Tuesday, April 01, 2008

It is, after all, April Fool's Day

I reprint this PR in full, and without comment (which, given the first para, was hard). Actually, encouraging innovation in our civil servants is fine. I just wonder whether it ever gets put into practice, especially when dealing with all in the private sector trying to suggest efficiencies. Anyway... enjoy.

Civil Service Live to inspire and showcase the best in innovation

Civil Service Live opens today, bringing together the inspirational people running today's and tomorrow's civil service, to showcase and learn from best practice and innovation across government.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who will be speaking at the event said: "I am grateful to the thousands of civil servants who work so hard, day in, day-out, to provide Britain with its vital public services.

"These services support each of us as individuals to realise our personal ambitions: for excellent education and lifelong learning, for good health and well being throughout our lives, for safety in our communities, and for security at work and in retirement.

"But we need more reform to ensure continued high standards. I want to see Whitehall working to empower schools, hospitals, local councils and the voluntary sector to deliver the very best in public services - matching new rights for people to choose and shape services around their needs with a new professionalism from service providers."

Over the next three days civil servants across all grades and from all parts of the UK will take part in interactive seminars, tailored training programmes and hear from a range of speakers from the wider public, private and third sectors including;
* Sir Gus O'Donnell, Cabinet Secretary
* Peter Jones, TV Dragon and Entrepreneur
* Matt Dawson, member of the 2003 world cup winning England rugby team
* John Denham, Secretary of State, Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills
* Cabinet Office Minister Ed Miliband
* Lin Homer, Chief Executive of the UK Border Agency
* Lesley Strathie,Chief Executive of Jobcentre Plus

Sir Gus O'Donnell said: "Civil Service Live is an opportunity not only to showcase all that is best about the civil service but also to learn from our partners in the wider public, private and third sector.

"The Prime Minister recently set out the key challenges that the nation will face in the next 10-15 years and the civil service has a central role to play in meeting these challenges.

"The civil service is working within an ever-changing environment to deliver public services to a diverse range of users. It will be challenged to do more with less and to respond to an evolving and competitive global market. To meet these challenges we must be better at innovating. I am looking for all civil servants attending the event to take an active part and then go back to their departments and put into practice the innovative lessons they have learnt."

Earlier this year civil servants were encouraged to submit ideas, no matter how big or small, which could make an effective difference to their place of work. More than 300 people submitted ideas from which eleven were chosen. These eleven were then filmed presenting their idea to the Lions Lair panel which included Peter Jones, TV Dragon, Helen Ghosh, Permanent Secretary DEFRA, Howell James, Permanent Secretary for
Government Communications, Alan Bishop, Chief Executive COI and Robin Tye, Ernst & Young.

The film of these best eleven ideas will be shown at the event while TV Dragon Peter Jones, Sir Gus and Minister for the Cabinet Office Ed Miliband will present sessions challenging perceptions of innovation in the private and public sectors.

Peter Jones said: "The biggest asset of any organisation is its people - the Lions' Lair event was really important to give civil servants the chance to showcase and pitch their ideas for improving the public sector. It's vital for the Civil Service to use the entrepreneurial and creative skills of its employees to keep streamlining and modernising what is often seen as a slow and overly bureaucratic organisation. I've been impressed by Sir Gus' efforts to support this beyond the scope of CS Live, and I've enjoyed working alongside him sharing public sector and private sector knowledge.

"I hope this is the start of something special within the Civil Service and that the many passionate and determined employees come forward and drive positive change throughout the organisation, knowing that Sir Gus will actually help them by taking action."

The people shortlisted for their Lions Lair ideas were ;

* Kash Walayat, DCSF; Learning on the job through Supershadowing.

* Philip John, Job Centre Plus; Using technology to improve customer service through using text messages

* John McGregor, DWP; A tool to calculate arrears of benefit.

* Kathleen Lindsey, Access to Work, Job Centre Plus; Reducing water usage in departments.

* Gavin Duffy, Environment & Heritage Service; To run Government vehicles on environmentally friendly and sustainable fuel.

* Clare Merrills and David Gostelow, HMRC; Improve community understanding of policies by training staff to explain complex information in clear and understandable language and recruit staff who are multi-lingual

* Rob Murphy: Home Office, create a portal across central Government that will enable civil servants to access business directories for all Government departments. This will assist civil servants who deal with issues which cut across the responsibility of more than one Government Department or agency by enabling them to identify colleagues in other

* Jonathan Lepper, HM Treasury; A cross Whitehall on-line job share notice board to create a formal market place for job sharers accessible to all civil servants.

* Doug Roberts, HMRC; Unify the coding for Company Tax to allow all depts. to access the information they need easily.

* Rupert Cryer, Cabinet Office; Highlight success in departments through Headlines - a short, monthly note from each department setting out the key successes for each directorate.

* Geoff Bantock, HMRC; A "Unified Tax System" that can work out straightaway household's net disposable monthly income.

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