SENIOR Scottish mandarins are said to be "livid" at the decision by Whitehall to appoint a new head of the Scottish civil service from London without an open competiti

Sir Bob Kerslake is to be the new head of the Civil Service in a shake-up of senior mandarins in Whitehall.

David Cameron could inherit a dysfunctional Whitehall machine unable to deliver his programme if he wins the general election, a damning report into the state of the civil service under Gordon Brown concludes

Civil service recruitment is too slow and £35m a year could be saved, the Whitehall spending watchdog says.

"This year has seen a significant increase in the number of women appointed to jobs at the very top of the Civil Service, but overall there was a further decline in the percentage of all senior appointments that went to women." Janet Paraskeva, the First Civil Service Commissioner said yesterday.

A mass cull of senior mandarins will see redundancies across Whitehall as part of plans to reduce staffing costs by £100 million a year.

DAVID Cameron has ordered the head of the civil service to review contacts between the media and Whitehall departments in the wake of the phone- hacking scandal.

The government faces a legal challenge over the civil service redundancy scheme after proposed changes were rejected by members of the main Whitehall union.

Damian McBride is a civil servant - and as such is bound by the Civil Service Code. Here are some juicy bits: "As a civil servant, you...are expected to carry out your role with dedication and a commitment to the Civil Service and its core values: integrity, honesty, objectivity and impartiality. In this code: "integrity" is putting the obligations of public service above your own personal interes...

Former trade minister Lord Jones brought fresh embarrassment on the government today when he claimed that half the civil service should be sacked. Jones told MPs that Whitehall could be run with "half as many" civil servants and that he had been amazed during his time in government by how many staff "deserved the sack". The ex-Confederation of British Industry chief also described being a junior m...