UK secondments and leadership schemes which aim to deepen links between central and local government in England can learn from Japan's long experience.
Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who took office in July, has made devolution one of the central pillars of his policy agenda.
On 30 July, approximately one week after taking office, he announced the “biggest transfer of power, funding and responsibility from Westminster in a generation”, under which mayors would receive a share of income tax revenues for the first time. The following day, on 31 July, the Cabinet issued a statement entitled “Rewiring the State”. Some of the measures it set out, including the No. 10 North initiative, have already begun to be implemented.
The rapid succession of announcements on devolution immediately after Prime Minister Burnham took over from his predecessor, Keir Starmer, appears to demonstrate the importance he attaches to this agenda. Since then, he has repeatedly stated that decisions affecting local areas should be made locally.
These policies have also been reported in Japan and are attracting growing interest among Japanese government officials.
One element of these reforms is the secondment of central government civil servants to local areas. The Burnham government has announced details of this scheme alongside the No. 10 North initiative. The proposal can, however, be seen as a continuation of the approach set out in the December 2024 English Devolution White Paper, published under the previous Starmer government. That paper proposed introducing a secondment scheme to support Strategic Authorities. In that sense, the proposal initially attracted attention mainly from the specialist press.
Under the initial pilot, every mayoral authority will receive between five and ten civil servants on secondments lasting six to nine months. By comparison, Japanese national government officials seconded to local authorities commonly remain there for several years. One possible reason for this difference is that the English secondment scheme forms part of a wider programme to reform the system of governance. The seconded civil servants may therefore be assigned clearly defined tasks for a limited period.
In Japan, national government officials are sometimes seconded to local authorities to advance specific projects, as in the current English scheme. Such secondments also give national civil servants a broader understanding of local circumstances. Conversely, local government officials are also seconded to central government ministries to gain experience.
Alongside the secondment scheme, the Burnham government has announced a new Civil Service Fast Stream pilot. It also intends to extend the Future Leaders Scheme—a development programme for senior civil servants—to officials working for mayoral and local authorities. These measures are expected to bring changes to career development for both central and local government officials.
There have also previously been instances in the UK of civil servants being posted to local areas to gain a better understanding of local circumstances. The UK and Japan have different histories of transferring powers from central to local government, and the relationship between their respective national and local governments cannot therefore be regarded as identical. Nevertheless, as a Japanese public official with a particularly strong interest in local government, I intend to follow closely how the exchange and development of personnel working in national and local public service evolves alongside this broader movement towards devolution.
Read more on staff rotation here: Building Capability Between Governments: What the UK Can Learn from Japan’s Secondment System
