Relationship advice

The Institute for Government heard many such stories during our connecting policy with practice programme. To the frustration of frontline professionals and policy makers alike, public services are rarely configured to deal with such complex problems. We identified the importance of longer term services that help the ‘whole person’ and genuinely understand and involve users. So it’s good to see ideas emerging about how to make such services a reality. Yesterday, the IPPR think-tank published a report on ways of reforming public services to make them more ‘relational’ – that is to say more personalised, and based on deep, lasting relationships between citizens, communities and professionals. The ‘relational state’ is one of those big ideas – like the 'Big Society' or pre-distribution – that appeals to certain politicians and policy wonks on an intellectual level. And it's difficult to disagree with much of the analysis in the IPPR report on the relational state: that when dealing with complex problems like long term unemployment government is too siloed, centrist, short-termist and transactional when what’s needed are deep, long-term personal relationships where services work with and empower those they seek to help. IPPR are rightly selective about what sort of policy problems a relational state should address – the truth is that some public services (getting your driving licence renewed, a routine medical appointment) are pretty straightforward – you just want them done effectively and efficiently. The two models of public service management that have dominated over the last few decades – bureaucracy and ‘marketisation’ – still have a place for more transactional services, IPPR argue. Along with the theoretical argument there are also lots of good examples of where a relational sort of approach is already working on the ground – small, community initiatives and pockets of effective practice both at home and internationally. The challenge is how to embed such practices across government. IPPR suggest that implementing this ambitious idea will need – alongside a more connected, enabling Whitehall – a major decentralisation of both decision making powers and budgets to a more local level. As we recently showed through looking at past attempts to devolve power from Whitehall, achieving political decentralisation is difficult, but there are factors that can make it successful in the face of likely obstacles: •Clarity and realism: reform leaders must decide what to devolve, when, where and how. In the case of relational public services, IPPR suggests budgets and control over services for the unemployed (particularly long-term unemployment), drug and alcohol treatment, and offender services might be devolved. Reformers need to think not just about the likely operational benefits and costs of shifting control but the possible timings. For example, the Ministry of Justice is currently in the process of negotiating 7-10 year regional contracts outsourcing probation services, so it might be some time before changes are feasible in that area. •Co-ordination within the centre of government: although central government in the UK is exceptionally powerful, past experience tells us that it struggles to act ‘as one’ when it comes to decentralising. For a decentralisation effort to succeed, some ministers will have to deny themselves the luxury of making announcements about policy areas that will be decentralised, and the leadership will need to keep in check those who want to progress their own policy agendas in whatever way they think best. •Building support across groups: decentralisation is not something that is just ‘done’ by central government. Those in local government and the public are vital, and have in the past resisted notionally ‘decentralising’ reforms that haven’t offered them enough real change to outweigh the costs. Working towards a relational state implies that powers will be on offer that are both significant to local government, and meaningful to the public. If the relational state idea is taken up by political leaders, it will be interesting to see if these building blocks are put in place in the months before election campaigns kick off. Once campaigning does begin, any serious planning for the future of Britain’s public services is very likely to be put on hold.