Coordination in UK Central Government

Abstract

Coordination is a long-term policy issue in the UK government (Pollitt, 2003; Bogdanor, 2005). The concept implies a need to bring policies, organizations and related practices into alignment to achieve goals. In the context of public policy in the UK territorial nation state, the central government and its strategic centre, known as the core executive which consists of the offices of the Prime Minister and Treasury and sets the strategic direction of elected governments (Dunleavy and Rhodes, 1995), undertake coordination in developing and implementing its policy goals. Although many other coordination activities exist it is coordination by the core executive that forms the central focus of this chapter. The recent period between 1997 and 2010 is particularly worthy of analysis because, whilst all UK governments have used a range of coordination tools, the Labour government under Prime Ministers (PMs) Blair and Brown was the most explicit about its ‘holistic’ approach to coordination. The government proposed a ‘Joined-up Government’ program to improve coordination across the public sector. This chapter focuses on these initiatives and lessons from them, particularly using four coordination issues as examples: central government priority setting and resource control, overcoming boundaries to implement policy within departmental structures, territorial governance and local governance. The examples are drawn from the policy domains of employment and healthcare which are long running areas of major expenditure by the UK government, and were also priority areas for new policy initiatives by the central government in this period.