Declaration versus Dom

The prime minister’s former top adviser made civil service reform a key plank of his time in No.10. Now that the official plan has been published, how much of his vision remains? Richard Johnstone investigates

The government has finally published its reform plan for the civil service, after months of speculation. This current round of civil service reform was kickstarted when incoming prime minister Boris Johnson brought Dominic Cummings into No.10 Downing Street in July 2019. Cummings was a long-standing critic of the civil service, having called the permanent civil service “an idea for the history books”. Although the reform drive has been taken on by Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove and the department’s permanent secretary and civil service chief operating officer Alex Chisholm, it will be viewed by many through the prism of Cummings – who said Whitehall reform was one of his four key conditions for working for the prime minister.

Although the proposed reforms have come from many quarters, it is striking how much seems to match elements of the former No.10 adviser’s critique.

Cummings has argued for nearly a decade that government “is programmed to go wrong” and believes “failure is normal, it is not something to be avoided”.

Let’s take a look at the Declaration on Government Reform to see where it shares its ideas with the firebrand former adviser.

The plan is made up of three strands: people, performance and partnership.