29 March 2002
In the wake of Cabinet Secretary Sir Richard Wilson's condemnation of the government's use of special advisers, delivered in a private speech on March 26, Jonathan Baume, the FDA's general secretary, said it was important that reform was undertaken quickly.
'Sir Richard's speech was a thoughtful encapsulation of the issues that surround a Civil Service Act. It is important that an Act be seen as a way to support and underpin the positive values of an impartial service, not as a way to impede reform,' he said.
Earlier, Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott had agreed that the government 'had accepted that the time had come' for a Civil Service Act. But the Cabinet Office refused to discuss the exact nature and timing of reform.
In a hard-hitting parting shot before his impending retirement, WIlson recommended a legal limit on the number of special advisers. He also called for clearly defined relationships between ministers and civil servants in order to stave off US-style politicisation of the civil service, and for a legally enshrined complaints procedure to make whistleblowing by civil servants easier.
The Cabinet Secretary also issued thinly veiled criticisms of Labour's communications director Alastair Campbell and 'spingate' adviser Jo Moore.
'Special advisers should not ask civil servants to do anything improper or illegal, or anything that might undermine the role and duties of permanent civil servants as described by the Civil Service Code.'
PFmar2002
