Public Bodies (Reform) Blog 15: Public Administration Committee Reports

This is entry No.15, first published on 7 January, of a blog on Public Bodies reform. Click here to view the whole blog. If you would like to be notified when the blog is updated, with links sent by email, click here.

As well reported in today's newspapers, the Public Administration Committee in the Commons, chaired by Bernard Jenkin, has published a report today on the reform of public bodies (Smaller Government - Shrinking the Quango State: see here). In headline terms, this describes the exercise as poorly managed and not something which will deliver significant costs savings or better accountability.

Labour has naturally seized on this, Liam Byrne the Shadow Cabinet Office Minister remarking that "the committee appears to confirm that Francis Maude is now Britain's most expensive butcher" (see here).

The report is clearly a thoughtful and well-informed review of all that has happened and, depending upon your point of view, a pretty comprehensive analysis of real or perceived deficiencies with the proposals. Whatever position you take on that, no-one can deny that what has happened so far has been rushed through. With that in mind and given the number of specialist agencies and jobs at risk, it is hardly surprising that there should be calls for more care, further consultation and less haste. As always but particularly at the start of a new Parliament, the balance to be struck between on the one hand getting on and doing something and on the other exhaustive...