Updated Whitehall business plans unveiled – live updates

Rolling coverage as the documents, which reveal what each government department plans to do and by when, are published 11.41am: At first glance this publication looks more significant than we thought. Ministers have beefed up the two central areas that the government has come into most criticism for: its growth strategy and social mobility. Growth has been a sore point with the accusation that George Osborne’s programme has focused on cutting, without having a proper plan for improving the strength of the economy. Social mobility is politically crucial to the Liberal Democrats, still reeling from the reputational damage of the coalition top-up fee policy. The written ministerial statement is here and there’s a very useful document here (pdf) which itemises every change that has been made from the previous versions of the business plans. 11.32am: No 10 has today published a written ministerial statement in the Commons including details of new business plans for every Whitehall department. The plans are a key part of David Cameron’s plan to make government more business-like and transparent. They set out what exactly each department is going to do and by when. They were first launched last November when they were described as a power shift from the centre to the people, who are now able to clearly see what each department plans to do and has failed to achieve. The plans are updated every month and they have allowed us to track what coalition promises have been dropped, such as plans to give new protections to whistleblowers in the public sector and to identify where progress is stalling . Last week the latest update revealed huge delays across Whitehall departments documented in this Telegraph story . My colleague Damian Carrington also blogged on the slippage in the coalition’s green plans here . Today the government – led by the policy chief Oliver Letwin and chief secretary to the treasury Danny Alexander – has updated those plans to mark the first year of the coalition. This effectively rewrites the coalition’s delivery goals. We’re looking through them for two things: changes that amount to significant policy shifts, anything that’s been dropped and anything that they’ve reset the clock on to give them extra time having failed to achieve it in the first year. We have our policy experts across the Guardian combing through the plans but want to hear from you if you spot interesting detail below the line or email me at polly.curtis@guardian.co.uk. You can read them all here Liberal-Conservative coalition David Cameron Liberal Democrats Conservatives Polly Curtis guardian.co.uk

Posted by on May 13, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.