Not What It Said on the Tin? Reflections on Three Decades of UK Public Management Reform

Despite decades of research, we still need more long‐term evidence of the effects of New Public Management (NPM) and accompanying changes in government over a generation. Looking at UK experience, a key case in NPM and digital‐age developments, this paper evaluates administrative data to show what happened to indicators of fairness and consistency and of prudent management through limitation of running costs in public administration over three decades. The analysis shows that running costs rose substantially in real terms (contrary to the cost‐cutting stereotype of NPM), while indicators of first‐stage formal challenges to government suggest increased dissatisfaction with fairness and consistency in administration.