Commons Sense

House of Commons · Ministers' Questions

Civil Service: Performance Management Plans

Thursday 23 April 2026 · 2 questions

Summarised by AI from the official record, so it can contain mistakes.

Read the full transcript on Parliament.uk

At a glance

Answered 0 Partly answered 2 Not answered 0

Key points

  • Ministerial Questions focused on Civil Service: Performance Management Plans
  • Peter Bedford inquired about the effectiveness of performance management plans in the civil service
  • Response indicated that departments set their own performance plans within centrally set frameworks

Topics (select to filter)

Questions & Answers

Q1 Peter Bedford Con Mid Leicestershire
Standards & Ethics
Context

The question arises from concerns over the effectiveness of current civil service performance management plans and their impact on constituent interactions with government agencies. The MP highlights record numbers of bureaucrats but points to low productivity, leading to errors and delays for constituents.

Question

What assessment has been made of the effectiveness of performance management plans in the civil service? Our constituents must interact with many Government agencies each week to renew their passport or driving licence or to submit their tax returns. Despite record numbers of bureaucrats, productivity remains low, which results in many errors and vast delays for our constituents.

Answer from Satvir Kaur

Departments are responsible for setting their own performance plans, subject to centrally set performance management frameworks. This Government are focused on a high-performing civil service, which is why we have recently announced changes to the senior civil service performance system that will see the performance of top civil servants linked to key performance indicators set by their Ministers, and underperformers held to tougher standards.

Partly answered

Not addressed: The Government's response did not address specific actions or commitments for poorly performing civil servants costing constituents millions of pounds each year. Instead, it focused on the general framework changes without concrete details about addressing poor performance issues directly.

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Q2 Peter Bedford Con Mid Leicestershire
Standards & Ethics
Context

The question is a follow-up to the initial query, focusing on constituent interactions with government agencies and highlighting issues of low productivity, errors, and delays. The MP also mentions that answers to written parliamentary questions confirm there is no proper performance management of civil servants.

Question

Our constituents must interact with many Government agencies each week to renew their passport or driving licence or to submit their tax returns. Despite record numbers of bureaucrats, productivity remains low, which results in many errors and vast delays for our constituents. The answers to my written parliamentary questions confirm that there is no proper performance management of our civil servants, corrective action or even dismissals for continued poor performance.

Answer from Satvir Kaur

I think it is ironic that Opposition Members complain about civil servants but did nothing when they were in power. Instead, this Government are updating the performance management framework, incentivising those who deliver and tackling underperformance as soon as it arises. To do this, we are changing the rules to ensure a closer, more effective link between pay and performance, with larger awards for the highest performers, and strengthening the minimum standards so that those who fail to manage the performance of their teams are quickly identified.

Partly answered

Not addressed: The Government's response did not provide specific details on addressing poorly performing civil servants costing constituents millions each year. Instead, it focused on framework updates without concrete actions or timelines for underperforming staff.

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