Ministers shelve diversity civil service recruitment pledge

  • Tory manifesto 2015 pledged to recruit people from more diverse backgrounds
  • Ministers wanted to give equal opportunity for public sector job candidates 
  • But consultation concluded in April 2016 and government hasn’t mentioned it 

A pledge to open up the public sector to candidates from more diverse backgrounds has been secretly shelved, it has been claimed.

The attempt to drop restricted recruitment practices was dropped after head of civil service Sir Jeremy Heywood intervened, according to The Times.  

The Tories promised to rethink public sector appointments in their 2015 manifesto.

A pledge to open up the public sector to candidates from more diverse backgrounds has been secretly shelved (file photo)

But a consultation into the strategy closed on April 15, 2016, and the government is yet to make any announcement.  

It is just one of 1,661 consultations set up by the Tories since taking office in 2015. 

Almost a third of the consultations have had no response and 202 of the 909 that started before the end of 2016 remain incomplete, The Times disclosed yesterday.

The government is supposed to respond to consultations within three months of them concluding.

Ministers wanted to act against ‘jobs for the boys’ in the public sector and give equal employment opportunity after it was revealed that train driving positions were not advertised publicly.

But the proposals were said to have caused a huge problem at the highest levels of the civil service and Sir Jeremy had them shelved.

Advertisement



Read more at DailyMail.co.uk