water quality with the public health element to it, do you think level of pay is justified and that's in alignment with your not-for-profit model?"
Mr Perry replied: "We don't have the term 'bonus' – we have the term 'variable pay' and variable pay puts at risk a potential earnings based on performance." He said in 2021 there was a four-star environmental performance for Dwr Cymru but the year where he took a £91,000 bonus it was only 25% of what he could have had earned because "100% of our variable pay is entirely based on performance". He said he believed the system was "reflective of performance".
"I personally have no influence over my pay – that's decided by an independent committee of the board – and the one thing I would say is it's significant. I can't say anything else about that but it is very much linked to performance and if we don't perform then we don't reach our earnings potential," he said.
Like other water companies, Welsh Water has an appalling record on polluting our waterways. As the website points out, in November 2024, it emerged Dwr Cymru pumped 56,000 cubic metres of untreated wastewater into the Western Cleddau at Picton in Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire, between July 2022 and February 2024 – the equivalent of 17 tanker loads a day – when they didn’t actually need to. That is just the tip of a very large iceberg.
As for the total remuneration received by Mr Perry in 2021, that's almost exactly £1 per hour for every hour of sewage Welsh Water dumped into the environment that year, 889,608 hours worth.
Wednesday, March 12, 2025
Real money or more spin?
The website says that senior politicians including First Minister Eluned Morgan, UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband and Wales Office Minister Dame Nia Griffith have praised the plans, which are backed by Danish investment firm Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) and will supposedly create 2,000 jobs.
However, they add that multiple industry figures have raised serious concerns that the £600m investment is not real but rather a speculative estimate entirely contingent on planning approvals for highly controversial wind and grid projects:
One senior Welsh industry insider described the situation as “yet more snake oil being swallowed by the Welsh Government. They haven’t got a clue when it comes to the private sector, and they’re being hoodwinked into going along with PR guff. It’s incredibly naïve. We’re now in a situation where ministers are undermining their own planning process and could end up facing judicial challenges on the basis that decisions have been pre-determined. This could cost the taxpayer a fortune.”
Another source familiar with the situation added: “This smacks of two governments desperate for good news, grabbing anything to announce without checking the details. No serious due diligence appears to have been done on this £600m claim, yet ministers are now endorsing it as fact. They’re setting themselves up for a fall.”
We asked the UK and Welsh governments a series of questions arising from the concerns:
* On what basis has the £600m investment figure been presented as fact, given that it appears to be entirely dependent on planning decisions yet to be made?
* What due diligence has been undertaken by the Welsh Government and/or UK Government to verify the credibility of this investment claim before publicly endorsing it?
*Given the ongoing planning processes, does the public backing of a specific investment not risk undermining the integrity of these decisions?
* The companies involved claim that 2,000 jobs will be created. Has this figure been independently assessed? How many of these jobs are expected to be permanent, full-time roles in Wales, as opposed to temporary construction roles or supply chain impacts abroad?
* Does the government accept that onshore wind is generally a low-employment industry post-construction, and if so, how does it justify promoting such high job numbers?
* Will the Welsh Government or UK Government commit to publishing any independent economic assessments underpinning these investment and job claims?
* What safeguards are in place to ensure that government backing of these projects does not expose planning decisions to legal challenges over pre-determination?
Nation Cymru have also posed questions to Bute Energy, who have confirmed that their investment is subject to achieving planning and other key development milestones. They say that like any major infrastructure investment, this funding is linked to project approvals, regulatory progress and other key project milestones.
We have already had issues with job estimates over the Baglan Energy Park so these are perfectly legitimate questions. Let's hope that the promise is fulfilled.
Tuesday, March 11, 2025
Mimicking Musk?
The paper says that Cabinet Office minister Pat McFadden did not deny reports that the Government plans to make it easier to oust civil servants, but he insisted the Government’s focus was not on people losing their jobs but was on being “radical” in reforming the civil service.
They add that McFadden says he wants to see more civil servants working in the UK’s regions, instead of in London, and an increase in using technology to make processes more efficient.
But not everybody is convinced:
The plans are facing a backlash from unions, as well as some within Labour. One Labour MP told the Mirror the plans were “another knee-jerk reaction, mimicking [Elon] Musk DOGE [Department of Government Efficiency]. Not a good look.” Mr Musk, who is Donald Trump's efficiency tsar, has come under fire after launching a wave of sackings since the Republican Party's return to the White House.
TUC boss Paul Nowak said “Trumpian language” from the Government is “not helpful”. He said: “I think these are a set of proposals that look more about grabbing headlines rather than about a serious plan for reforming our public services.
“Our members are absolutely up for that debate about delivering effective public services, interesting and serious discussions about things like how you deploy digital technology, AI, about workload, about flexible working. But you've got to have those conversations with the staff involved. What I want is a government that's going to help rebuild and repair our public services, bring public service workers with them while they do that.”
Prospect General Secretary Mike Clancy said: "Nobody would say the civil service is perfect, and our members are willing partners in reform, but this government must end the tradition of treating the civil service as a political punchbag. A serious reform agenda must start not from blunt headcount targets, but from an appraisal of the specialist skills needed in areas like science and data, and a realisation that the current pay system does not compete with the private sector for these skills."
We shall have to wait and see to what extent Musk has influenced the current UK Government.
But not everybody is convinced:
The plans are facing a backlash from unions, as well as some within Labour. One Labour MP told the Mirror the plans were “another knee-jerk reaction, mimicking [Elon] Musk DOGE [Department of Government Efficiency]. Not a good look.” Mr Musk, who is Donald Trump's efficiency tsar, has come under fire after launching a wave of sackings since the Republican Party's return to the White House.
TUC boss Paul Nowak said “Trumpian language” from the Government is “not helpful”. He said: “I think these are a set of proposals that look more about grabbing headlines rather than about a serious plan for reforming our public services.
“Our members are absolutely up for that debate about delivering effective public services, interesting and serious discussions about things like how you deploy digital technology, AI, about workload, about flexible working. But you've got to have those conversations with the staff involved. What I want is a government that's going to help rebuild and repair our public services, bring public service workers with them while they do that.”
Prospect General Secretary Mike Clancy said: "Nobody would say the civil service is perfect, and our members are willing partners in reform, but this government must end the tradition of treating the civil service as a political punchbag. A serious reform agenda must start not from blunt headcount targets, but from an appraisal of the specialist skills needed in areas like science and data, and a realisation that the current pay system does not compete with the private sector for these skills."
We shall have to wait and see to what extent Musk has influenced the current UK Government.
