Labour accuse Maude of “politically inspired civil service bashing”

Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude has been accused of causing a crisis in Whitehall morale through “routine, politically inspired civil service bashing” by his Labour counterpart Michael Dugher. This comes after Sir Bob Kerslake stepped down from his role as Head of the Civil Service last week, a situation that Dugher describes as “shabby”.

Speaking to the national trade union committee today, Dugher said that Kerslake’s departure comes due to Tory ministers fomenting a poor working relationship, say they had: “made up their minds almost from day one that he was a problem. He was dragged through the mud until he was given the boot. This was nothing short of shabby.”

Sir Jeremy Heywood will now take up Kerslake’s position, and is tasked with rebuilding relationships that have been especially damaged over the past four years by a tendency within government for ministers to publicly lay the blame for mistakes with civil servants – which Dugher says has led to “the worst crisis in civil service morale in living memory.”

This has not been helped, he adds, by “counterproductive” staff cuts, with Maude spending £30million on redundancy packages and a further £30million on hiring agency staff. “This,” Dugher said, “is a particular form of genius.”