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Reforming Britain’s Public Services – The Art of Delivery: Sir Michael Barber and the Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit 2001 to 2005

1 Oct 15 – 1 Apr 20
Hewlett Packard
This PhD thesis examines how the Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit, a seemingly common-sense mechanism created by Sir Michael Barber in 2001 and led by him through to 2005, proved to be quietly transformative. The Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit was set up to monitor and accelerate the delivery of Prime Minister Tony Blair’s public service reform priorities. This research was conducted using Michael Barber’s private, unpublished, handwritten diaries from his time in government as well as interviews with key Cabinet ministers, civil servants and special advisers.

Lecturer Dr Michelle Clement’s PhD thesis unearths the human story behind the first ever Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit. It was set up to monitor and accelerate the delivery of Tony Blair’s public service reform priorities in health, education, transport, crime and asylum.

The PMDU was designed and led by Barber who developed a method which then Treasury official Nicholas Macpherson labelled ‘Deliverology’, and was both a science and an art.

While the Unit’s success was far from inevitable, it became seen as integral to the Government’s marked performance improvement in the vast majority of target areas.

This research thesis is the first academic work to benefit from Barber’s unpublished, handwritten diaries which provide a new dimension to our understanding of the reform of major public services.