Unelected experts as ministers
How to make an unelected expert placed in the Lords as a Minister accountable
The new prime minister has translated several experts into ministers and put them into the House of Lords. This has created a bit of media commentary but because the experts themselves were well respected in their fields it was surprisingly uncontroversial. The question remains as to whether it is democratic and how they are to be properly accountable. Were there really no suitably qualified and expert MPs to fulfil these jobs?
Gordon Brown said he wanted to create a government of all the talents (who became known as the GOATS) in 2011 and elevated four men (sic) who came from the military, business and diplomatic worlds. This had a mixed impact with few of them lasting long and they generally found it tricky to navigate the civil service and government machine. I’m not sure they can be said to have been a great success.
I’ve read a handful of memoirs about government recently and it is clear that whilst new ministers, from inside or outside Parliament, can come into a ministerial post with bright ideas and lots of enthusiasm for change, it is incredibly difficult to get change, particularly if you are a only a junior minister. A Secretary of State can push through change, for good or ill - I am thinking of the disastrous reforms to probation and prisons forced by Chris Grayling which are still causing untold damage to both, which he did in the face of all expert advice. But a minister doesn’t have that much power. Read, for example, Rory Stewart and Chris Mullin’s books which detail the frustrations of being a minister, yet both of them were elected politicians with years of experience.
There is a question about the democratic legitimacy of parachuting someone into the Lords to be a minister, even if they have years of experience on the subject. Whilst it is tempting to assume that policy expertise is a better option than simply promoting an MP who knows nothing about their new area of responsibilities, it may not be the best way to get efficient management of a department.
There may be another way. Ministers and secretaries of state can employ special advisors (SPADS) and why could they not be used more effectively? Currently a SPAD is a often recent graduate, a bright young thing who is used as bull-dog foil against a supposedly recalcitrant civil service, but who is unlikely to have any real expertise in the ministerial policy area.
Select committees appoint acknowledged experts to help and guide their inquiries. It might be a better idea for ministers to do the same, to employ academics or business leaders or scientists part time to give advice and balance in the departmental thinking. Instead of a 22 year old graduate, you could have a business man with decades of experience at managing a big company, perhaps one who has employed prisoners for example, to help with the reform of the penal system. It is not necessary to plonk them in the Lords.
Just a thought.
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