15 June 2007
The tensions between the demands of politics and the need for effective public services illustrate the need to look carefully at proposals for independent management of public services, incoming CIPFA president John Butler has said.
In his opening address to CIPFA's annual conference in Bournemouth on June 13, he told delegates that the policy model of the past decade – which involved conflicts between public servants wanting less or slower change and politicians pushing for 'rapid waves' of destabilising change without proper consultation – was fraught with risk.
'This is not a cheap shot at MPs. But it does seem to me that representing the interests of the people and managing public services are entirely different things, with inevitable and very predictable tensions between the two,' Butler said.
The creation of more arm's-length management models for public services, such as the proposal for an independent NHS board, could be the solution, offering a means to 'hear the opposing arguments and… to trade off short-term pain against long-term gain'. Such a model would help to limit changes of direction by politicians who, having pushed for rapid change, sometimes got 'nervous' when public views differed from those expressed in the 'focus group laboratory'.
'They may want to row gently backwards or even abandon the ship altogether,' Butler said. 'In sharp contrast, management may take the view that these are no more than teething difficulties and, while there may be a case for touching the tiller, fundamentally, we just need to stay calm and work the problems through.'
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