“Ministers need to hold their nerve” on public service reform, says think tank

July 11, 2011

In advance of the publication of the Public Services White Paper today, Simon Parker, Director of localism think tank the New Local Government Network (NLGN) said:

“Ministers are right to encourage local government to push decisions down to communities – and many councils are already doing exactly that. But the drive for localism must also apply to Whitehall departments”

“We need to see an ambitious new right for councils to bid to run central government services. Ministers should be prepared to devolve everything from job centres to criminal justice unless there is a genuinely compelling case not to”

“The presumption that services should always be run by the public sector died a generation ago in local government. More than half of all highways, housing, environmental and social services are already outsourced and the proportion is likely to rise as cuts bite”

“Government’s had a rocky time of late with NHS reforms and the hacking scandal, but ministers need to hold their nerve in public service reform”

Ends


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