The Major Government and Whitehall: The Civil Service at the Crossroads
| Author | Tony Butcher |
| DOI | 10.1177/014473949501500102 |
| Published date | 01 March 1995 |
| Date | 01 March 1995 |
Teaching Public Administration: Spring
1995,
vol.
xv,
no.
1,
pp
19-31
The Major Government and Whitehall: The Civil Service
at
the Crossroads
TONY BUTCHER
Department
of
Social Policy
and
Politics, Goldsmiths' College
University
of
London
The election
of
the Thatcher Government in 1979 introduced an era in which the
position
of
the civil service came under intense challenge, and in which its relationship
with the Conservative Government was the subject
of
much strain. These changes
were documented in a previous article in this journal (Butcher, 1991). What has been
described as Whitehall's 'managerial revolution' has continued in the 1990s under the
premiership
of
John Major. Indeed, in the words
of
one analyst
of
the Major
Government's impact on the civil service:
'Far
from stilling the revolution,
Mr
Major
has spurred it
on'
(Willman, 1994, p 64).
Like the developments
of
the 1980s, the Major Government's pursuit
of
increased
efficiency and better management in central government has been accompanied by
worries about the constitutional implications
of
such changes. In addition, there has
been an increasing concern about declining standards
of
conduct in the civil service
together with suggestions that its traditional values are being eroded. One former
prime minister has gone so far as to state that he is more worried about the civil
service
than
he has ever been in the sixty or so years that he has been associated with
it (Treasury and Civil Service Committee, 1993, Q 587). A former senior civil servant
has argued that the civil service is in
'a
state
of
crisis', with widespread uncertainty
about its future (plowden, 1994: Foreword).
What, then, has happened to the civil service in the 1990s? Why is it the subject
of
so much concern? The aim
of
this article is to examine developments in the civil
service since John Major succeeded Mrs Thatcher as prime minister in November
1990.
Before we come to these developments, however, we need to briefly remind ourselves
of
the legacy
of
the Thatcher years.
THE THATCHER LEGACY
The Thatcher decade was a crucial one for the civil service. In the words
of
one
observer: 'Not since
Mr
Gladstone has any premier had such influence on Whitehall'
(Hennessy, I 990a). The 1980s witnessed severe cuts in staffing and the introduction
of
a series
of
managerial initiatives -the Rayner efficiency scrutinies, the Management
19
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