JOHN PRESCOTT should take urgent action to crack down on bullying and discrimination in his department, a committee of MPs said yesterday.
According to a survey of staff, one in ten workers at the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister said that they had been bullied in the past year, and one in twelve had experienced discrimination.
The survey, carried out last summer by ORC International, also indicated that 6 per cent had reported harassment and 22 per cent had witnessed unfair treatment. Black and disabled people were more likely to have faced discrimination than other staff.
Details of the survey were published yesterday by the Commons Select Committee on the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister as part of its response to Mr Prescott’s annual report and accounts for last year.
“The department should take steps immediately to reinforce the message that bullying and intimidation is unacceptable,” the report states. “It should ensure that all staff are confident such reports will be taken seriously.”
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The staff survey showed that many people were unhappy about the lack of leadership, visibility and openness of senior officials at board level “Only 20 per cent believed the board had been open and honest in communication with staff,” the MPs say. “This figure is 20 per cent less than the benchmark for comparable central government surveys.”
The committee also accuses Mr Prescott’s department of spin, claiming that its annual report showed “an unjustifiable presentation of its achievements”. The most obvious example was reporting efficiency gains totalling £150,000 per year as “noticeable” progress towards a target of £620 million by 2007-08.
In addition the MPs accuse the Deputy Prime Minister’s office of double-counting over its resource management. “Through our efforts to secure further information about the real nature and extent of the department’s efficiency plans, we were able to establish that there is an overlap between two reported efficiency targets.”
Mr Prescott is criticised for failing to appear before the committee; he claimed that he was busy with Britain’s presidency of the EU.
The committee also voices its doubts about the department’s ability to deal effectively with other departments on which it often depends to deliver its agenda. “Stronger leadership and greater clarity about the importance of this objective will help the department win its case,” Phyllis Starkey, the committee’s chairwoman, says.
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The Tories seized on the MPs’ finding: “These reports of financial irregularities, double-counting and a culture of bullying are extremely serious,” Caroline Spelman, the Shadow Local Government Minister, said. “This raises yet more questions about John Prescott’s beleaguered Whitehall empire.”
Peter Housden, the department’s permanent secretary, said that it had achieved a huge amount since it was created in 2002. “But we are not complacent,” said Mr Housden, who has been appointed only recently. “We have taken very seriously the views expressed in our stakeholder and staff surveys and put in place robust measures to address these concerns.
“As the person responsible for the management of the office I am determined that we should be open and transparent in our dealings with staff and stakeholders. I have put in place a wideranging programme to improve communications and the visibility of senior managers at all levels of the organisation.”