The last thing civil servants need is to babysit tech bros

There is a deep irony in a government that has kept making the same sort of mistakes now lecturing its civil servants who have to deal with the consequences) that they should adopt the test-and-learn culture” of the best digital companies and first-class” government projects.

- SEAN O'GRADY

Since Labour ministers arrived at their desks in July, less prepared than might be optimal, they have tested many policies with disastrous political consequences. But, like the Bourbon dynasty in France, they seem to have learned remarkably little about public persuasion. If they carry on at this rate, they’ll lose the next election as comprehensively as they won the last one.

In such circumstances, all governments have to take stock, assess performance and presentation, study public opinion – and find someone to blame.

The Tories alighted on the unions, the EU, migrants, “lefty lawyers”, and the amorphous (and mostly mythical) administrative “blob”, to explain away their failures. Now, it’s Labour’s turn to turn the civil service into a scapegoat for its own shortcomings.

Not only is this facile and deeply distasteful, it’s disrespectful and counterproductive. For its entire existence, but particularly ever since Boris Johnson arrived in No 10, civil servants have had to cope with confused, chaotic ministers who either don’t know what they want or simultaneously demand mutually incompatible outcomes – culminating in the Johnsonite doctrine of “cakeism”. The worst ones just expect their staff to tell them what to do.