The task facing the new cabinet secretary

As the prime minister interviews the contenders to be the next cabinet secretary, he should consider what faces the successful candidate. While the announcement confirms that the pool is confined to serving or former permanent secretaries, he is said to be interested in those who have moved to the private sector (so the field is open to former permanent secretaries like Sharon White and John Kingman if they want to put their hats in the ring). There are as well quite a few senior officials who are likely to want to be considered. The prime minister has some room to clarify the authority and remit of the job and should do so; the strains on Sir Mark Sedwill stemmed partly from lack of clear lines of responsibility in Whitehall. But it has always been a job demanding exceptional skills, as much for spotting trouble and helping the government machine grapple with emergencies as well as strategy. The coronavirus emergency and the government’s agenda raise the bar further.

It is right that the cabinet secretary does not double up as national security adviser 

There are good reasons for continuing to combine the post of cabinet secretary with that of head of the civil service, so that questions which are purely about the civil service are not marginalised.

In appointing his chief Brexit negotiator David Frost as national security adviser, the prime minister has rightly given that job the sole attention it needs although he will no doubt have anticipated the debate that it has triggered about whether it shortchanges the work needed to complete Brexit smoothly and whether the role needs someone with more experience of security questions. There is a concern, however, that appointing a special adviser to be national security adviser makes a political appointment out of a role previously performed by a civil servant.

Economic experience and understanding how the Treasury works will help

The government’s hardest task in the coming year will be on the economy. No matter that this is the part of the coronavirus response that has performed best so far. Handing out money is the easiest part. Deciding when to turn off the furlough scheme, how to help people retrain as unemployment rises, and how to combine this with the government’s aim of “levelling up” prosperity across the country will be harder. At the same time, the chancellor will be looking for ways to raise tax revenue.

The new cabinet secretary is likely to be more effective if she or he is sure-footed in economics and in techniques of fostering growth. Whoever does the job is likely to do it better for understanding how the Treasury works, the thinking it has devoted to fostering growth and the way it controls the spending of other departments.

With Simon Case, the newly-appointed permanent secretary for No.10, focussing on the response to coronavirus, the new cabinet secretary is freer to focus on the wider challenge of governing in the age of covid and its legacy for all parts of government.

Understanding the health, social care and education sectors would be an advantage

The government’s greatest frustrations in the coronavirus crisis have been in healthcare and in schools. It is likely to want the new cabinet secretary to help it improve data and strengthen communication with NHS England and with local government over social care, and to help it devise a way to get all pupils back to school. Even more simply, it will want that person to exert authority over these areas of public services – easier said than done, as Tony Blair, David Cameron and Theresa May could testify. An understanding of the scale and complexity of these sectors and their politics would be an advantage.

The new cabinet secretary needs to look beyond London 

The government wants to “level up” prosperity across the UK and to look after those voters in the formerly “red wall” seats who voted Conservative for the first time. Its focus will increasingly be on projects and public services outside London. One of Mark Sedwill’s priorities was to improve government outside the south east. His successor will need to share that.

Digital government and use of data will be a priority

Coronavirus has thrust many parts of the public sector a long leap further into the digital age. Steps that had been planned for more than a decade but not happened – such as widespread GP consultations by phone call or video – are now standard. At the same time, management of the crisis has shown the importance for government of constantly updated, accurate data. Pushing this forward across government needs to be high on the list for the next cabinet secretary.

How will the new cabinet secretary advance the civil service reform agenda?

The new cabinet secretary will find that she or he arrives in post with a ferment of ideas for the future of the civil service already flowing out from Michael Gove, minister for the cabinet office, and Dominic Cummings, the prime minister’s chief adviser. They want more accountability of officials, a clearer sense of performance, more specialist skills especially in statistics and other techniques of assessment, more diversity and recruitment outside London.

It would be unlikely that Sedwill’s successor would oppose these widely-shared goals for reform (and in any case, unwise to do so). The question is how to advance them. Some, like encouraging more risk-taking and innovation, and discouraging frequent job-changing in search of promotion, are easily said – and have often been said – but mean profound change in the culture and procedures of the civil service. 

One question for the new cabinet secretary is how much of this task to take on, and how much to hand to Alex Chisholm, the recently-appointed chief operating officer of the civil service. It would be right for Chisholm to lead this, given the sheer scale of assisting the prime minister with the government’s agenda for the next year. But it needs real attention after the considerable strains of Brexit and then coronavirus.

The new cabinet secretary must help the prime minister consolidate his team

There have already been many changes in and around No.10 and the cabinet office, and in cabinet committees. In many respects, the government is still settling in. The new cabinet secretary needs to help the prime minister in bedding those in. She or he will also need to advise on rebuilding the permanent secretary team after a lot of change.

Any cabinet secretary starts the job with a formidable in-tray – and that is before new crises break. However, given the scale of the coronavirus emergency, the economic difficulties that have yet to manifest themselves, and the abrupt manner of Sedwill’s departure, that is in this case an understatement.