MPs criticise ministerial turnover at CLG

The Communities and Local Government Select Committee’s annual review of CLG says staff stayed in post for an average of nine months before being moved on to other tasks. The report says this is ‘not a sensible way to run an organisation’ and also recommends that the prime minister ‘take greater account of the prerequisites of effective government’ by reducing ministerial turnover.

The average minister is in post for just under a year. Since it was established on 5 May 2006 CLG has had three secretaries of state, three local government ministers and four housing ministers plus several changes at more junior levels.

The report says the department failed to hit its efficiency savings target of cutting £887 million out of its budget by March 2011. It says CLG needs to show it can find other ways to save the money or cover the shortfall if the target is not met.

The report says the department has not provided a complete set of figures to demonstrate its performance and should produce progress reports on its performance against public service agreements and departmental strategic objective targets much earlier.

It says the part of the department dealing with the fire service lacked essential project management skills although the number of fires and deaths from them had reduced.

Dr Phyllis Starkey, chair of the committee, said: ‘Our report acknowledges improvements in CLG’s performance and influence over the past year. However, the department has yet to become the kind of “big hitter” it needs to be within Whitehall and we have yet to see consistent and sustained evidence that the department possesses the full range of skills required for the effective formulation and delivery of the policies for which it is responsible.

‘It cannot help that officials serve an average tenure of just nine months and that, over the lifetime of the department so far, senior ministers have remained in post for barely a year.’

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