Policy changes are being dressed up as savings

9 Dec 04
The CBI has attacked the 'confusing and vague' plans drawn up by Whitehall departments to meet the £21.5bn Gershon efficiency drive and warned of 'serious concerns' that it may fail.

10 December 2004

The CBI has attacked the 'confusing and vague' plans drawn up by Whitehall departments to meet the £21.5bn Gershon efficiency drive and warned of 'serious concerns' that it may fail.

The business leaders' group has analysed the efficiency technical notes drawn up by ministries to set out how they will meet the savings targets outlined for them in July.

It accuses departments of 'dressing up' policy changes as efficiency savings and of failing to provide concrete details of how money will be saved. The organisation is also warning that frontline services may be threatened as a result of departments' plans.

The CBI's analysis, released on December 9, cites the Ministry of Defence's plan to cut the number of attack submarines from ten to eight as an example of a policy decision being presented as a saving.

It also criticises the Home Office for claiming it will save £450m on correctional services through better procurement and reducing the cost of electronic tagging, without explaining how this will be achieved.

John Cridland, the CBI's deputy director general, was even more sceptical about the prospect of achieving the savings that are supposed come from the wider public sector, in particular health and local government.

He said 'worthy intentions and headlines' were pointless and the Gershon agenda was doomed unless there were 'substantive cultural changes' to the way public services operate.

'Although we support what the government is trying to do, there is little or no point in having an efficiency review if all it results in is contentious job cuts, attempts at below-the-radar policy changes and limited plans for how things will actually work in practice,' he added.

PFdec2004

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