Prime Minister and the Executive

What is the executive?

Also known as the government is formed of the prime minister, members of the cabinet and junior ministers

What is the prime minister?

• PM is head of the executive and holds the final decision making power

• PM leads the executive by determining government policy and making national decisions

What the cabinet?

• Cabinet is formed of the PM and ministers appointed by the PM

• Ministers in the cabinet lead the government departments and consult the PM on formulating policy

• cabinet meets weekly

  • 2022 cabinet included 22 ministers (Suella Braveman the Secretary of State for the home department, James Cleverly the secretary of state for foreign and commonwealth affairs

  • 2024 cabinet includes 26 ministers (Angela Rayner deputy PM and Secretary of State for housing, communities and local government, Rachel Reeves first female chancellor of the exchequer)

What are Junior Ministers?

• appointed by the PM and have responsibilities within specific government departments

• specific roles under cabinet ministers who are the heads of government departments

What is a government department?

• responsibilities of areas of policy

• run by secretary of state and included ministers and civil servants

  • civil servants are permanent staff within the government who support the current government In carrying out policy

What are the roles of the Executive?

• proposes legislation:

  • This includes policies in election manifesto, government departments develop legislation proposals which are called bills and are outlined in the kings speech

• Budget:

  • around March or April each year a budget is proposed by the executive this outlines changes to taxation and the state of the nations economy following the chancellors speech there will be a debate

  • 2017 budget developed by chancellor Phillip Hammond outlined increasing national living wage from £7.50 to £7.83

• Policy decisions:

  • Makes policy decisions which determine how the country is run

What are the powers of the executive? (Royal Prerogative)

Royal Prerogative:

• the monarchs powers which the PM exercises

• Prerogative powers regarding the judicial system includes legal pardons and reducing sentences

• The executive has prerogative powers to deploy the army, grant honours and use prerogative emergency powers to act decisively during emergencies

What are the powers of the executive? (initiating legislation)

• The executive has the power the enact any policy outlined in the election manifesto

What is individual ministerial responsibility?

The principle by which ministers are held to account and sates that ministers must be competent and are expected to resign if they are not

• Ministers are responsible for the performance of their department and are expected to resign if their department fails majorly

• Ministers must take personal responsibility if they do not succeed

  • Examples: Amber Rudd previous home secretary resigned in 2018 after she misled the home affairs select committee on targets for deporting illegal immigrants, Suella Braveman resigned in 2022 for sending official documents from her personal email

What are advantages of individual ministerial responsibility?

• A strong standard of behaviour is maintained by government officials

• The government is held accountable for their behaviour towards the public

  • Michael Fallon secretary of defence resigned in 2017 after claims of sexual misconduct

What are disadvantages of individual ministerial responsibility?

• Fails when ministers choose not to resign and blame others for their departments failings

  • In 2011 the home secretary Theresa May did not resign over weakened border checks which allowed foreign criminals terror suspects into the UK. Instead she blamed Brodie Clark the head of UK border defence

What is collective ministerial responsibility?

Cabinet members must publicly support the decisions made by the cabinet

• If they fail to do this they must resign

  • In 2018 Johnson resigned as foreign secretary as he disagreed with the governments ‘chequers deal’ for leaving the EU

What are advantages of collective ministerial responsibility?

• Ensures the governments appears united and that ministers have the support of the government

• Ensures a strong government as the government has a clear official position on policies

  • In 2013 the LibDem supported the conservatives ministers in opposing the mansion tax which they had previously supported which showed a strong coalition government

What are disadvantages of collective ministerial responsibility?

• Ministers must support policies even if they do not agree with them which means policies can be forced upon them by the PM

  • Ministers of Blairs government were not consulted regarding the Iraq invasion in 2003 until 3 days before the invasion and some ministers claim they were forced to agree to the war

what is relaxing collective responsibility?

• When the PM wants to keep a politician but knows they will not agree to a particular policy they may relax collective ministerial responsibility

  • David Cameron did this during the EU referendum giving ministers the choice of leave or remain

what is the role of the PM?

Government head:

• Responsible for the work of departments and creates new departments, government roles, chairs and decides who is on the cabinet and is the head of the civil service

• Responsible for governments policy, agenda and decides what policies are priority

Party head:

• Elected by party members and is the party leader

Decision maker:

• Makes decisions regarding the UKs national security and responds to national and international crises which may affect the UK - 2017 attempted terrorist attack on train

International leadership

• decides whether or not to deploy British armed forces

Parliament role

• Leads parliament as the leader of the HoC

Chief communicator

• communicates with the public on the media

What are the powers of the PM? (patronage)

Appoint and dismiss

• PM uses powers of patronage to appoint cabinet ministers

  • PMs can dismiss those who rival them or appoint those who rival them to make them support the government

• This can be called a reshuffle after an election

Strengths

• Allows the PM to appoint ministers who have the same views as them

• Gives the PM some control over ministers and MPs

What are the powers of the PM? (Parliament)

• PM uses parties majority to make sure their policies become law

• Appoint government chief whip, HoC leader and HoL leader

What are the powers of the PM? (Cabinet)

• Determines the agenda for cabinet meetings and priorities policies they favour

What are the powers of the PM? (Media influence)

• PMs with strong press offices will be able to successfully influence the media

  • Tony Blair - The sun

  • Tony Blair - Alistair Campbell

What are the powers of the PM? (Foreign policy)

• PM can use royal prerogative to declare war overseas and deploy British armed forces

• Power to sign the UK up to foreign treaties

What are the powers of the PM? (Civil service)

• reforms and appointments of the civil service are done by the PM

  • Ensures all civil servants remain loyal

What are limits to the PMs powers? (cabinet)

• The cabinet is needed in order to approve the PMs policy decisions

  • In theory the PM is ‘First among equals’ meaning they have equal say

  • The cabinet is an important check and balance on the PMs powers

What are limits to the PMs powers? (Electorate)

• Loss of support from the electorate will end the PMs time In power

What are limits to the PMs powers? (Parliament)

• Parliament limits the power of the PM through votes and scrutiny and holds the PM to account in PMQ weekly in the HoC \

• A vote of no confidence by parliament removes the PM from power

What are limits to the PMs powers? (Political party)

• PM must maintain the support of the party in order to stay in power

  • A PM without the support of their party has a weaker position and may be challenged by their cabinet

  • In 1990 Margaret Thatcher resigned as PM after she was challenged to stand down by members of her own party

What are limits to the PMs powers? (Media)

• Communicates with the public and influences their opinion which might pressure the PM about their decisions

What is the role of the cabinet?

Policy maker

• The cabinet makes final decisions regarding and they must make an agreement

• Needed to legitimise and ratify the PM and gov policies

Coordinates government works

• Coordinates governments programme of legislation and priorities when to introduce legislation into parliament and the cabinet organises the weekly agenda

Limits PMs power

• If PM loses the support of the cabinet they will lose their authority

Emergencies

• Cabinet deals with emergencies by making quick decisions to address crises

  • E.g. cabinet office briefing room meeting (COBR) was called following the suspected Russian poisoning of Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury

What are features of a ‘cabinet government’?

• In a cabinet government the PM is first among equals - they have equal decisions making power

• Policy is collectively decided

• Collectively decides government strategy e.g. managing all business in parliament such as upcoming votes and bills

What is an example of a cabinet government?

2010 - David Cameron

What is a counterpoint to David Cameron having a cabinet government?

He also has a quad which was four of the most senior ministers who made most of the decision making

• David Cameron – Prime Minister (Conservative)

• George Osborne – Chancellor of the Exchequer (Conservative)

• Nick Clegg – Deputy Prime Minister (Liberal Democrat)

• Danny Alexander – Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Liberal Democrat)

What other government also had a Quad?

2019 - Boris Johnson

• Boris Johnson (Prime Minister)

• Rishi Sunak (Chancellor)

• Matt Hancock (Health Secretary)

• Michael Gove (Cabinet Office Minister)

  • Mainly relied on them during covid 19

What affects the relationship between the PM and the cabinet?

• Use of the PMs powers

  • This determines both the relationship and the use of the cabinet, PM decides the cabinets agenda and how often they meet

• If the PM decides to meet with a closer inner circle of ministers (sofa cabinet) rather than the entire cabinet then this will weaken the relations

• The larger and more influential the cabinet members the harder it is for a PM to ignore

• Media focus - more media focus on the PM than the cabinet gives the cabinet more power and vice versa

• Popularity in the cabinet

What is an example of a sofa cabinet?

• Tony Blair - discussed policies with close advisors and a special team

  • Main three: Gordon Brown, Alistair Campbell and Jonathan Powell

What is a presidential style government?

This is when one individual usually the PM has strong dominance over the executive

What are features of a presidential style government?

• PM has a strong personality

• A strong PM office

  • More special advisors who have more access to the PM than the cabinet members

• Personal leadership and greater focus on the PM rather than the cabinet in the media

• PM has strong influence regarding foreign policy - making more military decisions without consulting the cabinet

How does a strong personalty lead to a presidential style government?

• PM gets more media attention than the government this makes them more likely to be associated with policy formulation in comparison to the cabinet

• Televised leadership debates has put more focus on leaders rather than parties in the 2010, 2015, 2017 etc elections - overshadowing the cabinet.

What factors limit a presidential style government?

• institutional checks and balances e.g. HoL, backbenchers (votes of no confidence) , judiciary, select committees

• cabinet influence - if influential can remove ministers e.g. Thatcher, Major

• party cohesion

• public accountability

  • ALL can limit the dominance of the Prime Minister in a presidential style government.

Explain the cabinet in Thatchers government?

• Had a lot of influence over her cabinet for most of her leadership

• They were consulted rarely regarding policy - usually found out about it when they read it in the news

• She sacked many ministers who opposed and called out minsters she though were weak

  • Francis Pam foreign secretary sacked in 1983

• However a lack of support from her cabinet eventually ended her time as PM

Explain John Majors cabinet?

• Had far less control of the cabinet

• Power was limited by a small party majority from 1992

• He used the cabinet when making important decisions

• Unable to make up his mind regarding important decisions and was seen as a weak policy maker

• ministers had greater control over policy