Government Social Research
Treasury Permanent Secretary Nick Macpherson praised the ‘swift and striking impact’ GSRU was having in the Treasury, at the GSRU ‘house warming’ event on Monday 3 July. With an audience of GSR members from across government, the event was held to introduce them to GSRU’s new home following its move from Cabinet Office, and to update them on recent developments
Highlighting the work being done reviewing evidence for the Treasury’s Children and Young People and the Mental Health and Employment teams, Nick Macpherson also noted the importance to policy makers of having a wide perspective of evidence to draw on. He urged GSR members to take advantage of opportunities to work together, citing the example of Economics in Government in Treasury: “The Spending Review process is evidence-driven so the presence of GSRU in Treasury is not only natural but will provide opportunities for social researchers and economists to offer a more joined-up and therefore effective service.”
GSRU’s Teresa Williams announced the planned publication of the new GSR Professional Development Workbook in September. Commenting on the underpinning values behind the publication she said, “We aim to provide clarity and standardisation of expectations of staff at each grade, support consistency and best practice in recruiting, and provide access to the tools you need to plan your development.”
Chief Government Social Researcher Sue Duncan concluded the more formal part of proceedings with news of the GSRU Review. She specifically focused on its work to foster greater collaboration with other analysts in government: “We need to complement existing work to create an analytical community which feels joined-up to people who work in it and, as importantly, appears joined-up to the people who use it”, she said.
In the short term the proposal is to create communications material which explains ‘who does what’ across the social science professions and to bring together PSG Champions and Heads of Profession (HoPs) across all the analytical professions.
Finally Sue Duncan announced that, in the longer term, GSRU aims to do
more to promote shared learning and development across the analytical community,
for example through exploring joint induction arrangements and development
opportunities.