DO PRIME MINISTERS' DEPARTMENTS REALLY CREATE PROBLEMS?
| Published date | 01 March 1983 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9299.1983.tb00501.x |
| Date | 01 March 1983 |
| Author | PATRICK WELLER |
DO
PRIME MINISTERS’ DEPARTMENTS REALLY
CREATE PROBLEMS?
PATRICK
WELLER
In the current debates on the growth of the prime minister’s power,
G.W.
Jones
has consistently argued that the claims about prime ministerial government are
exaggerated. In a series of detailed and careful articles and reviews, he has
described the development of those organizations that support prime ministers
and explained how they work (Jones 1973,1976,1978,1979). These articles leave
no
doubt that Jones believes that the present system works well and provides
prime ministers with the right type of support, primarily because of its
considerable flexibility.
Indeed Jones has argued stridently in some of his analyses of prime ministerial
support that Britain does not need, and should not attempt
to
establish, a prime
minister’s department.
At
various times he has suggested six reasons for his
opposition to such a proposal.
1.
‘A
prime minister cannot help cabinet colleagues arrive at a unified decision if he
is the protagonist of a particular line’ (Jones 1981, 219).
’A
department might,
especially if large, develop a view and momentum of its own‘ (Jones 1976,37), and
’put up to the Prime Minister a certain line’ (Jones 1979, 20).
2. The prime minister’s ’role is to help forge politically acceptable solutions, and to
relate policies together in an order of priorities by providing a coherent theme,
tone or philosophy.
His
contribution is not to be a substitute for his ministers, but
a supplement’ (Jones 1981, 220).
3.
A
prime minister’s department ’can never be as informed about any policy and
its consequences as the department with responsibility for its implementation.
. . .
Its intervention will be regarded as naive and meddlesome, and its policy
prescriptions as ignorant and damaging’ (Jones 1981, 220).
4. A
department ’will generate a large amount of paper, which the Prime Minister
will find difficult to master’ (Jones 1979,20); ’his gaze will be distracted away from
considering the problems
of
government as a whole towards what worries his
department’ (Jones 1981, 220).
Patrick Weller
is
a Senior Lecturer in Political Science, Australian National University, Canberra.
Public Administration
Vol.
61
Spring
1983
(59-78)
0
1983
Royal Institute
of
Public Administration
60
PATRICK
WELLER
5. ’The establishment of a Prime Minister’s department, formal, structured,
bureaucratized, might diminish the personal power of a Prime Minister to draw
help from many sources and in many ways
...
A
disorderly, ad hoc, personalized
system serves only him’ (Jones 1973, 375; see also 1976, 37; 1978, 121, 123).
6. ’There is a danger in having a single head
...
Everything might be channelled
through that one person. The present system enables the Prime Minister to be in
charge, not a single subordinate’ (Jones 1979,
20).
Jones (1978,123) has suggested that if a prime minister’s department were created,
a prime minister ’might have to acquire a further set
of
private secretaries and
political aides’ to control it. Obviously Jones’s opinions are important: they
represent the orthodox vision in Whitehall and reflect the views of many ministers
and senior officia1s.l They have received an explicit seal of approval from Harold
Wilson (1976, 106-7), even though he had earlier stated the need for a small but
strong prime minister’s department (Jones 1973, 375).
But two points need to be made. First, Jones has strong views on the role that
prime ministers should play, and these include, implicitly at least, the idea that
they should keep out of detailed policy. These normative assumptions however
are no more than that. What if prime ministers decide they want to become deeply
involved in some policy areas where they are sceptical of the policy direction
which the minister is proposing the government should follow? The recent record
shows Callaghan and Thatcher involved in very specific policy areas. Can they
intervene effectively? Even if it is accepted that there are things prime ministers
must do, that these effectively structure most of their time (Rose 1980), and
therefore that their scope for action is severely limited, it remains true that it is not
entirely constrained. If prime ministers choose to undertake other tasks, do they
have the support capacity?
This point is made more important because the precise boundaries of Jones’s
target prime minister’s department are not spelt out. He discusses approvingly the
flexible interaction of the partisan and non-partisan components of the staff at
No.
10, and then criticizes the concept of a prime minister’s department (Jones
1978; 1979). Presumably such a department would include the
CPRS,
the Cabinet
Office, the private secretaries in
No.
10 and such outfits as the European Unit.
Whether the partisan components like the Policy Unit are inside or outside is not
stated, although it seems probable that the distinctions between the political and
non-political would remain.
Second, Jones’s comments can be no more than informed speculation. It is true
that in anticipating the problems, he is talking only about Britain, but in practice
the problems might have far wider applicability. They are directed at the problem
of supporting the leader in a collective government. If they are true for Britain,
they should be true for any Western parliamentary democracy. But are they? If the
problems are assessed in relation to two similar systems
-
Canada and Australia
-
where the prime minister has substantial bureaucratic support, it can be shown
that the dangers he posits are
not
an inevitable outcome of prime ministers’
1
Parts
of
this article are based on a series
of
interviews undertaken by the author in 1979 and 1980.
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