04-07-2025
Do cabinet ministers need to be experts?
Sir Keir Starmer confesses that he could not give full attention to the Universal Credit and Personal Independence Bill until shortly before second reading. Rachel Reeves was in obvious distress at Prime Minister's Questions.
Are ministers overburdened with executive and constituency duties? And is the answer to appoint more experts from outside politics?
Prime Ministers have a ridiculously small talent pool from which to choose. In 2024, 411 Labour MPs were elected. But, of these, 231 were new and untried. From the remaining 180, Keir Starmer had to select 23 Cabinet ministers and a host of junior ministers.
One or two Cabinet ministers and a few junior ministers can be put into the Lords via life peerages. That, however, is easier for the Conservatives than for Labour, which always tends to be suspicious of the Lords. In any case MPs are annoyed if they cannot question senior ministers. In 1982, following the Argentine invasion of the Falklands, Foreign Secretary, Lord Carrington, unable to defend himself in the Commons against furious MPs, felt compelled to resign.
Outsiders are not often successful as MPs. Business people in particular tend to be as unsuccessful in politics as politicians are in business. They are different trades.
Business people find it particularly difficult to accommodate themselves to an often raucous House of Commons. There is no business equivalent to the principle of ministerial responsibility. The head of Marks and Spencer does not, after all, have to face an organised opposition every week baying for blood.
Besides it is not the job of a minister to be an expert. That is for her civil servants and other advisers. The minister's task is to evaluate evidence, interpret it in terms of public feeling, and then communicate policy effectively, a task in which, sadly, most ministers are quite deficient.
The best ministers have been far from experts. Michael Gove, the author of successful policies on education and levelling up under the Conservatives, had been a journalist before entering politics, not an educationalist. Des Browne, between 2006 and 2008 one of the best Defence Secretaries in recent years, had been a lawyer before entering politics, not an authority on the military.
The problems of the Starmer Government lie elsewhere. They work too hard and think too little. Unlike those working for Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair, the Starmtroopers had not thought through their policies in opposition for fear, no doubt, of re-opening ideological wounds with the Corbynites. As a result, the Starmer Government displays little sense of direction.
Ministers should concentrate on large issues of principle, get rid of flatterers and juniors recently down from university, and leave detail to officials and advisers. That is where experts are needed. Michael Gove did not personally write his White Paper on levelling up, but employed for the task Andy Haldane, former Chief Economist at the Bank of England. Attlee used to say that if you have a good dog you do not need to bark yourself.
Above all, the Prime Minister needs to lead. Harold Macmillan, Prime Minister from 1957 to 1963, regarded it as the easiest job in Government since there was no department to run. Keir Starmer should devote his time to developing a strategy for Government.
That strategy should be collective, with the Cabinet discussing and deciding policy rather than degenerating into a federation of departments. Cabinet meetings should be complemented with brainstorming sessions at Chequers so that the wicked issues can be confronted before they hit the Government on the head. Then we will have a Government that works, not ministers who are overworked.
Sir Vernon Bogdanor is Professor of Government, King's College, London and author of
