Six new policy officers needed but will work across States
A QUARTER of a million pounds has been set aside for new States policy officers, after committees said their priority work streams could not be completed without additional resources.
As part of the Budget for 2019, Policy & Resources has recommended making the extra funding available.
However, at a time when the chief executive Paul Whitfield is aiming to eliminate some committee-specific roles to break down silos in the civil service, these posts will see the officers cover multiple areas.
‘Funding of £252,000 (ongoing £351,000) is recommended in order to enhance policy work across the States. It is evident that this resource needs to be made available to fill gaps that are arising in delivering the priority work streams in the Policy & Resource Plan,’ the Budget states.
‘Principal committees have now indicated that delivery of the priority work streams cannot be resourced by using only their existing complement of policy staff and, through the budget process, submitted requests for a total of eight additional policy officers.
‘However, it is considered that a flexible pool of additional policy officers will be a more effective and efficient solution and this allocation will enable the appointment of six additional policy officers for the States.’
The policy officers will be deployed across the organisation on short- to medium-term placements.
‘[They will be] spending time in different service areas in accordance with the priorities established by the States within the Policy & Resource Plan, and managed under the Policy & Resources Committee’s mandate to coordinate policy development.
‘As identified in its June 2018 policy letter, the committee’s view is that the way of working envisaged with the change to the structure of government in 2016, with more cross-committee work being undertaken through the sharing of resources, has not been embedded.
‘This approach will help to achieve that, and will also enable the committee to consider whether the Policy & Resource Plan requires further refinement and prioritisation, including a reduction in the number of prioritised work streams.
‘The committee will make recommendations to the Assembly on these matters in its June 2019 update.’
