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Jun 07, 2023

Meetings mania

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By JOHN JOHNSTON

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Hello and welcome to London Influence. Tips, gossip, state secrets and coffee requests @johnjohnstonmi or [email protected] | View in your browser

SUMMER BLUES: London Influence is taking a break during the depths of recess, but fear not, we will return in just two short weeks. We’re leaving you with a proper nerd-out, though.

— Influence goes rifling around in the government’s transparency documents — and finds some comedy clangers.

— A big think tank exit sets tongues wagging.

— A new report tries to map out why Whitehall reform just ain’t working.

MEETING MANIA: Forget cocktail umbrellas and beach BBQs — the real treat of summer is getting a mountain of transparency documents from government departments, right?!?

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Data! Data! Data!: We’ve fired up Excel so you don’t have to, and crunched meetings data for the key business-facing departments during the first quarter of this year — including No. 10, the Treasury and shiny new Department for Business and Trade, making its Influence debut.

On the Hunt: Chancellor Jeremy Hunt logged 73 meetings in the first quarter of the year — with all the major business lobbying groups getting face-time with the top finance minister in preparation for the spring budget.

That included: Three meetings with the CBI — among the last chances they’ll have had for engagement before the sexual misconduct scandal broke and saw them frozen out by Whitehall.

Bunch of bankers: While the tech and life sciences sectors also featured heavily in Hunt’s returns — the majority of the U.K.’s big city hitters were pressing the flesh with economic secretary Andrew Griffith.

Top score: He logged an impressive 79 meetings over the period — ticking off all the major banking outfits — and squeezing in some crisis talks as Silicon Valley Bank teetered on the edge of collapse.

Main man: Rishi Sunak logged a total of 39 meetings in the first quarter of 2023, with tech and healthcare players taking up a chunk of his time.

The ‘B’ word: Sunak’s diary in late February was absolutely packed with meetings about the Northern Ireland protocol with trade bodies, supermarkets, financial services firms and exporters all getting their chance to bend the PM’s ear over their Brexit issues …

Media chums: As well as the usual discussions about his “priorities” with members of the British press, Sunak logged four “social meetings” with senior media figures — including Sunday Times chief political commentator Tim Shipman; Daily Mail editor Ted Verity; then-BBC chairman Richard Sharp; and Telegraph bigwigs Aidan and Howard Barclay.

Meanwhile: Kemi Badenoch, who became the U.K.’s business and trade secretary in February following a Whitehall shake-up, logged a total of 23 meetings.

Helpful: Influence would love to give you a flavor of the topics, but a chunk of the meetings with big firms have simply been described as to “discuss investment” or “discuss exports.” Cheers for that! Can’t wait for these searing insights to go monthly.

Could be worse: Given the obvious snafu in Science Minister George Freeman’s team. Under the entry for a roundtable on Polar Research the actually-published participants field has this gem: “ANY EXTERNELS? IF NO THEN DELETE”. And a meeting with various Midlands groups has the illuminating description: “Round table to discuss ???????????”

Tables turned: What’s missing from the data can be just as revealing as what is in there … with Michael Gove’s failure to have a one-on-one with a single major house builder or their trade groups causing a stir.

ICYMI: The industry told Influence earlier this week they are fuming with Gove and feel he’s freezing them out at a time the government’s meant to be getting a move on with housebuilding.

On the defense: His department said he had met with the industry — just not in the first quarter of this year — and that other ministers had kept up engagement.

But but but: One lobbyist from a major developer said they were relieved to see Sunak taking the lead on the latest housing announcement. “[Sunak] has obviously realized that his housing secretary isn’t interested in anything other than fighting the industry and pandering to NIMBYs which, a year out from the general election, may support his Surrey majority but won’t help solve the housing crisis or create a new generation of home-owners,” they said. Ouch. Full story here.

END OF AN IE(R)A: Big changes in wonk world with Mark Littlewood announcing he is stepping down as director general of the Institute of Economic Affairs after a 14-year tenure.

Movin’ on: The IEA claimed victory after many of their economic ideas were adopted by then-Prime Minister Liz Truss, with Littlewood later telling POLITICO he was “distraught” when Truss was forced to abandon them in the wake of her mini-Budget.

Eyebrows: Littlewood made no mention of his next move, further inflaming speculation that he could be handed a peerage in Truss’s resignation honors …

DIVERSITY DRIVE: The Chartered Institute of Public Relations launched their first Equity, Diversity and Inclusion strategy with a pledge to drive change both internally and through the wider industry.

Slow progress: The CIPR said the move is partly in response to data showing that 9 in 10 U.K. PR practitioners are white and 25 per cent are privately educated — around four times the U.K. average.

Be the change: CIPR CEO Alastair McCapra said taking steps to improve the group’s own diversity would help put them in a position to “confidently advocate” for the wider sector.

REFORMING ZEAL: It’s no secret that Whitehall reform has become a Gordian knot. Think tank Reform think is trying to flip the script by properly diagnosing the problems rather than rushing straight for a cure. A new report taps up a swathe of former cabinet ministers, current civil servants and ex-cabinet secretaries to try and land on why it can be so hard to move the machine.

In a Pickles: Reform director Charlotte Pickles tells Influence the overarching issue is the sheer size and complexity of the civil service — with departments working in silos and little appetite among those at the center to spend time on this.

Cut from the same cloth: Breaking through those walls requires expertise in delivering major change programs — something respondents said was lacking among a largely homogenous group of senior staff at the top of the civil service.

Old boys club: “People talked quite a lot about the leadership group that didn’t have a great deal of experience outside of the civil service … that makes it very difficult if you’ve never seen anything different,” Pickles argues.

Butt out: While buy-in from politicians is necessary for reforms to proceed, the consensus from the study is that relying on ministers to lead reforms is a bad move. One former permanent secretary lamented that ministers actually lack the “faintest idea” about how the machinery of government operates.

Clout chasers: Others reported civil servants simply “waiting out” ministers who land in their departments with big ideas for change — presumably not too daunting a task given the recent carousel of appointments.

But but but: Pickles says strong civil service leadership is required both to build political support for change and manage the process of reform — something those interviewed did not feel was in plentiful supply.

She argues: “The power is vested in the cabinet secretary, who also works as the head of the civil service, but can’t prioritize that because they’re constantly trying to firefight for the prime minister.”

Tough love: There’s also a feeling that senior leaders lack the “ruthlessness” needed to overcome malaise among their colleagues or tackle “dysfunction” in the system.

Insanity: “You wouldn’t take the corporate HQ at Shell and, in addition to reporting on risk management and the overall financing of the group, [say] we’re going to have a unit which does drilling in Namibia,” one respondent said. “You would say that’s insane.”

Forged in the fires: In a counter to the usual narrative about slow change in Whitehall, Pickles says respondents felt crisis points like COVID had actually provided a “burning platform” for change rather than an excuse for inaction.

She adds: “A really strong message that we heard was that out of adversity comes this opportunity. Take the pandemic, there was really quite innovative behavior — obviously some challenging ones too — but in terms of how the civil service changed its processes; streamlining decision-making, pushing some of it down to lower levels and embracing the digital push.”

Slipping away: Those opportunities can be short-lived. Many public services are already reverting to pre-COVID ways of doing things, says Pickles.

No surprise: Civil servants were also keen to stress that political attacks on the civil service — think Jacob Rees-Mogg’s attempts to portray them as stay-at-home slackers — undermined the potential for reform and created an “instinctive defensiveness” among staff.

Ouch: “You know, you don’t go into an ultra-large organization and change it by telling people how shit they are,” one former senior civil servant said. “That’s a bad idea, right?”

What’s next: Putting long-standing concerns on paper will, Pickles hopes, give civil servants and ministers the chance for some proper reflection. It’s something she argues is crucial to any successful future attempts to overhaul Whitehall.

Big thinking: “If I’m sitting in the civil service, I’d be asking how you change the executive centre…The Cabinet Office is confused so do we need to think about splitting out different roles rather than dumping more into it.”

She adds: “I’d want to be thinking about the accountability structures and incentives around permanent secretaries so the response to reform isn’t an eye roll but is seen as an opportunity.”

**Reach beyond the headlines with Power Play, POLITICO’s brand-new global podcast bringing you compelling discussions with international power players, hosted by award-winning broadcaster Anne McElvoy. Episodes of the must-listen podcast will drop this September - click here to be notified.**

Richard Messingham started as head of public affairs at wealth management firm St. James’s Place.

Drew Smith has been promoted to head of government relations (UK & Ireland) at Zoom.

Jonathan Blake is joining Headland after 16 years at the BBC.

Lucy Grove joined Inflect as an account manager.

Alex Clarke joined Guide Dogs for the Blind Association as senior policy, public affairs and campaigns manager.

Harry Lye takes up a new role with Labour as a political adviser to shadow defense secretary John Healey.

Jobs jobs jobs: Pro Bono Economics needs a policy and public affairs manager … The Centre for Social Justice is after a policy director … DevoInflect wants an account executive based in Manchester … WA Communications is hiring for an account executive in strategic communications … Network Rail is on the hunt for a public affairs manager … CIPD is hiring for a senior public affairs officer … The Trussell Trust‘s recruiting for a head of impact and evidence … and the Stroke Association needs a policy officer.

Thanks: To editor Matt Honeycombe-Foster for sending typos packing. And to the production team for preparing this to meet your out of offices.

**A message from bp: bp’s wider transformation is underway. Whilst today we’re mostly in oil & gas, we’ve increased global investment into our lower carbon & other transition businesses from around 3% in 2019 to around 30% last year. Increasing investment in the transition to lower carbon energy and keeping oil and gas flowing where it’s needed. And, not or - that’s our strategy. Find out more.**

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