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The Conservatives claim Keir Starmer is “not serious” about civil service reform. In a statement released last night in response to the overnight preview of Starmer’s speech, Alex Burghart, the shadow Cabinet Office minister, said:
Labour is not serious about getting Britain growing.
The prime minister has no plan to reform the civil service or cut public spending. Thanks to his budget the size of the state will reach a staggering 44% of GDP by 2030. Meanwhile businesses are being strangled by Rachel Reeves’s taxes and Angela Rayner’s red tape.
Decision not to classify Southport killer as a terrorist was right, says UK watchdog
The decision not to classify Axel Rudakubana as a terrorist following the Southport murders was right because it would be unhelpful to stretch the definition of terrorism to cover all extreme violence, Jonathan Hall KC, the UK’s terror watchdog, has concluded. Rachel Hall has the story.
Peter Kyle says ministers want to be disruptors, but 'in positive way', when asked about similarities with Elon Musk
The Times today is running a story saying that Peter Kyle, the science secretary, “has described himself as a ‘disruptor’ with similarities to Elon Musk or Dominic Cummings” because he wants to use AI to modernise the delivery of public services.
As explained on the blog yesterday, the government is now in favour of “disruptor” politics.
But, an in interview with LBC, Kyle was keen to clarify what this meant. Asked if he wanted to be seen as a disruptor like Musk or Cummings, he replied:
I aspire to be a disruptor in a positive way that takes people with us and excites people for change.
The issue about disruptors and disruption – in the past, it’s been used in a fearful way, in a threatening way, in a way that actually creates circumstances where people are fearful of change.
In Keir Starmer as prime minister, you see somebody who wants to lead positively through change, but yes, be assiduous and be determined in delivering the outcome.
Hospital waiting list figure for England falls slightly for five month in row
The headline hospital waiting list figure for England has fallen for the fifth month in a row, PA Media reports.
An estimated 7.43m treatments were waiting to be carried out at the end of January, down from 7.46m at the end of December, NHS England figures show.
This is the lowest figure since April 2023.
But 6.25m patients were estimated to be waiting for treatments at the end of January, up slightly from 6.24m at the end of December.
The two figures are different because some individuals are waiting for more than one procedure.
The waiting list hit a record high in September 2023, with 7.77m treatments and 6.5m patients.
There will be two Commons statements today at about 11.30am, after business questions. First Wes Streeting, the health secretary, will give an update on NHS England, where about half the HQ workforce is being cut to avoid duplication with the work done by the Department of Health and Social Security. And then Stephanie Peacock, a culture minister, is making a statement about the plans to celebrate the 80th anniversaries of Victory in Europe day and Victory over Japan day.
Keir Starmer to outline reforms of ‘overcautious, flabby state’ in civil service speech
Good morning. All prime ministers, sooner or later, get frustrated when they realise that the central government machine isn’t as effective as they would like. They arrive thinking that if they tell their officials to do something, it will happen, and they find out that it’s not that simple. When talking about this, they normally combine their criticism of the system with comments about how the individual civil servants with whom they work personally are excellent.
Keir Starmer has arrived at this stage more quickly than some of his predecessors and this week there have been a series of announcements about shaking up Whitehall. Pat McFadden, the Cabinet Office minister, has said measures will be taken to ease out officials who are under-performing. On Tuesday Starmer told cabinet that the government should be taking more responsibility for decisions, and not outsourcing them to regulators. And today Starmer is going to say that the state has become “bigger, but weaker”.
Ahead of the speech (or mini-speech – No 10 are billing it as an intervention, not a proper, set-piece policy speech), Starmer has published an article in the Daily Telegraph setting out his thinking.
Starmer says he is only interested in making the state more effective, and does not care if it gets bigger or smaller.
We need to go further and faster on security and renewal. In such uncertain times, people want a state that will take care of the big questions, not a bigger state that asks more from them. We need to be operating at maximum efficiency and strength. I believe in the power of the state. I’m not interested in ideological arguments about whether it should be bigger or smaller. I simply want it to work.
I saw the state at its best in our response to the riots last summer. It was dynamic, strong and urgent. But for the most part, that’s not the state that most people will recognise.
And he says the state has become “overcautious” and “flabby”. He cites planning policy as an example.
I heard from a family business owner in Wales that builds homes for first-time buyers. During the consultation delays and the lengthy planning application, the cost of resources went up. The regulations held him back for so long that he lost the site. Business unable to grow because of red tape. Families unable to buy because an overcautious flabby state got in the way.
As Rowena Mason reports in her preview, Starmer is also going to use the speech to say artificial intelligence (AI) should be doing more work currently done by civil servants.
According to the extracts released by No 10 in advance, Starmer will argue that civil service reform should be shaped by the mantra:
No person’s substantive time should be spent on a task where digital or AI can do it better, quicker and to the same high quality and standard.
Starmer will be taking questions. Obviously reporters will want to question him about the growing Labour revolt over the proposed sickness and disability benefit cuts, but hopefully someone will ask if this mantra should apply to politicians too. You would not want AI running the control (I presume?), but most ministers who turn up on the morning interview programmes to regurgitate the No 10 line to take could easily be replaced by an AI bot.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary, takes questions in the Commons.
9.30am: NHS England publishes its latest monthly performance figures.
10am: Helen Whately, the former care minister, gives evidence to the Covid inquiry as part of its module looking at PPE procurement.
After 10.30am: Lucy Powell, the leader of the Commons, makes a statement on next week’s Commons business.
Morning: Keir Starmer is doing a Q&A in Yorkshire where he will deliver a short speech about reforming the state.
Noon: John Swinney, Scotland’s first minister, takes questions at Holyrood.
Early afternoon: Kemi Badenoch is on a visit near Glasgow where she is expected to speak to reporters.
And at some point today Shabana Mahmood, the justice secretary, is holding a meeting with the Sentencing Council to discuss the guidelines that Mahmood claims would implement “two-tier” justice.
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