Tuesday 28 October 2014

A culture of fear in the civil service?

The prime minister's assertion that the call for a €2.1bn "adjustment" came out of the blue began to look a little ragged during the Q&A on his European Council statement yesterday. However, it does seem that information had not been passed up the civil service chain as quickly as it should have been, judging by this report. The question that comes to mind is: were the civil servants attending the meeting with their EU colleagues in mid-October afraid of reporting the bad news? Moreover, what were "junior" civil servants doing at what was clearly an important meeting? (How junior is junior? Are we talking clerical staff here?)


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