Volume 15: Government and Public Administration
Annex 1: The organisation of MAFF and DH, 1986-96
Organisational changes, 1986-96

30 There were two major structural changes during this period. The first was the division in July 1988 of the Department of Health and Social Security (DHSS) into two parts: DH and the Department of Social Security. This was prompted by a recognition that the two main businesses of the DHSS - public health/health care and social security benefits - were sufficiently divergent to justify two separate Departments.

31 The second major change was the replacement of the parallel medical and administrative hierarchies described above by single integrated (ie, multidisciplinary) divisions in April 1995, following a review of the functions and manpower of the NHS Executive and DH. The review identified weaknesses in DH, among them that:

Responsibilities between the administrative and medical parts are often unclear, the duplicate management structures are wasteful, and unnecessary tension is caused by artificial links between pay and grading. ¹

It concluded that paired Divisions had not adequately overcome the problems arising from parallel hierarchies, and that greater integration was needed. ²

32 Other organisational changes relevant to the BSE story were:

1. the restructuring in 1992 of the Health Divisions of the Health and Social Services Group so that medical and administrative Divisions responsible for particular areas of work reported jointly to medical and administrative Grade 3s and Grade 2s;
2. the transfer of medicines regulation in April 1989 from the main part of DH to an Agency, which 'finally became an Executive Agency on 11 July 1991'; and ³
3. the transfer of medical devices regulation from the main part of DH to an Agency from September 1994.