Publication Administration Committee Report (Smaller Government)

Debate between Bernard Jenkin and Greg Knight

Thursday 10th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jenkin]

We asked Sir David Normington, who was still permanent secretary at the Home Office when he gave evidence, whether he had ever had to create work to keep a Minister busy, and he diplomatically answered, “Not in recent times”.

[Mr Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con)]

One suggestion to my hon. Friend’s Committee was that Ministers should do less media work, and that the role should be taken over by paid civil servants. Does he agree that such a suggestion should be roundly dismissed? If Ministers are democratically accountable, which they are, they should also be seen to be democratically accountable.

[Mr Jenkin]

There is no question but that Ministers should be accountable for decisions that they take. However, can my right hon. Friend put his hand on his heart and say that on no occasion has he seen a Minister promoting a political or personal agenda on a television screen, as opposed to something that is absolutely in the public interest for a Minister to do? In this world of 24/7 media, the amount of media that a Minister could do is almost limitless, and we have to keep a check on the priorities that take up his time.

Lord Rooker thought that many Ministers were under the misapprehension that they were there to manage their Departments. Lord Norton told us that Ministers should

“focus on what is strategically important, rather that just getting through the paperwork”.

So, to echo the title of our report, what should Ministers do? The consensus is that they should set policy priorities, provide leadership to their Departments, represent their Departments across Government and outside, and answer to Parliament. They should focus on their core job and less on what one might call “announceables”. Lord Rooker pointed out how they had to operate in this way in the old Northern Ireland Office before devolution, where there were only four Ministers covering a broad range of portfolios. He added that officials were forced to

“fillet out the key strategic decisions that as a minister you really had to do. So you didn’t get all the minutiae that you get in Westminster Red Boxes.”

This strongly suggests that having fewer Ministers would itself bring about new ways of working. It is also obvious that if Ministers were reshuffled less often and specialists were more encouraged, they would be more effective as Ministers.