DFE top civil servant sacked - AIBU to feel sad and frustrated?

[Gromitt]

Just came on here for a bit of a rant and to ask if anyone else feels the same way (whether you work in the Civil Service or otherwise).

I work in the Department for Education, and heard today that the Permanent Secretary at the Department for Education was sacked by Boris Johnson earlier. I just feel so frustrated and sad at this.

I absolutely love working as a civil servant (there can be lots of opportunities for positive change both in the jobs people do and in other initiatives encouraged in departments), and the work that departments have done over the last few months (and in general) has been fantastic.

I also am hugely grateful I have a job, as I realise this is a very difficult for lots of people in the U.K. and around the world, and realise I am very lucky to have a job that gives me an income and is relatively stable.

However, I still feel really demoralised at what’s happened to the Civil Service over the last few months.

I think how I’ve felt today has been the build-up of several months of feeling demoralised and uncertain at what this government is doing.

1. Over the last few months, the entire Civil Service has worked so, so hard to achieve what the government wants (I realise this is what we are paid to do). Our jobs have been made more stressful and hectic because of Covid, the lockdown and the mountain of policy or operational challenges brought about by Covid. The sacking of the DFE Permanent Secretary only adds to this negativity and loss of morale.

1. Boris Johnson and his government have now sacked at least 3 top civil servants (the Home Office Permanent Secretary, the Cabinet Secretary and the DFE Permanent Secretary). This absolutely isn’t the way things were or should be done! (This is at least my view - I may be alone in thinking this though!)

I do feel incredibly grateful that we her support systems like unions and we can of course talk to each other, but it just feels like this government has been hindering the Civil Service rather than helping it over the last few months in particular. And it just makes me feel so frustrated and hopeless.

Sorry for the typos!

The permanent secretary was a convenient scapegoat for Gavin Williamson, who was the one who should have been sacked.

Yanbu, it is a sign of chaotic and destructive government.

I fear there will be nothing left by the time the 2024 election arrives .

I’ve always understood that the ministers are responsible for making decisions, and yet 2 civil servants at DFE have been sacked in as many days (Ofqual head Sally Collier and Permanent Secretary Jonathan Slater) as a result of decisions that ministers had the final say on.

I do think this is a direct result of Boris Johnson’s particular government style, as when I think back to the Windrush scandal, under Theresa May, it was Amber Rudd (a minister) who was sacked rather than the civil servant who was in charge of the Home Office at the time.

YANBU. I work in the department too and Jonathan will be a great loss imo :(

Definitely agree Jonathan Slater was a convenient scapegoat for Gavin Williamson, which is just so awful and unfair.

Shit isn't it. Don't worry we're getting Tony Abbott !!!

YANBU, just another example of civil servants being blamed for political decisions.

He was the fall guy for an incompetent government.

YA very very very much NBU. The scapegoating of Ofqual and DfE for carrying out the political decisions imposed upon them is appalling. I'm not a civil servant but I completely understand why it would be incredibly demoralising if I were; as it is, it just makes me fear even more for the country as it's governed by people who think that policies are just PR statements and that that's fine because other people will bear the actual consequences.

YANBU I work at DfT and it's worrying what is happening to the civil service. Civil servants shouldn't be being sacked as a result of political decisions going wrong. Nothing happens without ministerial sign off

YANBU. As former SCS I am horrified by what is happening.

YANBU - I am in no way connected with the CS and am only an interested watcher of current events. This is fucking outrageous. Johnson and Cummings are steamrollering their way through everything and NOBODY fucking stops them. Nobody. They just do what the fuck they like and care nothing for the legality, morality or consequences of their actions. And still nobody stops them.
God knows where we are heading.

YANBU
This government is appalling. A bunch of rich, naughty boys playing at being politicians like it’s a game of Dungeons and Dragons.

Yup, not looking good - makes a mockery of the impartial civil service (another civil servant of 19 years here). Only the Cabinet Secretary should be able to remove a Perm Sec. I thought the principle that civil servants advise, ministers decide, and take the consequences of good /bad decisions was irrefutable, but apparently not. I wonder if Jonathan Slater will go down the same route as the Home Office Perm Sec and start a legal case.

So so glad to have escaped one of the large central govt departments last year to go on secondment to a big ALB - was just getting so fed up and cynical about it all (working for two particular awful junior ministers, each awful in her own special but different way, tipped me over the edge).

YANBU in feeling this way.

H owever. You know the expression " look for the woman"? In this case it's more look for the little bald Golum. He's made his views on the CS very clear, he despises them.I

As a retired civil servant I know their role is to advise ministers how to achieve their stated ends, and the to tell them what the implications of that decision could be.

Blaming civil servants only makes them less likely to tell ministers the truth.

But the Barnard Castle going one doesn't give a flying fuck about that.

I have never been so glad that I'm retired

Yanbu. I'm not a civil servant, but I read the news earlier and thought about how unfair it was that Gavin Williamson gets to stay in his job while Sally Collier and Jonathan Slater have had to go.

To be fair, the A-level results fiasco was an almighty fuck-up, and regardless of blame, I think those at the top do sometimes have to carry the can - it goes with the territory. However, for the person right at the top (the minister) to sack those beneath him while he hangs onto his own job... that's pretty shit.

I don't know whether Gavin Williamson actually signed off on the approach that was initially taken for the A-level results or not, but it was his responsibility. If he did sign it off, then he is culpable because it was ultimately his decision. If he didn't sign it off, then he is equally culpable because it was his responsibility, and under the circumstances, he should have ensured that he knew exactly what was going on.

DH and I were saying at lunch that we were glad we hadn't gone into the civil service.
It is very frustrating to see what is happening in government.

Well Dominic Cummings said he was going to overhaul the Civil Service, it looks like he is doing this

Don’t the civil service carry out the instructions of the government? It was knobhead Williamson who should have gone - been sacked pronto if he hadn’t the grace to resign - not the civil servant. It’s outrageous what this government is being allowed to get away with. Where’s the outcry in the papers about it? Oh, I forgot they’re run by billionaire tories aren’t they.

Yanbu, it is a sign of chaotic and destructive government.

It is indeed. I seem to remember Gordon Brown getting through quite a few civil servants in the Treasury and HMRC when he was running things.

YANBU- the wrong people are being sacked because it's more convenient for the government to scapegoat them. No minister is going to get off that gravy train if they don't have to. I work in education and I am appalled by the recent sackings of civil service workers. The whole things smacks to me of a reckless, chaotic and deluded government- it is really quite terrifying.

I wonder if Jonathan Slater will go down the same route as the Home Office Perm Sec and start a legal case

I bloody well hope so!

I don't feel sadness, anger is the emotion I have. The country voted for a Conservative government not the nasty spiteful one we have.

@Bluepolkadots42

YANBU- the wrong people are being sacked because it's more convenient for the government to scapegoat them. No minister is going to get off that gravy train if they don't have to. I work in education and I am appalled by the recent sackings of civil service workers. The whole things smacks to me of a reckless, chaotic and deluded government- it is really quite terrifying.

I absolutely agree with this