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The Coalition Programme for Government was published on 20 May 2010. It gives commitments across the Equalities agenda and will form the basis of the work that the Government Equalities Office will now take forward.
The Government believes that there are many barriers to social mobility and equal opportunities in Britain to-day, and promises concerted action to help build a fairer society. Specific commitments include:
- ‘We will promote equal pay and take a range of measures to end discrimination in the workplace.
- We will extend the right to request flexible working to all employees, consulting with business on how best to do so.
- We will undertake a fair pay review in the public sector to implement our proposed “20 times” pay multiple.
- We will look to promote gender equality on the boards of listed companies.
- We will promote improved community relations and opportunities for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) communities, including by providing internships for under-represented minorities in every Whitehall department and funding a targeted national enterprise mentoring scheme for BAME people who want to start a business.
- We will stop the deportation of asylum seekers who have had to leave particular countries because their sexual orientation or gender identification puts them at proven risk of imprisonment, torture or execution.
- We will use our relationships with other countries to push for unequivocal support for gay rights and for UK civil partnerships to be recognised internationally.’
In addition Ministers have committed to implement the Equality Act 2010, and there are important commitments relevant to our work in other parts of the Programme.
The GEO has said that it looks forward to working together with all of its partners to ensure its important work continues.
EDF thanks to GEO for the above summary
Click here for full details of the Coalition document and what is means for all Government Departments
• A freeze on hiring in the civil service until April 2011. It will apply across all government departments, agencies and quangos. Critical frontline appointments will be allowed, but most will have to be approved by the secretary of state. The Treasury estimates that will save £163m a year.
• £10m savings on cutting down on first-class travel and £5m from restricting ministerial cars and drivers and getting members of the government to walk, use public transport or a pooled car. David Laws, the chief secretary to the Treasury, is the first ditch the personal car and driver he is entitled to.
• A new "efficiency and reform" group, to be co-chaired by Laws and the cabinet minister Francis Maude, to scrutinise departments and ensure they are implementing the cuts announced today. It will also oversee an immediate freeze on non-critical spending on consultancy, advertising and recruitment of non-frontline civil service staff.
• The Cabinet Office, one of the smallest spending departments, will have to save £79m.
• £600m from cutting public sector quangos.
Analysis by Polly Curtis: The freeze on civil service recruitment is in effect a massive job cut, with a reduction of thousands of posts. Every civil servant who retires, or flees the increasingly beleaguered public sector, will not be replaced. It stores up a problem: you can spread staff thinner for a short period of time but unless there is a managed staff restructuring a department could struggle to ask colleagues to fill in indefinitely. It could just lead to a spike in employment once the freeze is lifted. But it also avoids the compulsory job cuts that are very expensive in the civil service due to generous redundancy schemes. The new "efficiency and reform" group will be the coalition's enforcement strategy. Previous efficiency savings have been announced with great fanfare, but not carried through. A combination of Treasury and Cabinet Office muscle will help this happen. The Cabinet Office, the heart of government, is being boosted again. It seems to be enjoying something of a revival under the coalition. The cuts lead to with one, central question: what is a frontline service, to be protected, and what is back office, and therefore up for grabs? Is a teacher training body a support service or central to the quality of education in schools? Every organisation will be arguing its case with all its might in the months to come.
Education
• Schools, 16- to 19-year-olds and Sure Start funding protected.
• £670m savings in the Department for Education.
• £80m saved by abolishing schools technology agency Becta and other savings
in education quangos.
• £50m will be invested in further education colleges, particularly
building programmes.
• £150m extra funding for 50,000 new adult apprenticeship places at
small and medium-sized companies.
• There will be 10,000 fewer university places for this autumn than had been promised by Labour, this at a time of record demand. Applications are up 16.5% on last year.
Analysis by Jessica Shepherd: In the run-up to the election, the Conservatives did not promise to ring-fence the education budget, while the Lib Dems pledged to cut child trust funds and put extra money into schools. The decision to scrap the trust funds and ringfence the education budget may therefore be a happy compromise for both parties. The £50m capital investment fund for further education colleges will be welcomed: some are in dire need of extra cash. Labour's flagship college rebuilding project had to be abandoned after the level of demand from colleges for funds towards rebuilding far exceeded the scheme's budget. Both parties promised to scrap Train to Gain, Labour's key programme to persuade employers to improve workforce skills. The Tories said they would use the money to create 400,000 apprenticeships and college and training places, but today's announcement promised funding for only 50,000 new adult apprenticeships.
Welfare and disabilities
• Cuts totalling £535m in the Department for Work and Pensions.
• £320m savings by reducing then axing child trust funds.
• £320m by ending "ineffective" elements of employment programmes.
• Labour's key programme to persuade employers to improve workforce
skills, Train to Gain, is being cut.
• Extra £20m funding for respite care, to pay for 8,000 week-long
breaks for people caring for severely-disabled children.
Analysis by Randeep Ramesh: The curtain falls on two big ideas from New Labour: the child trust fund and the future jobs fund. The former was sold as a way of encouraging saving: where the chancellor hands over £250 at birth and age seven into an investment account. But the coalition sees this as way too expensive, a cut worth £320m. The jobs fund, the brainchild of former Labour high flier James Purnell, was targeted after studies showed the recession left almost one in two young black people without a job. Critics said the fund was unable to shield the most vulnerable from the downturn. The only bright spot is that 8,000 people caring for severely-disabled children will get a week's holiday – fulfilling in part a Lib Dem manifesto commitment.
Local government and social care
• £780m cuts in the Department for Communities and Local Government.
• £1.2bn reduction to local authority grants, though the main grant,
the £29bn formula grant, is untouched.
• £270m by scrapping "lower value" spending by regional development agencies.
• Retaining £150m cuts in housing identified by Labour, but providing an extra £170m to fund 4,000 social housing.
• Removing £1.7bn ringfencing of other council grants.
Analysis by Randeep Ramesh: Taking the biggest hit in the Government's savings plans is the Department for Communities and Local Government, which will have to find £780m in savings. Local government fares worse in numbers, with grants falling by £1.165bn. Whitehall will in return end ring-fencing for more than £1.7bn of local authority budgets. The thinking is that councils can make their own cuts. Regional Development Agencies will also lose £270m. But this is a reprieve – last year the Lib Dems pointed out that abolishing the agencies would save £2.3bn a year. The coalition has tried to blame Labour for £150m cuts in housing and burnished their progressive credentials with an extra £170m to fund social housing.
NHS
• The core NHS budget is protected.
• Savings expected to be dominated by cuts to quangos, with money
saved to be recycled in the NHS budget.
Economy and business
• "Great majority" of £6.243bn of spending cuts will be used to cut the 2010-11 deficit, which was previously estimated at £163bn.
• British industrial growth could be hit by the £836m of cuts at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills.
• Possible targets for cuts include an £80m loan to Sheffield Forgemasters, a £20m loan to Nissan to develop green cars, and £270m of support for General Motors/Vauxhall.
• £200m of the BIS savings will be "recycled", funding 50,000 adult apprenticeship starts and capital investment in some Further Education colleges.
• Cuts will be made to the "Train to Gain" skills scheme.
• On unemployment, the Young Person's Guarantee scheme stays, but the temporary jobs option is being dropped, saving £290m.
• Cuts in IT projects and consultancy will hurt outsourcing companies.
Analysis by Graeme Wearden: £6bn is less than 0.5% of Britain's GDP, so today's cuts will not eliminate fears in the financial markets over the UK's economic health. But with Spain, Portugal and Greece all making austerity measures this year, City analysts say it is important that Britain shows it too is serious about deficit reduction. The size of the cuts being made to BIS's budget will alarm British industry as it struggles back from the recession. Lord Mandelson, the former business secretary, had created a £950m "strategic investment" fund for UK manufacturing – with car-makers across the country benefiting. Economists have already warned the unemployment could rise this year, having just hit 2.51 million. Jim Knight, the former employment minister, estimated this morning that the £290m cut from the future jobs fund could cost 44,000 jobs. Some outsourcing firms have predicted they might benefit from the government's need to cut spending. But the City may need convincing – Capita's share price fell 2% this morning.
Home affairs
The Home Office budget is to be cut by £367m:
• £34m from increased immigration and visa fees, and criminal asset recovery receipts.
• £135m from police efficiency savings.
• £82m from arms-length bodies, including NPIA (£30m) and SOCA (£10m).
Analysis by Alan Travis: A third of the earmarked savings are from the police, who are already looking for £500m of efficiencies, including cuts to overtime. The police's three-year pay deal has been guaranteed and as this accounts for 80% of police spending it will mean a higher squeeze on areas other than the pay bill. The £30m cut in the £700m National Police Improvement Agency budget comes as ministers consider it a target in the Whitehall quango cull.
TaxPayers' Alliance welcomes £6.25bn cuts as a good start - and a TPA victory
The TaxPayers' Alliance (TPA), which has been campaigning for six years to identify and promote cuts in public spending, today welcomed the announcement from George Osborne and David Laws of £6.25 billion of savings.
Many of the spending cuts chosen by the Treasury are TPA policies that have been taken up either in part or in full, and our recent book How to cut public spending (and still win an election) features a list of proposed cuts that would save over £50 billion.
The cuts announced by the Coalition Government today that are drawn from TPA policy proposals include:
- Abolishing the Child Trust Fund: £320 million - proposed in the TPA's How to save £50 billion, September 2009
- Abolishing BECTA: £80 million - proposed in How to save £50 billion, September 2009
- Reducing size of RDAs: £270 million - the TPA proposed scrapping the agencies in The case for abolishing RDAs, August 2008
- Cutting the Business Department by £836 billion - the TPA proposed cutting this department by £930 million in An Affordable Voice for Business, February 2009
- Reduction in grants to local authorities: £1.165 billion - the TPA proposed freezing these grants to save £687 million in How to save £50 billion, September 2009
- Reducing grants to devolved administrations: £704 million - the TPA proposed a freeze in grants, followed by a matching of the cuts in England via the Barnett Formula, in How to save £50 billion, September 2009
- Civil service recruitment freeze: £120 million - we proposed and costed this policy in How to save £3.3 billion a year from the Civil Service, February 2008
- Cutting the consultancy bill - we called for consultancy spending to be cut by £1.1 billion in How to save £50 billion, September 2009
- Cutting the cost of quangos: £600m - the TPA published the most comprehensive survey of the size and extent of the quango sector in October 2009, revealing many bodies that are ripe for cuts. Our full series of quango reports and proposals for savings can be found here.
- Cutting the cost of Ministerial and Whitehall travel: £15m - the TPA identified £10.6 million wasted on first and business class flights in Departmental Use of Air Travel, February 2009. Our report Departmental Use of Taxis and Chauffeured Cars identified over £8m spent on taxis and Government cars in July 2009.
Matthew Elliott, Chief Executive of the TaxPayers' Alliance, said:
"This is a really good start, and a vindication of all the work we have done over the last six years to make the case for cutting spending. Taxpayers have suffered the pain of a recession and rising taxes, and they will welcome the news that a Government is finally making the public sector share the burden. This must only be the beginning - we need to see tens of billions of pounds of cuts in the Emergency Budget in June to start to make an impact on the country's vast deficit. It was refreshing to hear the Chancellor talking about scrapping waste and closing down quangos. At last it seems Westminster is starting to wake up and do the things we have long called for."
http://www.taxpayersalliance.com/home/2010/05/taxpayers-alliance-welcome...
As part of the Government’s drive to achieve the £6.2 billion of spending cuts announced by the Chancellor this morning, a powerful new joint Treasury-Cabinet Office group will be set up to ensure savings across Whitehall and Arms Length Bodies happen quickly.
The savings will be driven by the Efficiency and Reform Group, whose board will be chaired jointly by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, David Laws, and the Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General, Francis Maude. The Group, which will be formed by pulling together existing capabilities, will have the power to make sure departments work together to tackle waste and improve accountability across a range of areas, including ICT spend, procurement, advertising and marketing spend, and Civil Service expenses and recruitment.
The group’s first priorities, with immediate effect, will be to:
- Conduct centralised procurement for commodity goods and services to drive down prices;
- Implement an immediate freeze on all new ICT spend above £1 million;
- Review the Government’s biggest projects, including ICT projects, to see where costs can be reduced or wasteful projects stopped altogether;
- Start renegotiating contracts with major suppliers across Government to reduce costs;
- Freeze all new advertising and marketing spend. Only essential campaigns will be allowed;
- Freeze on all new consultancy spend unless it is an operational necessity. Where spend is proposed, Ministerial sign-off will be required for £20,000 or above;
- Cut spend on Civil Service expenses, including a clamp down on first class travel and on the number of Government cars;
- Freeze Civil Service recruitment, except in important front line and business critical areas, and significantly cut the number of temporary staff;
- Conduct an immediate review to create a more simplified approach to Civil Service pay structures and terms and conditions;
- Implement a programme to simplify HR functions across Whitehall and, wherever possible, eradicate duplication; and
- Stop the signing of any new property leases or lease extensions unless they are approved centrally.
Minister for the Cabinet Office Francis Maude said the group will ensure there is a stronger central push driving through the efficiency savings:
“We have got to get an immediate grip on Whitehall waste if we’re going to tackle this unprecedented £156 billion deficit quickly, while protecting the quality of important front line services and getting the economy growing. Good government can cost less. It won't do just to carry on as before. By joining forces and concentrating our efforts where the money actually gets spent, we can make sure the maximum amount gets taken out of government overheads, not front line services.”
The Group will be chaired by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury and the Minister for the Cabinet Office and will include other members with specialist commercial expertise.
http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/newsroom/news_releases/2010/100524-waste...
The State Opening of Parliament on Tuesday 25 May marks the formal start of the new 2010-11 parliamentary session. The primary purpose of this colourful state occasion is to set out the Government’s legislative agenda in the Queen’s Speech.
This State Opening also signals the official start of the new Parliament following the General Election. The Queen’s Speech will outline the new Government’s proposed policies for the forthcoming parliamentary session which, because of the election, will be longer than usual.
Watch the State Opening
You can watch the State Opening of Parliament from 11.20am.
Please note that roads around the Houses of Parliament are subject to closure before the ceremony.
If you wish to watch the journey of the carriage procession from Buckingham Palace to the Houses of Parliament, you may be able to do this from street level either on the Mall or from Parliament Square.
Members of the public cannot attend the State Opening itself. However, members of the public can gain access to Parliament in the afternoon - when normal business resumes.
State Opening ceremony
The ceremony brings together the constituent parts of Parliament: the monarch, the Lords and the Commons – a symbolic reminder of Parliament’s unity.
As a symbol of the Commons' independence, the door to their Chamber is slammed in the face of Black Rod – an official who acts as the messenger of the Queen whenever MPs are required in the House of Lords – and not opened until he has knocked on the door three times with his staff of office: the Black Rod.
The Yeoman Usher is deputising for Black Rod on this occasion.
The Queen’s Speech
Although the speech is delivered by the Queen in the House of Lords Chamber, the content of the speech is entirely drawn up by the Government and approved by the Cabinet. The final words of the speech are always "other measures will be laid before you." This allows the Government to introduce other laws as required. No business can take place in the House of Lords or the House of Commons before the speech is read.
Back to business
After the Queen’s Speech, both Houses start to debate the proposed programme of new laws and policies. The Commons debate begins at 2.30pm. The debate in the Lords begins at 3.30pm to allow time for the Chamber to be cleared.
The official record of the debate is reported in Lords Hansard.
The debates will take place over five days in both Houses, including the afternoon of the Speech, from 25 May to 2 June.
Find out what's on in both Houses on 25 May and beyond:
Further information
- Frequently Asked Questions: State Opening
- State Opening: timetable of events
- State Opening of Parliament
- List of Queen's Speeches
- Flickr: State Opening slideshow
- YouTube: Lord Speaker on State Opening
-
Briefing: State Opening of Parliament (
PDF 810 KB)
http://www.parliament.uk/business/news/2010/05/state-opening-25-may-2010/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_2010/8676333.stm