Problems with the civil service risk frustrating the government's missions

All governments rely on the civil service to deliver their agenda. And, six months into this Labour government, ministers and officials have now got the measure of each other. With working relationships established and priorities clarified, the early months of 2025 should – in theory – be focused on delivery.

Yet already, some familiar tensions have surfaced, and ministers are sceptical of Whitehall’s ability to deliver their vision of ‘mission-led’ government.

The new edition of Whitehall Monitor – our annual, data-led assessment on the size, shape and capability of the civil service, and the first to be published under a Labour government, analysed progress made on the missions and the government’s early thinking on civil service reform. It found that, while ministers are right that mission-led government will mean a change of approach in Whitehall, they must not neglect long-standing, fundamental problems with how the civil service works.

The missions are ambitious – but have not yet gripped Whitehall

Labour’s pitch to the country was based on its five national missions. But underneath the headline ambitions, the party also promised to deliver them through a new way of governing, and of working in Whitehall.

The theory of mission-led government reprises common themes of civil service reform – including embedding longer-term thinking in policy making, breaking down departmental silos, and bringing external perspectives and expertise into decision making. And there have been some structural innovations to bring this about. ‘Mission boards’ and a Mission Delivery Unit have been established, for example, though their actual roles are not yet clear. Overall, our analysis found little evidence that the missions have truly gripped Whitehall.

More promising are signs of ministers’ appreciation that the civil service will need to change to deliver the missions. In December Keir Starmer’s Plan for Change speech, for example, had a welcome focus on Whitehall reform, and came soon after he tasked his new cabinet secretary with the ‘complete rewiring of the British state’. Cabinet Office minister Pat McFadden, meanwhile, has spoken of the need to adopt a ‘test and learn’ mindset, and for more external recruitment into the civil service. 

These are familiar subjects, and while the proposals lack detail they will certainly be necessary if mission-led government is to take hold. 

Problems of pay, workforce planning and morale could frustrate the government’s agenda

But the focus of our analysis in Whitehall Monitor – the state of the civil service as it exists today – reveals the danger of focusing on such areas at the expense of underlying problems.

Most significantly, the report shows that the civil service workforce remains poorly planned and managed. The expansion of the civil service has continued, for example – with growth of 3.8% in the 12 months to Q3 2024 – without any clear plan or rationale. The excessive turnover of officials has also got worse. Almost 13% either moved departments or left the civil service in 2023/24, the second highest level for well over a decade.

Low pay is also a problem. Even though overall pay ticked up in 2024 and is almost back to 2010 levels in real terms, individual grades have seen their pay significantly eroded by inflation. Pay for both mid-level grades 6s and 7s, for instance, as well as for the senior civil service is more than 20% below 2010 levels in real terms. 

This in turn has made the workforce more difficult to manage. The data suggest that early promotions have been used as the only way to give officials a pay rise and retain them in the civil service. This can be seen in the changing grade structure of the civil service – while numbers of the most junior ‘administrative officer / assistant’ grades have fallen by 45% since 2010 (partly because of automation), those of grade 6s and 7s have risen by over 120%.

Poor workforce management is not the only challenge. Officials’ morale has fallen for the third consecutive year, as has satisfaction with their leadership and how change is managed. There is also more work to do in improving the use of external consultancies and temporary labour. Spending in both areas increased in 2023/24 and is far above pre-pandemic levels.

There are some reasons for optimism. The civil service has a more positive story to tell on diversity, for example, and the accelerating adoption of artificial intelligence is encouraging. But overall, the foundations of the civil service are unstable – ministers must address them before ‘rewiring’ Whitehall to deliver the missions.

Ministers must grasp the nettle in 2025

The government may be just six months into its term, but time is already running short to tackle these challenges. The missions face up to difficult, long-term challenges, yet the civil service is not yet set up to deliver them.

So having got their feet under the desk in 2024, ministers will have little excuse not to make meaningful progress this year. The problems in the civil service are all-too familiar, as are the solutions. The government’s agenda will not succeed without fundamental reforms to Whitehall.