COMPONENT 2: Prime Minister and Executive

Question 1

What is the structure of the executive?

Answer 1

The Prime Minister:

• Head of the executive who chairs the Cabinet and manages its agenda.
• Appoints all members of the Cabinet and Junior Ministers, and decides who sits on cabinet committees.
• Organises the structure of Gov - can create, abolish or merge departments.

The Cabinet:

• Consists of 20 to 23 senior Ministers, including those who hold the title secretary of State.
• Several senior Figures who are not members of the cabinet attend its meetings
• Administrative Support and help in delivering policy is provided by the cabinet office, headed by the cabinet secretary, the UK’s most senior Civil Servant.
• Many decisions taken in cabinet Committees, which deal with particular. area of policy such as economic affairs

Government departments:

• Each one is responsible for an area of policy e.g Ministry of Defence
• Each is headed by a cabinet Minister, supported by several Junior Ministrs responsible for specific aspects of the work of the department.

Executive agencies:

• ## Semi- independant bodies that carry out some of the functions of Gov departments, for example the DVLA is overseen by the department for transport

Question 2

What are the Main roles of the executive?

Answer 2

proposing legislation - The majority of legislation comes from gov via the pm and cabinet, often based on their manifesto.

Proposing a budget - The Chancellor proposes a budget after negotiations with other departments and in cabinet.

Making policy decisions - The cabinet sets Government objectives and ministers make day to day decisions from this, provided they are within legislation and budget.

Question 3

What are the Prime Ministers powers?

Answer 3

The Prime Ministers authority and power is variable. Each Prime Minister faces a different set of circumstances.

Factors which may enhance or restrict the Prime Minister’s powers:

• The extent to which the governing party and cabinet are united
• The popularity of the Prime Minister and size of the Governing party’s parliamentary Majority
• Personality and leadership style of the Prime Minister
• Impact of external pressures such as the state of the economy and unforseen crisises in foreign affairs.

Prime Ministerial Government: This is a government where the Prime Minister is dominant in terms of executive.

Cabinet Government: A term used to describe a situation where the main decision making of the government takes place in cabinet.

Question 4

What is the Role of the Cabinet and its functions?

Answer 4

It should be stressed that the role of the cabinet is both changeable and unclear. Its existence is merely an unwritten constitutional convention.

The cabinet’s role varies from one prime Minister to another. For example PMs like John Major and David Cameron used the Cabinet as a sounding Board for ideas and policy initiatives.

Prime Ministers like Tony Blair and Margaret Thatcher had little time for cabinet discussion and tended to use the cabinet as a rubber stamp.

Rubber Stamp: To officially approve a decision or plan without thinking about it.

Functions:

• Meetings of the full cabinet are normally held once a week on a Thursday
• Cabinet will discuss and set the way in which policy is to be represented to parliament, to the Government’s own Mps, media. and wider Public.
• The Cabinet helps decide what business will be brought before parliament in the immediate future, which ministers will contribute towards debates and what tacts to adopt if votes in either house are likely to be very close.
• In some emergency or crisis situations the PM may revert to the collective Wisdom Of the Cabinet to make decisions.

Most decisions are made in smaller cabinet committees. The PM sees all the proposals in advance, controlling cabinet agenda and can therfore simply avoid discussion of ideas they do not like. If ministers have misgivings about a proposal they normally raise them with the PM before a meeting, not during it.

THEREFORE, OFTEN THE CABINET IS A KIND OF ‘CLEARING HOUSE’ FOR DECISIONS WHERE LITTLE DISCUSSION IS NEEDED. THE PM WILL CHECK THAT EVERYONE CAN SUPPORT A DECISION AND IT INVARIABLY GOES THROUGH ON ‘THE NOD’.