Cabinet Office Homepage

Steven Aldridge, Strategy Unit Director

Britain is one of the world's most prosperous nations, but keeping up with the pace of change globally and domestically is a continuous challenge. This demands decisive action on a number of fronts, including the promotion and development of skills to tap into the varied talents of the UK population.

These are the conclusions of Realising Britain's Potential: Future Strategic Challenges for Britain – a comprehensive report detailing the long-term strategic challenges facing the UK, published by the Strategy Unit in the Cabinet Office in February 2008.

Commissioned by the Prime Minister in late 2007, the report represents the most in-depth analysis of future challenges and opportunities yet produced by government, covering everything from globalisation to an ageing population and climate change.

“While the report is not a statement of government policy, it is helping to define strategic policy work across government and will help to frame the next Spending Review,”

says Strategy Unit Director Stephen Aldridge.

“Because the Strategy Unit operates from the centre of government, we're strongly placed to influence strategy and policy on a wide range of issues which cut across government departments. We do a lot of ‘heavy lifting’ for government in terms of analysis; our approach is to think across, as well as within departmental boundaries, while grounding our research firmly in evidence.”

Helping government departments build effective strategies and policies is a key role for the Strategy Unit. It works in partnership with other departments on a range of projects covering education, children and families, health and social care, home affairs, life chances, welfare reform and skills, public service improvement, food policy and local communities.

The landmark Children's Plan: building brighter futures [External PDF}, published in December 2007, is a good example of partnership working across government, with the plan setting out world class ambitions for all Britain's children. Although the plan is owned by the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCFS) [External website], policy colleagues from DCSF worked closely with Cabinet Office to develop it, with the Strategy Unit adding value by helping to analyse issues and define policies for short and long term improvements.

Anne Bonson-Johnson, Assistant Information Manager, Strategy Unit

The Strategy Unit is also making government work better by using innovative approaches to encourage thinking ‘outside the box’ on fundamental issues affecting all UK citizens. One such issue is food – the subject of a high profile analytical discussion paper published in January 2008.

“Food: an analysis of the issues was broad-ranging and highly innovative,”

says Stephen Aldridge.

“It brought together some excellent analysis on food in a range of contexts, from diet and health to climate change and food safety. Like most of our work, it involved collaboration with other government departments, notably Health [External website] and Environment, Food and Rural Affairs [External website] as well as the Food Standards Agency [External website]. Because food issues had not been approached in that way before, it was well received across government and is influencing cross-government thinking in a number of areas.’

As well as working on time-limited projects, the Strategy Unit has a number of standing teams covering core policy areas such as education, home affairs, health and public service improvement.

David Knott is a policy analyst in the health standing team.

“I work closely with the Department of Health, most recently on Lord Darzi's 60th anniversary review of the NHS,”

he says.

“There's a strong focus on how we can encourage more preventative action in health, building partnerships between government, the NHS, society and individuals.”

David also did some analytical work for a Prime Minister's speech in January, which set out the early intervention health agenda.

“A key part of our remit is to give strategy and policy advice to the Prime Minister and No.10 [External website] and we work closely with special advisers in the No.10 Policy Unit.

“I also recently authored Achieving Culture Change: A policy framework, a cross-cutting discussion paper. This looked at the impact of our choices on such issues as obesity, climate change and higher education retention rates – as well as the lessons learned from customer insight and behavioural science in addressing these issues. It was fascinating work, with a focus on how the Government can play an enabling role in helping people reach the better outcomes both they and we want to see.

“There are about 45 core staff in the Strategy Unit but there's a lot of flexibility, as people are brought in for specific projects as well as loaned or seconded out to other departments and to the private, third and wider public sectors. The teams work well together and we'll often bring our collective analytical skills to bear on strategic issues.

“As well as liaising across government, we work across the Cabinet Office on strategic issues affecting other units – social exclusion and sustainability, for example. We also have an active seminar series where we invite high profile public figures into the Cabinet Office to discuss the key issues of the day – we encourage all units to attend.”

Adam Sharples, Director General of Work Welfare and Equality at the Department for Work and Pensions, says that the Strategy Unit has added value to strategic work in his department.

“In my experience the Strategy Unit can complement and strengthen policy thinking in departments. I am always hugely impressed by the unit's ability to draw on a wide range of research, bring fresh insights and distil complex issues into excellent presentations.”

For further information about the work of the Strategy Unit go to:
www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/strategy/