priministers power

3. Presidential Government ?

• A powerful office - no-one can seriously argue today that a Prime Minister is simply ‘first among equals’ in the Cabinet. Any and every Prime Minister is the public face of a government, has much more power than anyone else to shape which people and which policies predominate and the priorities and style of any government are conditioned by the personality of the person at ‘the top of the greasy pole’ of British politics. But some commentators have gone further, suggesting that the Prime Minister has become a Presidential figure dominating politics to the detriment of parliamentary and collective Cabinet government. It is to this debate which we now turn.
• The concept of Presidential Government - The potential resources of any Prime Minister have increased in this century; the Prime Minister has far more resources than any other individual to shape the general framework and agenda of his/her government.  Any Prime Minister has many advantages in the persuasion game amounting to 'a greater power to persuade'.  Also the personal qualities and style of any Prime Minister will greatly condition the character of the whole government.  But some commentators have gone further.
• The basic idea – that collective Cabinet government has been replaced by personal or Presidential government - is encapsulated by Tony Benn's assessment of the early 1980s,
• 'The wide range of powers at present exercised by a British Prime Minister... are now so great as usurp some of the functions of collective Cabinet.... in short, the present centralisation of power into the hands of one person has gone too far and amounts to a system of personal rule in the very heart of our parliamentary democracy.'
• The opposing theory is the 'Chairmanship' thesis; the essence of which is that the Prime Mmister is the leader of a party and a government and support of both is conditional, depending on performance - on the degree of political success the Prime Minister 'delivers'.  The restraints on personal power remain considerable and the Prime Minister is best seen as a chairman rather than a President.

4.   Evidence :  Powers of Appointment

• The Arguments in Brief 

• According to the Presidential thesis, the ability to select specific individuals for specific tasks, to arrange them in rank order and to dismiss them, is the key power of any Prime Minister.  
• Opponents of this view point to Harold Wilson’s comment that parties are broad churches and that the freedom of a Prime Minister is limited by the need to balance the Cabinet to reflect different factions in the party.  They point out how Mrs Thatcher’s failure to keep the support of important figures like like Heseltine, Lawson and Howe led to her downfall. Major was unable to prevent anti-Europeans rocking his Cabinet with divisions and even his amiable character was not able to prevent bitter disputes at the top of government – for example Norman Lamont’s demotion from the job of Chancellor of the Exchequer. Blair has faced significant personal conflicts among his top ministers, for example the intense dislike of ministers like Cook and Prescott for Peter Mandelson.

• The Arguments For Presidential Government : Evidence

• With regard to power over policy, the Prime Minister can influence a department greatly by installing a minister whose views agree with his own.  
• The swift elevation to the Foreign Office of David Owen by Callaghan and of John Major by Mrs Thatcher was intended to make that department more amenable to the Prime Minister's intentions.
• Mrs Thatcher used appointments,to promote her own policy aims. Parkinson, Lawson, Ridley, Tebbit, Brittan and Lilley were all promoted as 'true believers'.  Waverers like Pym, Prior, Biffen, and St John Stevas were discarded.  
• John Major appointed close friends and supporters to key positions. He created the Heritage Department for David Mellor and give the man who organised his leadership campaign – Norman Lamont – the major job of Chancellor of the Exechequer.
• Blair has given his former ‘boss’ Lord Irvine a central role in his government, not only as Lord Chancellor but as a central policy-maker, for example, Irvine chaired the Cabinet Committee on devolution.

• The Restraints on Prime Ministerial Power : Evidence

• Most new Prime Ministers feel constrained to include in their Cabinets or other ministerial posts, those men whom they have just beaten in the contest for leadership or their chief lieutenants when in opposition.  

• Simon James has recently outlined some of the limits on the Prime Minister's powers of appointment:

• The claims of senior colleagues.  All Prime Minister must include most senior party colleagues in the Cabinet. .Colleagues with any substantial following or those of high ability or great popularity could be troublesome if left on the backbenches. These factors taken together impose up to a dozen ministers who must go to fairly important posts. Brown, Straw, Cook, Irvine, Blunkett are all unassailable under Blair.

• The balance of party factions. A modern democratic party is a broad church, Prime Ministers must reflect this in their Cabinets.  The Prime Minister is further hampered by the need to balance various groupings and streams of opinion in the  party.  In 1964 and in the many reshuffles that followed, Wilson scrupulously balanced left against right, old faces against new, intellectuals against trade unionists.  The limits of the Parliamentary pool.  The Prime Minister must select a government of some hundred ministers, senior and junior, mostly from the Commons.  In a parliamentary party of around 350, many will be too young, too old, or for various reasons unsuitable.

• The framework he inherits -  John Major taking over a Cabinet shuffled repeatedly by Mrs Thatcher in the previous year, could make only limited changes. Tony Blair has had to keep a significant number of ‘old Labour’ politicians in his Cabinet – including the error prone John Prescott and former Deputy Leader, Margaret Becket.

•  Cultivating younger talent.  The premier also has to think ahead.  He must bring on younger ministers to ensure an adequate pool of experienced colleagues for the future.  

• There are also restraints on the ability of a Prime Minister to dismiss ministers. Dismissal is a two-edged weapon. Any sacked minister colleague is a potential focus for backbench dissent.  Too many dismissals create the impression that the Prime Minister is nervous, or not in control, or heads a divided Cabinet.  Macmillan's ‘ night of the long knives', the dismissal of half his Cabinet, made him appear panicky and weak.’ The biggest danger is that a Prime Minister builds up a range of enemies.  This is what happened to Mrs Thatcher. Mrs Thatcher had made a storehouse of enemies on her backbenches and they were ready to pounce when things went wrong.  
• Nor can Prime Ministers always keep Ministers they would like to. Thatcher lost Parkinson in 1987 over a sex scandal; Mellor similarly went in 1992; Mandelson was sacked by Blair in a panic early in 2001. The limits of Blair’s power has been shown by the victory of Ken Livingstone in the London mayoral contest and in the ultimate victory of Rhodri Morgan in Wales.

5.  Evidence : Co-ordinator –in-Chief 

• The Arguments in Brief The Presidential thesis suggests that a Prime Minister has a range of powers to dictate where, when and by whom decisions are taken, including

• the calling of, and procedure at Cabinet meetings;

•  the formation of Cabinet committees, their jurisdiction and personnel;

• the use of ad hoc or informal groups in decision-making,

• the existence of a Prime Ministers department,

• the dominance of policy-making in foreign policy and economic policy by the Prime Minister.

• Advocates of the Chairmanship thesis point to the weakness of many Prime Ministers

•  'When prime ministers are  up, they are very, very up . . ., (Jenkins 1987, p. 184). but '. . . when they are down they can be virtually powerless.'

• For example, Mrs Thatchers style of Cabinet leadership led to more defeats than any other Prime  Minister in Cabinet - for example on the key issue of EMS entry.

• A great deal of Conservative opposition to Thatcher was personal - especially the bitter attack by Sir Geoffrey Howe in resigning from the government in November 1990.

• Mrs Thatcher ultimately failed as a party leader because she believed she could ignore senior figures in the party.

• Evidence for the Presidential Thesis - The prime minister is responsible for directing and organising the work of the government at the highest level.

•  The Prime Minister has personal machinery to help co-ordinate the activities of government including  a personal staff of around 100 people, about one-third of whom are senior officials and advisers.  The prime minister's office includes the the Private Office; the Press Office; the Political Office; the Policy Unit; Special Advisers; the Efficiency Unit; and the 'Kitchen Cabinet'. For example, The Press Office - media management is now considered an essential task of government and the role of the Press Office is to handle the prime minister's relations with the media and the flow of government information.  It briefs lobby correspondents 'off the record' on a daily basis and plans the PM's media appearances.  Because of the central role of the press officer in presenting government policy to the media, recent  holders of the job have been close confidantes of the PM. Bernard Ingham, Margaret Thatcher’s  Thatcher's Press Officer, gained a controversial reputation for pugnacious defences of the Prime Minister and occasional scathing denigrations of ministers. Tony Blair’s press secretary, Alistair Campbell has become even more prominent. The Policy Unit   provides policy and analysis and advice for the prime minister.  Specifically, its main purposes are, Commenting critically upon Departmental proposals; bringing forward new ideas and identifying new areas requiring attention; following up policy proposals.

• The Prime Minister as Chairman of the Cabinet - The Prime Minister is Chairman of the Cabinet.  He or she decides when the Cabinet meets.  Procedure at Cabinet meetings is entirely in the hands of the Prime Minister. The prime minister chairs Cabinet meetings.  Prime Ministerial 'styles' of chairmanship have included the clipped and businesslike (Attlee), the dominant but discursive (Churchill), the relaxed yet efficient (Macmillan), the nondirective/consensual (Wilson), the aloof (Heath), the managerial (Callaghan) and the directive non-consensual (Thatcher).

• The Prime Minister and the Cabinet Committee System - Because of the sheer volume and complexity of governmental business, the bulk of decisions  within the Cabinet system are taken by Cabinet committees.  The establishment, composition, terms of reference and chairmanship of Cabinet committees are the responsibility of the prime minister 

• The Prime Ministers Dominance of some policy areas - Prime Ministers have always been personally involved in diplomacy but in recent decades this involvement has deepened, for example, a revolution in communications allows politicians to travel faster and more frequently, maintaining personal contacts with other leaders. Membership of the EC has made a vast number of domestic policy issues the subject of international action and so brought under the Prime Minister's eye. 

• Thatcher and Blair as Presidential figures - Margaret Thatcher's premiership has been seen by some commentators as validating the prime ministerial power thesis . Tony Blair has been seen as going even further than Mrs Thatcher in centralising power in his own hands. Tony Blair has been accused of greatly increasing his own power. Particularly that :

• He maintains an iron grip over the parliamentary party and the Labour Party in general.
• No. 10 exerts control over ministers by insisting that all contacts with the media are cleared in advance.
• Blair has little contact with Parliament; the twice-weekly Prime Minister's Question Time has been reduced to a once-weekly event.
• He has diminished the importance of Cabinet by downgrading meetings, taking decisions in bilateral meetings with ministers, and so on.
• It is  clear that Blair and his circle are determined that government should not descend into a directionless shambles, as happened under John Major
• Blair has little interest in lengthy Cabinet discussions of policy.  On a number of key issues, such as the transfer of exchange rates to the Bank of England and the use of proportional representation for European Parliament elections, the Cabinet was informed rather than consulted. 

• The main features of Thatcher's 'style' of government have been described as:

• Systematic by-passing of Cabinet by use of Cabinet committees, especially ad hoc committees, informal ministerial group's and bilateral meetings with a minister and officials
• The holding of fewer Cabinet meetings down to one per week, possibly fewer than her predecessors in the 1970s and half the number in the immediate postwar period.
• Personal involvement over a wide range of government policy-making, including e.g. GCHQ, (Government Communications Headquarters), the 'poll tax', opting-out schools, industrial relations legislation, the environment, football hooliganism;
• Use of PM's Policy Unit to promote policies and follow up initiatives; also, extensive reliance on special advisers, outside advice from right-wing think-tanks such as the Adam Smith Institute, the Centre for Policy Studies and the Institute of Economic Affairs, and  experts convened in special seminars
• Tendency to make policy 'on the hoof' in a conference speech or TV interview without consultation with ministerial colleagues (e.g. Poll tax)
• Brusque treatment of ministers regarded as weak, 'wet', 'not one of us' - e.g. especially the sacking of Foreign Secretary Francis Pym (1983), and Leader of the House John Biffen (1987), and the demotion from the Foreign Secretaryship and subsequent humiliation of Sir Geoffrey Howe (1989-90);
• Use of PM's Press Office to undermine ministers, sometimes as a prelude to sacking them (e.g. Pym, Biffen, Patrick Jenkin , 1985).

• Evidence of the Restraints on Prime Ministerial Power - The key Point made by the advocates of the chairmanship view is that, while a Prime Minister does have a wide range of potential personal powers, the actual realisation of personal power over the governments agenda and policy is highly variable.  For every example of 'Prime Ministerial Government', examples can be given of Prime Ministerial limitations and setbacks.

• John Major serves best to illustrate the factors which can combine to limit the personal authority of a prime Minister. He did well in the 18 months before the 1992 election victory but from then on his Premiership became one nightmare after another. The continued recession (and sluggish  recovery), high unemployment, a high trade deficit and budget deficit, and the EMS disaster of September 1992 plagued the government. Major's handling of Norman Lamont’s position was inept – keeping him in office as a lame-duck Chancellor for 10 months then sacking him and provoking a vitriolic resignation speech in the Commons. The  David Mellor, Michael Mates  and Tim Yeo resignations were all handled in the worst possible way – saying resignations were not necessary then backing down.  
• Europe deeply divided the party throughout the 1992-7 parliament and when 9 rebel MPs were expelled from the party the small Commons majority disappeared. Tories on the right of the party  made veiled criticisms of Major whose  irritation was reflected in the so-called 'bastards’ tape in the summer  of 1993.  A scandal about party finances was fuelled by Asil Nadir's escape from British justice; poor local election results in 1993; disastrous by-elections; an appalling party conference in the summer of 1993 which launched the ill-thought out 'back to basics' propaganda which backfired with a series of revelations about Tory M.P.s indiscretions; hostility among the traditional Tory press; backbenchers openly calling for Major to stand down - all painted  a pretty dismal picture for Major.  
• John Major had no great oratorical gifts, little personal presence and apparently few firm commitments. A significant criticism was that he dithered and could not make up mind, resulting in drift, uncertainty and indecision, especially over Europe.  His unwillingness to assert himself and bang the table infuriated some, led to charges of letting circumstances and other people determine iss rather than forcing a resolution himself.   Unfavourable economic circumstances; a divided party; incompetence; bad luck; personal weaknesses - all contributed to Major's problems.  The power of the Prime Minister is clearly conditional. 
• The Blair Experience - Tony Blair has attempted to exercise tight control of the machinery of government and his ‘honeymoon’ period was the longest on record. Yet he  had a difficult 2000 and 2001  which have reduced his personal standing.  A number of factors are involved:

• A sense of public disillusionment – for example in education, health and public transport – especially the railways, trade union opposition to reforms eg police pay reforms
• ‘Sleaze’ – the second Mandelson affair; the Vaz issue, Lord Irvine and party fund-raising, Byers and spin
• A loss of personal standing – Blair appears to be out of the country too much, he has occasionally appeared out of touch – unable to say clearly what he believes in; the Labour government lacks many ministers of real statue

• Blair’s own image in decline –  for example, barracked by the Women’s Institute, a victim of satire – depicted by Rory Bremner as a puppet of Alistair Campbell
• Political setbacks – for example Ken Livingstone’s victory in London mayoral race; Rhodri Morgan’s leadership in Wales
• Political opposition – particularly from the rural population and from a more assertive House of Lords
• Bad luck – the foot and mouth disaster, compounded by vascilating policy
• Criticism from people and organisations usually sympathetic to Labour, for example the trade unions – for example Blair accused unioNs of being wreckers of reform in the public services and the unions have accused Blair of being friendly with right wing leaders in the EU.

6. Evidence  :  Party Leader

• A . The Arguments in Brief 

• The Prime Ministerial thesis argues that :

•  MPs support their leader in good times and bad
• Elections have become presidential
• Prime Ministers dominate party policy-making
• Prime Ministers have great powers of patronage

• The Chairmanship view suggests:

• Parties are coalitions of viewpoints
• Prime Ministers never enjoy the support of all their party
• Their patronage has limited impact on party loyalty
• Elections are about party records not personality
• Prime Ministers can lose the support of their party

• Evidence for the Prime Ministerial Thesis - The Office of Prime Minister, with all its potentialities, is a product of the party system; a system which sees one-party majority dominance of the legislative process and a unity of the executive and legislative.  A British government can normally expect to translate its legislative proposals into reality.

• MacIntosh argues that the majority party want their leader to be successful. if he does well, if his methods and policies are acclaimed, they also share in the benefits.  But if a Prime Minister is encountering difficulties and if the government's policies are bringing unpopularity and press criticism, while some M.P.'s may grumble, the normal reaction is to support their leader.  After all, if these criticisms are not countered, the whole party will In general, a Prime Minister at his weakest and most exposed can be sure that if he-and his Cabinet decide to push on with a policy, party loyalty will see them through
• This is exactly what happened during the Westland crisis of January, 1986. Tory backbench MP's rallied round their leader in a crucial confidence motion in the Commons.
• Modern elections have enhanced the status of the party leader -  leaders have come to embody their parties in the eyes of the electorate.  Party leaders are likened to leaders of an army and elections have the nature of personal plebiscites. Thus, it is suggested that party leaders have acquired the initiative in defining party objectives and goals. Mrs Thatcher's period in office appears to provides supporting evidence to the argument that a Prime Minister can dictate policies and style to the party. Philip Norton suggests that Thatcherism had three distinct elements – free market economics, an emphasis on moral values and on the maintenance of public and educational standards and the third, and in many respects the most important, element of Thatcherism was one of style.  That style was a combative and aggressive one.  
• Finally, a Prime Minister has a considerable amount of patronage, above and beyond appointments to government posts. Backbenchers may be Knighted, dismissed or former Ministers can be elevated to the House of Lords to discourage them from becoming rebellious; important supporters can be given posts on the many government advisory bodies and lesser honours can be given to loyal supporters in the country.

• Evidence of the Limits of Party Support - Political parties are not easily led; loyalty has its limits and leaders who are not successful, like Ted Heath, do not last long.  The major parties are really coalitions of interests, ‘they are riven with factions, divided over both short and long term policy objectives, the claims of various interests and local and regional issues’ (G.W. Jones) John Major inherited a deeply divided party, with a serious division on  Europe.  The divide was between those who resisted  European integration and those who welcomed it, or saw it as inevitable.   

• Since 1970 backbench MP's have been more willing to vote against their own leadership and sometimes with effect.  The most dramatic example was in 1986 when over 100 Conservative MP's either voted against, or abstained, on the Shops Bill
• Another check on the leadership commonly cited is the existence of ambitious colleagues who have an eye on the leadership themselves and it is not uncommon for there to be embittered opponents of the leader on the backbenches who 'make trouble'.
• Patronage has severe limitations in ensuring loyalty and submissiveness.  Backbench MP's do have other pulls on their loyalty - constituency interests, associations with cause and interest groups and their own consciences and beliefs.  Loyalty is the result of generally shared aims not the dangling of rewards.
• Norton points out that Mrs Thatcher never converted the party to her ideas, ‘As prime minister, Thatcher did not convert it to her particular brand of Conservative thought. The majority of MPs under Thatcher could be labelled the party faithful.  This group constituted those MPs whose loyalty was principally to the party itself, and to its electoral success, rather than to any particular strand of thought within the party/ As long as the leader provides competent and successful leadership, loyalty follows; if the leader falters, the party faithful start to waver.’ Mrs Thatcher lost power because she appeared to be failing the party – the poll tax, inflation and divisions on Europe led her party to reject her leadership. Her nationalism made it impossible for her to follow the Cabinets agreed line on Europe with any conviction. This led, one way or another, to the resignation of five Cabinet ministers.
• Major also faced personal attacks from some of his backbenchers , including the 9  rebel MPs who  refused to support the government on Europe; from the embittered Norman Lamont and from within his own government, culminating in John Redwood's leadership challenge in the summer of 1995.

7. Evidence : The Personalisation of Politics and the Control of Information

• The Arguments in Brief

• The Presidential view argues that:

• The Prime Minister is now the centre of media attention

• He or she controls government presentation to the press

• Only the  PM knows who is discussing what in government

• The Chairmanship thesis suggests:

• Media attention is a two-edged sword
• PMs often become personally associated with unpopular policies
• Governments cannot control the press
• Governments ‘leak’ – the PM cannot control all the departments

• Evidence : The Presidential Thesis - Prime Ministers are inevitably the centre of media attention. 'The Prime Minister can arrange visits abroad, which usually draw considerable press and television coverage as do his receptions for statesmen visiting Britain.  ' (Macintosh).

• Crossman emphasises the Prime Minister's control of government publicity and the 'gloss' he can put on government policies. 'His final power is her personal control of Government publicity.  The Government's press relations are conducted by the Number 10 press department at its daily press conferences.  That means we have a daily coherent, central explanation of what the Government is doing - an explanation naturally in terms the Prime Minister thinks right’.
• The PM has more information than his colleagues.  ‘Whitehall is a huge network of lines of communication, all converging on 10 Downing Street.  The Prime Minister can keep abreast of progress by studying Cabinet and committee papers - alone among ministers he gets the papers of all committees - and by selective reading of interdepartmental correspondence, the most important of which is copied to him.  No other minister receives so much information about so many departments.’ (Simon James)
• Only the PM knows what is going on. It is clear from the diaries of Crossman and Castle that they knew little of what was happening in other departments Under Mrs Thatcher, many ministers knew nothing of many policy announcements until they read of them in their newspapers.
• Virtually any important ministerial announcement must be cleared by No 10, giving the Prime Minister considerable opportunity to influence its timing and content.The Blair government has been particularly centralised in this respect. Frank Field gave it as one reason for resigning in 1998.  
• Prime Ministers receive much greater media attention than their colleagues and are treated like Presidents – especially in times of national crisis and/or war.

• Evidence: The Chairmanship Thesis - Media attention is a two-edged sword. 

•  If a Prime Minister is ineffective on television, as Ted Heath was, he can lose standing and influence.
•  Likewise, if a government's policies        become unpopular , or if policies appear not to be working, or if a government performs u-turns, then the Prime Minister is in the firing line.  Prime Ministers face constant pressure - to perform well in the Commons, at international events, in press interviews, at party conferences and from pressure-group reaction to government policies.  
• Ironically, the more the general programme of the government is associated with the Prime Minister the more he or she becomes the target of opposition and the criticism of the other groups.
• Thatcher became personally associated with the poll tax and this contributed greatly to her down fall.
• Major was attacked by sections of the Tory press – there was unprecedented hostility of sections of the Conservative press.  The contempt of the Murdoch press for John Major's leadership and the partisan support for the Euro-rebels in the Telegraph newspapers was highly damaging
• Tony Blair has paid the price of having a high profile press secretary by being satirised by the highly effective Rory Bremmer show, The press – particularly the left-leaning Guardian and Observer have been strong critics of government. The Blair government has certainly not managed to control all its internal publicity nor to maintain policy and personal unity. The imfamous Woman’s Institute booing of Blair ended his ‘honeymoon’ with the public.

8. Conclusion : Does the UK have Presidential Government ? 

Some broad conclusions have run throughout the debate:

Any PM has extensive personal power. This power will wax and wane according to:

• The style, skill and personality of a specific PM
• The level of success the government experiences
• Election results
• Media comment
• Circumstances beyond the control of the government – wars, natural disasters, economic cycles
• Party unity and divisions
• The extent of rivals in the party leadership
• Personal chemistry
• The strength of the political opposition
• Sheer good or bad luck

A week is a long time in politics, Harold Wilson said. Every PM has periods where their personal power grows and they can – for eg – appoint and sack ministers. At other times PMs are hemmed in by circumstances. The PM who perhaps exercised greatest personal power – Mrs Thatcher – was also the only PM to be rejected by her own party while in good health and without the excuse of a political crisis.