Drive to move civil servants out of London 'going backwards' despite Wolverhampton base
Efforts to move civil servants out of London are "going backwards", a new report has claimed.
The first government headquarters outside London opened its doors in Wolverhampton in September, with a with a pledge by ministers to "bring decision making to the heart of the West Midlands".
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government opened a new base across two floors of the i9 building in Wolverhampton city centre. Around 100 staff including senior civil servants are based there, with a further 150 set to join them in April.
But the move is just a drop in the ocean, according to a new report by the Onward think tank, which is backed by West Midlands Mayor Andy Street.
It says government remains almost entirely London-based, with a growth in the number of civil servants based in the capital.
Since 2018, one in three civil servants has been recruited in London, meaning the number of civil servants has grown twice as fast in London, at 22 per cent, than it has in regions outside the capital.
It was also found that more than nine in 10 civil servants employed by the Treasury and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy work in London.
Furthermore, these departments hired nearly three times as many officials within the capital as outside in the six months from March 2021.
The findings are included in a report by the think tank that looked at the spread of places where government decisions are made.
It states that "despite warm words and good intentions, efforts to decentralise the civil service are going backwards".
Government commercial functions such as the Crown Commercial Service, Government Digital Service and UK Export Finance are all headquartered in Whitehall or the city.
The overall civil service headcount has risen by 50 per cent in London since 2006, compared to three per cent for the country as a whole. In the North East, East of England, South West and South East, numbers have fallen by 12 per cent or more, according to the report.
Onward states that moving civil servants to other regions could have a positive effect on growth and decision-making.
It says Newport in Wales has experienced a faster pace of knowledge-intensive jobs growth than other cities including Birmingham, Leeds, Newcastle and Sheffield since the Office for National Statistics moved there in 2005.
The report is backed by West Midlands Mayor Andy Street, North of Tyne Mayor Jamie Driscoll and a number of Red Wall MPs, who all want to see more civil servant jobs spread across the country.
It suggests that, while there have been high profile moves like the Ministry of Housing to Wolverhampton, the vast majority of jobs remain in London. And last year up to 140 jobs were lost when HMRC Telford in Priorslee shut its office.
The report concludes: "Successive governments have tried to shift the centre of government's gravity, but the civil service remains as centralised as in the mid-1970s.
"Emergency recruitment to respond to Brexit and the pandemic have further concentrated the civil service in London, despite well-intentioned plans to open a regional hub network.
"But it is necessary – and achievement will require a much greater pace and scale of dispersal than has been achieved to date."
Will Tanner, director of Onward and former deputy head of policy to Theresa May, said: "For civil servants, levelling up should mean spreading out. The pandemic has proved that officials do not rely on being in Whitehall to do their jobs, and a more dispersed civil service would lead to more balanced private sector growth and more representative government."
Relocating government commercial functions out of London and publishing information about civil service relocation to boost accountability are among the recommendations in the report.
Reviewing the location of regulators, such as Ofcom, Ofgem, the Financial Conduct Authority, and the Competition and Markets Authority, to ensure they reflect the economic geography of the industries they regulate is also suggested.
Expanding the network of regional civil service campuses, alongside a commitment that ministers and permanent secretaries should work from them at least one day a week or one week per month is another recommendation.
