British Industry and Services: Public Procurement
Baroness Goldie Excerpts(3 weeks, 6 days ago)
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Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
I am awfully fond of my noble friend, and he will remember that, over 25 years ago, I helped to run his “Buy British” campaign for our trade union. This is something that he has campaigned on for a very long time. As the Chancellor said in March,
“it matters where things are made and who makes them”,
which is why we have changed all these rules. To reassure my noble friend, in the last 12 months we have launched the national security procurement exemption and brought in new rules for local government on lower-threshold procurement to encourage use of a model similar to that in Preston. Government departments now have targets for SME use, ensuring that £7.4 billion of government expenditure will be used with SMEs by 2028, and we have redefined the definition of social value. However, my noble friend is absolutely right: the Government spend £400 billion a year, and we need to make sure we spend it well.
Baroness Goldie (Con)
My Lords, I think the noble Lord, Lord Spellar, speaks on behalf of the whole House. The plea he makes is really: can the Government lead by example? Can the Minister explain why the current Secretary of State for Defence recently decided to acquire the precision strike missile, which is an American ballistic missile programme—a course of action which was rejected by previous Defence Secretaries, including John Healey?
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
The noble Baroness has huge experience in this—and as soon as we talk about defence, I have to declare myself as an honorary captain in the Royal Navy. With regard to individual procurement decisions, she knows as well as me that I would not have been involved in the direct procurement, but I can ensure that the Defence Minister writes to her on it. However, let me be clear about what the defence investment plan means for British jobs. There will be an additional 60,000 British jobs because of the investment that this Government chose to make that the previous Government did not.
UK Public Servants: International Secondments
Baroness Goldie Excerpts(4 months, 2 weeks ago)
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Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend, but I suggest that it is always about your individual management style; for example, as a Minister, working with people and bringing them on a journey with you, making sure that you are able to deliver collectively and collaboratively in your policy area. But it is also about ensuring that culture change exists both within the Civil Service and elsewhere, so that anything considered as bullying and harassment is not acceptable in the 21st century.
Baroness Goldie (Con)
My Lords, is the Minister completely satisfied about the complexity and glacial progress which confronts civil servants who wish to make a complaint about another civil servant? In my experience, that seems to be a ponderous, unnecessarily arduous, distressing and very long-standing procedure.
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
The noble Baroness has had significant experience of ministerial office. I have not, but among the civil servants who I have worked with, if there are those who may have made complaints, I am not aware that they have faced that experience, but if she has specifics she would like to raise with me in terms of where there are challenges in the system, I would be more than happy to have that conversation with her outside the Chamber.