The United Kingdom Institute for Government says a new survey showing declining Public Service morale and anger over pay should prompt an urgent Ministerial response.
The 2022 Civil Service People Survey, which tracks officials’ attitudes to, and experiences of, working in the Public Service, should be a cause for concern, the Institute said in a statement.
“The survey offers an insight into a particularly difficult moment for the Civil Service with political turmoil and Ministerial churn causing uncertainty across Government,” the Institute said.
“Officials feel bruised by hostile briefing in the press, sometimes by Ministers or ‘close friends of’ them, and they have a two per cent pay award in the face of spiralling inflation.”
It said the results are worrying enough to require an urgent response.
The survey found that engagement with work fell in every Department last year, with a particularly significant drop in the Cabinet Office – nine percentage points – which now has the least engaged workforce of any Department.
The survey comes as Passport Offices around the nation are buckling under the strain of trying to maintain services with most staff in the midst of a five-week walk-out.
Offices that usually employ hundreds of staff members are currently operating with less than 10 workers as passport applications mount.
Staff still working in the Glasgow office can process only compassionate applications for people who urgently need to visit loved ones.
The Home Office continues to deny any delay to passports being processed due to the strike and insists that all passports will be processed within its current guideline time of 10 weeks.
However, union sources claimed day-to-day work from the Glasgow and Newport locations had been sent over to larger offices in Liverpool and Durham despite those offices being “largely empty as well”.
London, 6 April 2023
