Concerns raised over Defra budget cuts

 

Parliament’s Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (EFRA) Committee has voiced ‘concerns’ over the impact that impending budget cuts to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) will have on its ability to deliver its work.

In its ‘Ninth Report of Session 2013–14: Departmental Annual Report 2012-13’, the committee found that despite Defra being one of the smallest government departments, it has ‘faced among the most substantial budget cuts, which are set to continue up to 2016’.

Indeed, Defra’s budget has been cut by £500 million since the 2010 Spending Review, and will face another reduction of £300 million in the years up to 2015–16.

In the face of the recent flooding, the horsemeat scandal, and ash dieback disease, the committee has warned that Defra’s ability to ‘respond to emergencies such as these must be protected’.

‘Clarity’ needed on affected areas

Although Defra has outlined that it will focus on its four ‘priorities’ in the coming years (to ‘grow the rural economy; to improve the environment; to safeguard animal health; and to safeguard plant health’), the EFRA Committee has urged department officials to provide ‘clarity’ on which specific policies and programmes will face ‘significant’ budget reductions in the next two financial years.

These concerns follow on from those voiced by members of the waste and resources management sector, who last year wrote to Defra's then Resource Minister Lord de Mauley to urge him to ensure that funding for waste crime prevention (under the remit of the Environment Agency (EA), funded by Defra) did not become a ‘casualty’ of the cuts.

However, waste is one area that Defra has already said will be affected by the department’s reduced budget, with current Resource Minister Dan Rogerson announcing in his first official address to the sector that it will be ‘stepping back’ on waste.

Further to this, the EA has also announced that it will be reducing its work force by up to 12 per cent from March this year in face of its reduced budget.

Launching its report, the Chairman of the Environment Food and Rural Affairs Committee, Anne McIntosh, said: “Defra is a small ministry facing massive budget cuts and which relies on a large number of arms length bodies to deliver many significant areas of policy. Ministers must clarify how further budgets cuts of over £300 million over the coming two years will impact on the funding provided to these agencies and the ability of the department to respond to emergencies.”

She added: “Recent flooding events over the Christmas and New Year period reinforce the committee's concerns about cuts to the Defra budget and how these will be realised. The Environment Agency is set to lose 1,700 jobs in the next 12 months.” (The Executive Director of environmental campaign group Friends of the Earth, Andy Atkins, also voiced concerns over the government’s commitment to protect the environment, saying earlier today: "The Environment Secretary says the government is spending more on flood defences, when in fact he's presided over a real-terms cut and hundreds of Environment Agency jobs are under threat - his refusal to accept the science of climate change may be blinding him to the human costs of the consequences of this.”)

EFRA's report also voiced ‘disappointment’ that the charge for single-use plastic bags ‘will not come into effect in England until 2015, despite evidence of its success in reducing plastic carrier bag usage in other parts of the UK’, and recommended it to be implemented sooner.

Low staff morale

Aside from budgetary concerns, the report highlights that the department has below-average staff morale, with employees highlighting a lack of confidence in the management and leadership of the department.

Defra’s staff ‘engagement index’ – which asks government employees whether they feel ‘pride’, ‘inspiration’, ‘motivation’ and ‘attachment’ to their work – came in at 51 per cent, the fifth lowest rating for all government departments (ahead of just the Department for Work and Pensions (48 per cent), the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (45 per cent), the Department for Communities and Local Government (43 per cent), and Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs (41 per cent)). The departmental average for the UK government was 59 per cent, with the Department for International Development coming up top (71 per cent).

Indeed, the survey found that just 19 per cent of Defra employees thought that change was ‘managed well’ in the department, while three-quarters felt that Defra did not motivate them to ‘help the department achieve its objectives’. Around 10 per cent of Defra staff (approximately 200 people) added that they had experienced bullying or discrimination at work.

Defra’s Permanent Secretary, Bronwyn Hill,attributed to the low levels of morale to ‘a fair amount of restructuring which had created a period of uncertainty’, and suggested that there was sometimes a ‘perception gap’ between managers and their staff on what constituted harassment or bullying and what was intended to encourage better performance.

She added that the department was introducing initiatives focused on learning and development to help boost morale, including a series of question times with the senior management team.

She said: “Clearly I am not happy about those staff survey results… What we have done as a leadership team is to focus on the things we can change, act on those and prioritise key actions over the year. I cannot take away all the uncertainty, because in any organisation that faces lower budgets year on year, there is bound to be some uncertainly among the staff who are affected by them.”

The report suggested that Defra also review its award of bonuses, perhaps by ‘increasing performance-related bonuses for those at the lower end of salary scales, with a consequent reduction for its higher-paid senior staff’ to help improve staff morale.

McIntosh concluded: “There needs to be a greater sense of urgency about addressing these issues, especially as the department is about to enter a period of further budget cuts. Senior officials in the department must take steps to manage the changes arising from the savings so that staff morale and engagement improves.”

Read EFRA’s ‘Ninth Report of Session 2013–14: Departmental Annual Report 2012-13’.