All change at MOD Main Building?
Among the various news reports
circulating over the Christmas lull, one in particular was of interest. Taken from the Financial Times, and
circulated on the ARRSE website (link is HERE),
it revealed that there was allegedly opposition by civil servants from both the
MOD and the Department of Transport to move the DFT into the MOD Main Building
in Whitehall. The article highlights several points which are not hugely glamorous,
but which do show some of the challenges of trying to run a central government
department in London.
It is perhaps one of the most
enduring images of the MOD that the department has dozens of buildings in
London, all staffed with hugely anonymous officials hustling from one Kafkaesque
activity to another. The public image is of individuals sitting somewhere
between Winston Smith and the long suffering Bernard, while at the top of the
tree, crusty old officials like ‘General Melchett’ from Blackadder sit in
wooden panelled offices, ignorant of the lives of our brave boys who are
fighting and dying in Afghanistan.
The reality though is that the
MOD presence in London has been shrinking for decades. Less than 20 years ago
the MOD had nearly 20 office buildings scattered across central London, not
including British Army linked to London District or other Military sites like
the St Vincent COMCEN. Today that figure has been reduced to just two, both on
Whitehall – the MOD Main Building (built in the 1930s), and the Old War Office
Building (OWOB) next door. Reports in the media suggest that OWOB is due to
shut within the next couple of years, and be sold off to a private developer. It
is reasonable to assume that MOD Main Building will in short order be the only
MOD building in London.
The issue Main Building has is
what on earth does it exist for? It sometimes feels to the author that people
see Main Building as a combination of the Ministry of Magic, somehow home to
great mystery or secrets, and the home of high farce. Relatively few of the
Military or MOD Civil Service will ever work there, and much of the buildings
functions operate in a fairly rarefied environment, focusing on strategic or
political matters rather than day to day issues. It is often hard to put a
finger on why the building matters so much, and speak to some in the bar, and
they will often make a case that it could be rusticated en masse to some other location.
This is not helped by the
undeserved reputation acquired by the building in the 1990s and early 2000s
when it underwent a very complex (and expensive) refurbishment designed to make
it safe and habitable for the next 40 years. Crucially, the ownership of the
building also passed on, with the MOD using it under a PFI arrangement, where a
complicated mesh of contractors and subcontractors took on responsibility for
running the building on behalf of the MOD. Utterly false reports regularly
appeared in the media about the supposedly luxurious surroundings, including
chairs, art work and TV screens, all of which indicated a civil service
divorced from reality. This has continued to shape public attitudes to the MOD,
with many people whom the author has met citing their dislike of the MOD civil
service as stemming from this refit.
In theory, there is space for
3-4000 personnel in the building, a figure regularly cited as being all
Whitehall Warriors, although in reality this includes everyone from the
security guards and cleaners, through to Ministers. Although exact numbers do
vary, its fair to say that there is roughly a 50% split between civilian and
military staff overall.
There is a clear need for
these staffs to be in London – Ministers have a requirement to conduct their
Parliamentary duties, while the interface at the strategic levels means officials
need to have easy access to other Whitehall areas. Despite the many
technological advances, such as VTC and the like, there is still no substitute
for being able to have people able to get into departments and start working
together. This, coupled with the need for the various staff areas to be able to
interact regularly, both which each other and Ministers means there is a
definite need for a central HQ building, which brings together these joint
staffs.
Every nation in the world
needs a strategic HQ of some form or another for its military, and the MOD is
no different. Indeed the author would go so far as to say that Main Building is
perhaps a very good example of a fairly lean organisation running with far
fewer personnel than its peers (for example, in the late 20th
Century, there was reportedly 10% of the Canadian Forces based in Ottawa working
in DND HQ).
There have been two main
drivers for this removal of staff from London – firstly, command structure
changes which have seen much greater devolution of authority down to the various
Front Line Commands, and which now sees the Service Chiefs working far more
regularly from their FLC HQs. The second one has been the drive to reduce costs
and send civil servants (and military personnel) out of London and into the
regions. It is extremely expensive to house personnel in London, particularly
Military staff. A few years ago, the authors office team worked out that the
single most expensive person on the team was in fact the Corporal employed in
an administration role. By the time his military salary, allowances,
accommodation, travelcard and all the other costs associated with a London
posting had been paid, his total cost was rapidly approaching £60,000 per year.
By contrast, the civil servant who could do the same job would cost under
£20,000. Rustication massively reduces employment costs, and provides jobs in
more deprived areas – it also helps reduce costs in the planning round, although
cynics may suggest that a 10-20% headcount reduction rarely leads to a similar
reduction in work!
The net result, as the MOD
moves away from several years of planning rounds, reviews and general drive to
reduce headcounts is that MOD Main Building probably has more space in it than
is needed for the likely future number of occupants. The challenge is what to
do about this. On the one hand it makes little sense to keep large amounts of
office space sitting empty waiting for someone to occupy it. But, moving new
departments in brings fresh challenges in terms of access control, support to IT
networks, and also the sheer cost of moving. As noted above, with the building
now run under a PFI contract, any such move would probably cost a significant
amount of public money to fund, as the interior of the building was adapted,
and then reorganised as appropriate. This money would come out of someone’s
budget, and would probably have potential present a PR disaster for the MOD. The
inevitable FOI about costings would be a field day for the media, who would
slam the MOD for spending large amounts of public money on moving offices and
not buying body armour or bullets for ‘our brave boys’.
At the same time though, the
wider government need is to reduce expenditure where possible and reduce the
amount of occupancy of central London office space. So, here is one of those
terribly difficult decisions- does one act in line with direction from the
Government to reduce office space, save money and take an absolute PR beating
(not to mention a lot of expenditure), or does one not make different use of
the building, saving local budgets, but taking a PR beasting for wasteful use
of space!
There is no right answer to
this, and as the author is not involved in anyway on this, it would be wrong to
speculate on the outcome. But hopefully readers can perhaps understand a little
bit about the challenges of planning in Government – the MOD was refurbished to
meet requirements to deliver a certain level of capability, based on the
Government planning at the time. Now, through a change of circumstances, it
finds itself with space to spare and yet is probably going to be lambasted in
the press for whichever solution is chosen.
With the 'Rustification' process how has the security implications been dealt with?
ReplyDeleteI work for the Met Police and there is a high degree of mistrust around remote working even on secure laptops.
The official reason is concerns around 'shoulder surfing' of secure systems over the shoulder of the user. Unsaid but more likely and damaging IMHO is the increasing ease of leaking of data by staff.
Its arguable who leaks more the MPS or MOD but in some ways we are analogous as Scotland Yard (NSY) is up for sale and downsizing central London office space will be taking place over the next 3 years.
Have the MOD just excepted the risk or mitigated againest it in some way?
Ah to comment on my own post above; re-reading the article I realise rustication refers to working from other secure establishments out in the sticks rather than 'working from home'.
DeleteThats correct - while working from home is always possible for unclassified work, but thats not always possible.
DeleteRustification refers to the moving of Govt departments out of London and into the rest of the UK.
Is "rustication" your term or the official one - as when I was at university one could return from rustication - and I am sure Bernard would have pointed this out to the minister.
ReplyDeleteA cynic might note £60k for a Corporal who will be squeezed for every ounce of worth, or £20k for a civil servant who will give £20k worth and in general will lack the flexibility. It is probably quite valid that recruiting a CS on £20k is quite difficult and you may have to offer the post to someone from outside London who may then claim additional allowances, so the cost could rise admittedly by a small margin, In comparing CS and Military salaries you don't always compare like with like.
ReplyDeleteThey wouldn't be able to claim for travel if it wasn't in their Ts&Cs when they were employed, which is what I think the author was suggesting. Furthmore, if rustication moved this role to a region of the UK and regional public sector wages are brought in then costs could fall further still. Personally, I'd move the MoD to southern hampshire, spread between Portsmouth (home of the RN) and Aldershot (home of the Army). I'd disband the RAF and merge it back into those 2 so all command would be in that area. 1hr on train from c.London.
Delete9th Jan entry
ReplyDeleteAgainest! Plod? (suggestion, Groundhog day?)
Its just as well this chap/lass is on the beat, and is't in MOD procurement.