Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Neil Carmichael and Lord Maude of Horsham(9 years, 1 month ago)
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Neil Carmichael (Stroud) (Con)
8. What steps he has taken to increase the accountability to Parliament and the public of senior civil servants.
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Mr Francis Maude)
The Prime Minister can now exercise choice in making permanent secretary appointments. We have introduced fixed tenure for permanent secretaries. We publish their performance objectives, as well as improved management information, to allow them to be held to account. We have revised the Osmotherly rules to ensure that senior responsible owners are directly accountable to Parliament for project implementation and to allow former accounting officers to be called to Select Committees.
Neil Carmichael
Will the Paymaster General update the House on the role that Ministers might have in the performance review of permanent secretaries?
Mr Maude
We have now instituted a formal process where formal input must be provided by Ministers to the Cabinet Secretary and head of the civil service on the performance of their permanent secretaries. That input has to be taken into account as part of the end of year appraisal undertaken by the head of the civil service.
Cyber-security
Debate between Neil Carmichael and Lord Maude of Horsham(9 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr Maude
Let me first pay tribute to the work my hon. Friend has done in this area. When I recently visited Pendle, I had the opportunity to discuss the matter with him. There has been no stronger champion of our potential to work with businesses to build the companies, the skills and the kind of centres for training that he mentions. I am confident that he will be in a position to take this work forward over the coming five years.
Neil Carmichael (Stroud) (Con)
Does the Paymaster General agree that the excellent news about a new university technical college at Berkeley Green in my constituency, providing skills and training in cyber, is perfectly timely in view of his statement and that it is likely to bring a real benefit to the Government Communications Headquarters?
Mr Maude
My hon. Friend is exactly right to draw attention to that. We need to build these skills—and build them early. The kind of college he mentions can play an incredibly important role in that, particularly, as he says, in view of its proximity to Cheltenham and GCHQ. We need to get to children earlier so that we can encourage more of them to specialise in these subjects. Under our Cyber First scheme, which I referred to in my statement, and in pursuit of the most gifted students, we will absolutely look to find really gifted students at a much younger age.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Neil Carmichael and Lord Maude of Horsham(9 years, 6 months ago)
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Mr Maude
I warmly welcome the hon. Lady to her post. I have slightly lost count, but on my reckoning she is the fifth incumbent of the shadow post and I am sure the best. I look forward to a warm relationship with her over the coming period.
On the hon. Lady’s valid point about the need for the Government to exercise leadership in providing family-friendly opportunities for flexible working, I very much agree that we should do that, and we are already doing that. We are providing more opportunities and we think there are significant productivity improvements in enabling people to work more flexibly. However, it is always to be stressed that it is not an entitlement; it has to be according to the needs of the business.
Neil Carmichael (Stroud) (Con)
T5. What assessment has the Minister made of Labour’s proposals for a mansion tax on legacy giving, which is so appreciated by our charities?