黑洞社区

Andrew Lean, the ODPM鈥檚 finance director, has been made the civil service鈥檚 Olympic tsar, 黑洞社区 can reveal.

The news was revealed in an internal memo that also discloses a wide-ranging shake-up at the ODPM. This will include a beefed-up role for Richard McCarthy, whose Sustainable Communities Group is responsible for pushing through the ODPM鈥檚 housing growth plans.

In the memo, sent to ODPM staff on Tuesday, permanent secretary Peter Housden said Lean would leave at the end of the year to take up the post of director of the Olympic Games unit in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.

Lean鈥檚 Olympic role, according to the DCMS鈥� job specification, will be to ensure that there are effective project and programme management arrangements in place for the Games. He will be the government sponsor of the Olympic Delivery Authority, which will manage the building of the key Olympic venues, facilities and infrastructure.

In his memo, Housden said Lean had successfully streamlined the ODPM鈥檚 financial management and had helped improve the department鈥檚 budgeting and spending. Lean will be replaced by Clive Norris from the ODPM鈥檚 fire directorate.

The shake-up at the ODPM will be seen as confirmation that communities minister David Miliband and Housden, his recently appointed ally, have stamped their authority on what is ostensibly John Prescott鈥檚 department.

The most significant change concerns the Sustainable Communities Group, which will take responsibility for regional economic development and European structural funds, and be renamed Places, Planning and Communities Group.

These greater economic responsibilities will help McCarthy to get the funding he requires to pay for the infrastructure and regeneration schemes in the housing growth areas.

Housden hinted strongly that this was a result of Miliband鈥檚 decision earlier this year to revamp the ODPM. He said: 鈥淭he summer鈥檚 ministerial stocktake gave the ODPM an unambiguous focus on sustainable communities as our common task.鈥�