Anthony Fussey, deputy head of budget allocation, HM Courts Service, London.
| Position | STUDENT ONE2ONE - Her Majesty's Courts Service - Dialogue with Anthony Fussey - Interview |
It's been an extremely busy year for you.
Things are settling down quite well now but, yes, I have been on a steep learning curve. HM Courts Service was set up only just over a year ago and we had the task of merging 43 separate bodies into a single unified service. Before that, there was one organisation responsible for managing crown and county courts and 42 regional organisations managing magistrates' courts. We have now managed to bring together 43 disparate ways of working--and all the different systems involved--into one. We've overcome most of the operational challenges and we've produced all the financial information required, so the project has been a success.
What are your key duties in the new service?
The main part of my job is to negotiate with our parent department, HM Treasury, for funding and then to distribute the money it gives us, plus the funds we raise through court fees, to various parts of the organisation.
What I enjoy most about my work is the interaction I have with different people, particularly when negotiating and problem-solving. There are often competing priorities, so I have to apply fair and rigorous principles to ensure that everyone is treated the same way, while being careful to make sure that public money is being spent prudently. I also have to consider other stakeholders, such as the legal profession and court users. There are quite a few people to keep happy.
Surely you can't satisfy all stakeholders all of the time.
I really enjoy the problem-solving aspect, but at the same time I can also end up being piggy in the middle. As someone who holds the purse-strings, I imagine I'm not always the most popular guy around--nobody likes the person who has to say "no". That can be quite a challenge but, providing that I can show that I have applied rigorous criteria consistently, it's something that I can handle. I also have the support of a lot of people in my department to help me deal with that side of things.
What attracted you to a career in the public sector?
I'd always wanted to work for an...
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