Sir Geoffrey Charles Wardale, KCB (29 November 1919 – 18 December 2017) was a British civil servant. Born on 29 November 1919, he was educated at

Queens' College, Cambridge Queens' College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Queens' is one of the oldest colleges of the university, founded in 1448 by Margaret of Anjou. The college spans the River Cam, colloquially referred to as the "light s ...

, and the served in the Army from 1940 to 1941. He then entered HM Civil Service as a temporary official in the Ministry of War Transport, being appointed to a permanent role by 1946. He subsequently served in the

Ministry of Transport A ministry of transport or transportation is a ministry responsible for transportation within a country. It usually is administered by the ''minister for transport''. The term is also sometimes applied to the departments or other government age ...

and the

Department of the Environment An environmental ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for the environment and/or natural resources. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of the Environment, ...

, where he was promoted to Deputy Secretary in 1972 and then Second

Permanent Secretary A permanent secretary (also known as a principal secretary) is the most senior Civil Service (United Kingdom), civil servant of a department or Ministry (government department), ministry charged with running the department or ministry's day-to-day ...

in 1978, serving until 1980."Wardale, Sir Geoffrey (Charles)"
'' Who Was Who'' (online ed.,

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

, 2021). Retrieved 28 January 2022. Wardale had been appointed a Companion of the

Order of the Bath The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I of Great Britain, George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate medieval ceremony for appointing a knight, which involved Bathing#Medieval ...

in the

1974 New Year Honours The New Year Honours 1974 were appointments in many of the Commonwealth realms of Queen Elizabeth II to various orders and honours to reward and highlight good works by citizens of those countries. They were announced on 1 January 1974 to celebra ...

and had been promoted to Knight Companion in the

1979 Birthday Honours The Queen's Birthday Honours 1979 were appointments in many of the Commonwealth realms of Queen Elizabeth II to various orders and honours to reward and highlight good works by citizens of those countries. The appointments were made to celebrate ...

. After retiring, Wardale was called upon to carry out two inquiries. In 1981, he published the Wardale Report on the civil service's open structure. In 1983, he issued another report, this time on fraud in the

Property Services Agency The Property Services Agency (PSA) was an agency of the United Kingdom government, in existence from 1972 to 1993. Its role was to “provide, manage, maintain, and furnish the property used by the government, including defence establishments, offi ...

(PSA). This was critical of the PSA, concluding that the organisational culture was complacent around fraud. This occurred after the businessman Montague Alfred's appointment in 1982 by the minister Michael Heseltine as chief executive and second permanent secretary of the PSA (without open competition); when Alfred was asked about the report's allegations by members of parliament, he pointed out that only 0.005% of the PSA's budget was likely lost to fraud and that it would be impossible to completely stamp it out. Soon after, Alfred resigned over these statements as they were perceived to have clashed with the government's own statements in response to Wardale's findings.Richard A. Chapman, ''The Civil Service Commission, 1855–1991: A Bureau Biography'' (London: Routledge, 2004), p. 73. Wardale died on 18 December 2017.

References

1919 births 2017 deaths British civil servants Alumni of Queens' College, Cambridge Knights Companion of the Order of the Bath {{UK-gov-bio-stub