The state of the UK’s public finances means the need for public service reform is greater than ever, according to the CBI.
In a speech to public service leaders today (Thursday), CBI director-general Richard Lambert will say that the debate about reforms to schools, hospitals and other public services “should never be restricted to times of economic plenty.”
He will say: “It is exactly when a period of fiscal belt-tightening is upon us that we should strive to find innovative ways of delivering services and discuss new ideas that will help meet people’s desire for more and better services while being affordable to the country.”
Mr Lambert will warn that people should not become “obsessed” with how much public money is spent, but rather how it is spent and what the effect is. “One thing recent years have shown us is that extra money alone has a limited effect on service outcomes,” he will say.
The comments will come as the CBI publishes polling data that will make for uncomfortable reading for the government. YouGov figures show that only around three in ten voters (28%) think public services have improved over the last 11 years, compared to around one in two (49%) who think they have got a little or a lot worse.
Mr Lambert will say: “It doesn’t take a political genius to work out that yet more money is not the answer here, in part because there is almost no public appetite for further tax rises and in part because sinking more resources into inadequately reformed systems will not work.”
The YouGov polling does reveal a public appetite for reform, however, with two in three voters (66%) thinking the pace of public services reform should be stepped up, while fewer than one in ten (9%) think it should be slowed down.
Mr Lambert will warn: “Many trade unions, enjoying a spike in their bargaining power with the government, are drawing up wish lists and trying to strong-arm the government into reversing reforms.”
He will say the new polling shows: “Both the unions and the ministers they are targeting need to recognise how out of kilter with public mood any anti-reform stance is.”
The YouGov figures also show the public does not have a strong preference about which sector delivers public services. As long as services are of good quality and provided free at the point of delivery, 59 per cent of voters think the private sector should be allowed to deliver them, against only 31 per cent who do not.
The CBI Public Services Summit also sees the publication of a new report on the NHS ahead of next week’s Darzi Report on the future of the health service.
A healthy choice: building a stronger NHS, sets out how competition and patient choice must play a central role in the health service if failing provision is to be addressed and overall standards improved. It says:
- Increasing patient access to independent providers and introducing managed competition will strengthen the NHS by giving patients more choice, more innovation and better ways of getting the care they need more quickly;
- Patients need much more information about the options open to them if they are to use the new system of patient choice to their advantage;
- There should be a full purchaser-provider split, with cosy arrangements between local primary care trusts and general hospitals ended and all work and contracts awarded to the best available provider and not just the traditional local NHS service; and
- Ministers need to put in place a “failure regime” that smoothly handles the inevitable changes that a move towards more community and less hospital treatment will bring.