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Last updated: 24 March 2010
Supporting the Prime Minister and Cabinet
The Cabinet Office works in partnership with No.10 [External website] to provide a comprehensive service to the Prime Minister [External website] and Cabinet [External website], the supreme committee of government. They bring together a combination of policy, resilience, security, and communications expertise, to advise and deliver the Government's priorities.
With the arrival of the new Prime Minister in June 2007, we have made some structural changes which have enhanced the policy and security and intelligence functions. The roles of Adviser to the Prime Minister on European and Global Issues, on Foreign and Defence Policy, and on Domestic Policy all moved to the centre of the Cabinet Office from No.10.
At the same time, relationships between No.10 and Cabinet Office have been strengthened. The No.10 private office, the No.10 policy unit – staffed by Special Advisers – and the No.10 press office, work more closely with core Cabinet Office units and the Prime Minister's advisers to create a total policy, security, delivery and crisis management service.
With the appointment of Jeremy Heywood [External website] in January 2008, No.10 now has a Permanent Secretary for the first time. Jeremy is helping to ensure a greater sense of cohesion between No.10 and the other Cabinet Office units engaged in supporting the Prime Minister.
It's a more coordinated, coherent centre of government, which results in improved policy formulation, decision making and delivery.
The Cabinet Committee structure was also re-organised, to streamline the system and align it with the new set of 30 Public Service Agreements [External website].
Public Service Agreements (PSAs) are at the centre of departments' performance management systems. They are three-year agreements, negotiated every two years between each of the 17 main departments and HM Treasury during the Spending Review process. Each PSA sets out the department's high-level aim, priority objectives and key performance targets.
The Cabinet Committee system is supported by the Cabinet Secretariat and the Intelligence and Security function, working with the Strategy Unit and the Prime Minister's Delivery Unit (now in HM Treasury). The Secretariat plays a neutral but valuable role in: bringing people together, communicating the Prime Minister's views, brokering agreement on difficult issues, and preparing policy proposals for Ministers to consider and decide on.
EDS is primarily responsible for organising Cabinet and also organises the majority of Cabinet Committees. It provides policy advice to the Prime Minister on a wide range of domestic issues and works with departments on policy proposals. EDS also has a range of other responsibilities which include:
EDS also provides the secretariat for the Public Services Forum (PSF), which engages trade unions in dialogue with government on workforce reform issues such as learning and skills, staff engagement, diversity and health and well-being. This year private and third sector employers have been included in PSF work. The PSF has also agreed a Joint Statement on Access to Skills, Trade Unions and Advice for staff working on central government contracts.
Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007
This year the Cabinet Office also set up the independent UK Statistics Authority to replace the Office of National Statistics, in order to increase public confidence in official statistics.
Speaking at the launch of the Authority on 31 March 2008, the Chair of the Authority, Sir Michael Scholar, outlined his commitment:
“The UK Statistics Authority comes into being tomorrow, an independent statutory body, supported by all parties in both Houses of Parliament, and in all the devolved administrations, with powers and with the obligation to promote, to improve and to safeguard official statistics across the UK.
“I give you this promise, on behalf of myself and all my colleagues in the Authority, that we will do our utmost to achieve this objective, in the hope that, with time and hard work, we will make some serious progress in rebuilding public trust in UK official statistics”
The new Prime Minister wanted to improve the way that Britain is governed, by revitalising democracy and listening to the public. One of his first actions was to publish a Draft Legislative Programme (DLP) [External website]. This set out for the first time, the details of the bills that would appear in the Queen's Speech in November.
For the first time, the public, as well as Parliament, were asked what they thought about them, and the Government were able to consider their views before deciding what legislation should go before Parliament.
Gillian Merron MP, former Minister for the East Midlands and Alan Bishop, Central Office of Information Chief Executive
As part of the DLP consultation, East Midlands Minister Gillian Merron, went to Nottingham to meet with heads of business, community leaders and local policy makers from across the region. She said:
“I want to find out whether people think these themes are the right ones, what other issues they think the Government should be considering, and how they would like to be involved in shaping these priorities in the future. The views of local people will feed back into our thinking, paving the way for better laws which are more closely aligned to the services that people in the East Midlands want and need.”
Over the past year EGIS has supported the prime minister at:
EGIS, which was restructured in 2007, is responsible for the coordination of the Government's European and International economic policies, and directly supports the Prime Minister's own involvement in these policy areas. This includes preparation and support to the Prime Minister at European Council and G8 meetings.
In addition to direct support to the Prime Minister, EGIS has also coordinated broader government work on key European and international dossiers including: the Future of Europe; the Single Market Review; the Lisbon Reform Programme; and the international response to climate change.
The Foreign and Defence Policy Secretariat (F&DPS) supports and advises the Prime Minister and the Cabinet, ensuring coherence, quality and delivery of foreign, defence and security policy across government departments. Its primary role is to support the work and decision making of the National Security and International Development Committee (NSID) and its supporting sub-committees. Specifically, F&DPS:
Its key roles include: coordinating the Government's bilateral and multilateral policies; anticipating crises and managing any coordinated interventions; and driving the Government's defence and security policy.
Some recent examples of such work over the past year include:
The Honours and Appointment Secretariat is responsible for both the policy and the operation of the national honours and medals systems [External website]. The new independent honours committee system has been in place for three years, and its independence and the transparency of the new processes are becoming widely known.
In 2007 the Prime Minister set the challenge of identifying and honouring more people who are giving outstanding service to their local communities. These people are going the extra mile in support of the local community and often doing so on a voluntary basis. 80% and 76% of candidates at OBE and MBE in the honours lists published at New Year and The Queen's Birthday 2008 are in this category. A publicity campaign ran in four regions in January, to increase representation of these groups even further.
The Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP, Prime MinisterWe need to mobilise all the resources available to us: the power of our military, police and security services; the persuasive force and reach of diplomacy; the authority of strengthened global institutions which, with our full support, can deploy both ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ power; and because arms and authority will never be enough, the power of ideas, of shared values and hopes that can win over hearts and minds.
The Prime Minister's Security Adviser is responsible for providing advice on strategic issues relating to the security of the UK to the Head of the Civil Service and Prime Minister. The ISR Group supports the Prime Minister's Security Adviser, Permanent Secretaries, and Ministerial Committees in co-ordinating the policy, funding and delivery of security, intelligence and resilience.
Alex Allan, JIC Chairman
The Group provides advice to the Prime Minister on the full range of national security issues, including counter-terrorism. It provides the Secretariat for the National Security Committee and a number of its sub-committees, including those dealing with extremism, protective security and resilience. It is also responsible for the United Kingdom's crisis management arrangements; for the maintenance of associated facilities; and supporting the operation of the Cabinet Office Briefing Room (COBR), including providing any crisis secretariat. It is currently working to implement the Prime Minister's National Security Strategy, published in March 2008, and provides support to the new National Security Forum.
Intelligence, Security and Resilience Group
The Civil Contingencies Secretariat (CCS) has to ensure the resilience of the UK at every level, central, regional and local, and leads on emergency planning and training.
The Counter-terrorism and Crisis Management Team works closely with CCS to maintain the effective coordination of government response in the event of civil emergencies, terrorist incidents and international crises.
The Directorate of Security and Intelligence provides strategic leadership and coordination of government activity to manage risks to government assets; and support to the Prime Minister, Ministers, and the Prime Minister's Security Adviser on cross-cutting issues regarding the intelligence community.
The JIC is responsible for providing coordinated inter-departmental intelligence assessments on issues of immediate and long-term importance to the UK's national interests ' primarily in the fields of foreign affairs, defence and security.
The JIC's members are senior officials from across government: the Foreign and Commonwealth Office [External website]; Ministry of Defence [External website]; Home Office [External website]; Department for International Development [External website]; HM Treasury [External website] and Cabinet Office; the Heads of the three intelligence Agencies and the Chief of the Assessments Staff. Other departments attend JIC meetings as necessary.
The JIC Chairman is responsible for supervising the work of the JIC and is charged specifically with ensuring that the committee's warning and monitoring role is discharged effectively. Like the Agency Heads, he has direct access to the Prime Minister. Present Chairman Alex Allan says:
“JIC assessments provide vital underpinning for the key decisions the Government has to make on foreign and defence policy, on counter-terrorism and on counter-proliferation. With the deployment of British troops overseas and the continuing threat from international terrorism, the volume of reports produced by the assessment staff in 2007/ 08 was the highest for several years. I took over the Chairmanship in January this year, and was immediately struck by the depth of cross-departmental expertise around the JIC table, and the tradition of informed and challenging debate. This helps make sure that JIC judgements are respected and authoritative.”
In June 2007, the post of Prime Minister's Adviser on Security was separated from that of the Chairman to underline the clear separation of intelligence assessment from policy advice. The JIC Chairman is also Head of the Cabinet Office Joint Intelligence Organisation, which comprises the Assessments Staff, the Professional Head of Intelligence Analysis and the JIC Secretariat.