Asked by: Geraint Davies (Independent - Swansea West)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what the (a) average and (b) longest time between application and a start date for recruiting a civil servant was in the last three years; and whether he is taking steps to reduce those times.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
Civil Service recruitment must follow the rules set out in legislation within the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act (CRaGA) 2010 which outlines the requirements to ensure that Civil Servants are recruited on merit, via fair and open competition. The Civil Service must also ensure that detailed pre-employment checks (such as appropriate levels of security clearance) are carried out before employment can begin.
Information on the average time to hire across departments can be found in the recent National Audit Office report published on ‘Civil service workforce: Recruitment, pay and performance management', found here: https://www.nao.org.uk/reports/civil-service-workforce/
As set out in the Civil Service People Plan published on 10 January 2024, we are committed to ensuring we attract, develop and retain talented people from a diverse range of backgrounds, to create a brilliant Civil Service now, and for the future.
We must modernise the ways we recruit, speed up and simplify the process and improve the candidate experience without compromising on quality or fairness. We must also continue to expand the use of secondments and other direct entry routes (including the Fast Stream and apprenticeships), ensuring they are properly embedded in the skills and resourcing strategies of all departments and professions.
The Cabinet Office is introducing a set of consistent and comparable Civil Service recruitment measures and benchmarks which will be implemented across the Whitehall 17 departments. This will give greater transparency of metrics across the recruitment cycle.
Asked by: Martyn Day (Scottish National Party - Linlithgow and East Falkirk)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, whether he has made an assessment of the potential impact of reinstating former civil servants on public finances.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
Individual departments are responsible for the recruitment of their staff and are able to set their own policies accordingly, subject to the framework of instructions set out in the Civil Service Management Code and the Civil Service Recruitment Principles. This includes the reinstatement of former civil servants under exception five of the Recruitment Principles.
Asked by: Kerr, Stephen (Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party - Central Scotland)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what the anticipated returns are of the £200,000 that it has reportedly spent on psychological testing for civil servants.
Answered by Robison, Shona - Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Finance
The recruitment and promotion of Senior Civil Servants must include a robust selection process. Standards for hiring Senior Civil Servants (SCS) are set by UK Cabinet Office. These include the use of additional forms of assessment including psychological assessment, which have supplemented interviews for SCS for over 10 years. Academic research suggests that interviews alone are a poor predictor of future job performance, and supplementing interviews with other forms of assessments, including psychological, strengthens hiring decisions.
A Prior Information Notice was published on 13 February 2024 to inform the market of our intention to issue an Invitation to Tender for a new assessment contract for Senior Civil Service recruitment and promotion. The Tender is yet to be published and a new contract will be awarded, after all bids are assessed for quality of service and value for money, later in 2024. In the last 12 months, the current provider of psychometric assessments to the Scottish Government assessed 125 candidates for 30 SCS recruitment and promotion campaigns, at a cost of £165,401. This is in line with equivalent Cabinet Office contracts per SCS Campaign.
Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, whether there are controls on external recruitment of (a) new and (b) replacement (i) civil servants and (ii) other public sector administrators.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
There are specific statutory provisions in place that control all appointments to new and replacement Civil Service roles arising from external recruitment.
The Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010 requires that selection to the Civil Service must be on merit, on the basis of fair and open competition. The Civil Service Commission has a statutory duty to ensure that the merit requirement is upheld and is not being undermined. The Commission’s interpretation of this statutory requirement is outlined to Civil Service departments in the Civil Service Commission’s Recruitment Principles 2018.
The Aliens’ Employment Act 1955 outlines the eligibility for employment in the Civil Service on the grounds of nationality. The Cabinet Office has published the Civil Service Nationality Rules on Gov.uk to support departments in the interpretation of this statutory requirement.
The Civil Service Management Code delegates authority to individual departments to determine their recruitment approach within the scope of these statutory requirements. Additional policy provisions can be applied such as the Civil Service Recruitment Framework. Since January 2016, the Framework has been committed to opening up all Senior Civil Service (SCS) vacancies by advertising them externally to the public by default. In May 2022, this commitment was strengthened, requiring departments to obtain approval from the responsible minister when seeking to limit an SCS vacancy to existing civil servants only.
For other public administrators outside of the Civil Service, it would be down to their respective organisations to comment on whether they have such controls in place.
Government Response Jan. 24 2024
Committee: Constitution CommitteeFound: Public statements by special advisers about the recruitment, perform ance or departure of civil servants
May. 16 2024
Source Page: I. Civil Service equality, diversity and inclusion expenditure guidance. 5p. II. Guidance on diversity and inclusion and impartiality requirements for Civil Servants. 10p.Found: Civil Service equality, diversity and inclusion expenditure guidance. 5p. II.
Apr. 17 2024
Source Page: Invitation to Tender Psychometric testing contract: FOI releaseFound: the market of our intention to issue an Invitation to Tender for a new assessment contract for Senior Civil
May. 09 2024
Source Page: Minister for Cabinet Office's keynote at Reform's 'Reimagining Whitehall' conferenceFound: We’ve already started this work with our most senior civil servants.
Mentions:
1: Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston (XB - Life peer) The commission regulates recruitment into the Civil Service and hears appeals from civil servants under - Speech Link
2: Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD - Life peer) I recall meeting civil servants who had been sent to INSEAD, and I think the idea of sending civil servants - Speech Link
3: Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con - Life peer) It in turn specifically states that this includes the recruitment of civil servants, and this is reiterated - Speech Link
Asked by: Philip Davies (Conservative - Shipley)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, how many civil servants in her Department have a criminal conviction.
Answered by Nusrat Ghani - Minister of State (Minister for Europe)
DBT do not centrally hold data on employees with criminal convictions. This information will be captured and considered at application stage by the Government Recruitment Service through the BPSS checks. In line with wider Civil Service guidance, the Department does encourage applications from those with prior convictions via our recruitment campaigns on Civil Service Jobs. The department also supports the Going Forwards into Employment, Prison Leaver scheme which is an exception to the Civil Service Commission Recruitment Principles.