PM And Executive Flashcards
What are the three branches of government?
- the executive branch that carry out laws (made up of PM and cabinet)
- the legislative branch (Lords and Commons)
- the Judicial (Supreme Court)
What is a ‘core executive’?
The most important elements of government including the cabinet, senior civil servants and key political advisers based in the PM’s private office
What is secondary legislation?
The process by which primary legislation can be amended by government departments without requiring another act of parliament
How can the executive govern?
- it introduces parliament proposals for new legislation based on the manifesto it fought
- it introduces legislation into parliament in response to changing circumstances, known as a ‘doctors mandate’
- it introduces a budget, which outlines how the government proposes to raise revenue
- it can introduce secondary/delegated legislation means it can modify legislation without needing another act of parliament
What are statutory instruments used for?
They are used to make changes to primary legislation in the form of delegated legislation
Why are statutory instruments controversial?
They have been criticised for being undemocratic as they seek to bypass full parliamentary scrutiny and debate
What are executive agencies?
Semi-independent bodies that carry out the functions of government departments, such as the DVLA which is overseen by the department of transport
Where does the authority of the PM derive from?
The monarch asking them to form a government of their behalf
Key features of the Prime Minister?
- they tend to be from the largest party in the House of Commons, however in exceptional circumstances and individual can be appointed as PM without leading their party
- there is a convention that the PM should be a member of the House of Commons, which was demonstrated by Lord hope who gave up his peerage to become PM
What are the key powers of the prime ministers?
They determine the membership of the government, make senior appointments to the civil service and judiciary, recommend most appointment of life peers to the House of Lords, negotiates foreign treaties, directs military forces in combat and decides whether to activate UK’s trident nuclear deterrent
What is a royal prerogative?
The executives power of the monarchy, such as the command of the armed forces, patronage and the conduct of foreign policy - which powers have to be transferred to the PM who wields them on behalf of the monarch
What is the role of government departments?
- To manage their particularly area of government and develop policy
- each ministerial team within a dept. makes proposals for legislation concerning their department
- those within the department are bound by a principle of collective ministerial responsibility and each department relies on the support of the civil service
What is individual ministerial responsibility?
The principle that members of the cabinet take ultimately responsibility for what occurs within department, including both administrative and policy failures. They are also responsible to the PM for their personal conduct
Ministerial code of conduct 1997:
- ministers are expected to maintain high standards of behaviour and to behave in a way that upholds the highest standards of prosperity
- harassing, bullying or other discriminating behaviour will not be tolerated
- ministers have a duty to parliament to account and be held to account for the policies and decisions of their departmen and agencies
- ministers are supposed to give accurate and truthful information to parliament and correct inadvertent errors
- ministers can only remain in office so long as they retain the confidence of the PM
Key administrative failures of government:
- the poll tax 1990-91 - which replaced the previous system of property taxes and charged every adult in England Ireland wales and Scotland a flat-rate fee, regardless of income
- the Iraq warm2003under the leadership of Tony Blair who be,in Ed Iraq possessed WMD’s
Why was ‘poll tax’ a failure?
It was highly regressive and disproportionately affected low-income individuals, which led to protests and the 1990 Poll tax riots in London. Poll tax was seen to erode Thatchers’ popularity and contributed to her resignation in 2990, and was replaced with John major who replaced poll tax with council tax
Why was the 2003 Iraq war a failure?
What are key examples of policy failure?
- in 1982 Lord Carrington resigned as foreign server tray from Thatcher’s government after the aftermath of Argentina’s invasion of the Falkland Islands because he saw the foreign office as not being aware enough of Argentina’s intentions and should have made clear what the response of the British gov would be
- ## in 2002, a Tony Blair’s education secretary, Estelle Morris resigned after being caught up in a crisis over who should take responsibility for a scandal involving inappropriate A-Legel grade fixings
Why may ministers have held on to office despite intense parliamentary and media criticism of their department?
They would often argue they they were not personally responsible for the actions of those working in their department or that the policy was one of the whole government
What Policy failure did John Major’s government face and what was the impact?
On ‘black Wednesday’ in 1992, Mjaor’s government was forced to abandon the European exchange rate mechanism (ERM, having raised interests by 5% to retain membership. Norman Lamont (chancellor) was most closely associated with this policy failure however refused to resign because the policy was also that of the Prime Minister’s
What policy failure did government face in 2020 and what was the impact?
During the Covid-19 pandemic, students were given GCSE/A-Level grades based on means of algorithm, which led to many pupils not getting their required uni grades. Hence, Gavin Williamson (education secretary) abandoned the algorithm and pupils were given grades based purely off centre assessments and Williamson remained in his post until he was dismissed by Johnson is 2021
On the 29th April 2018, why did Theresa May’s Home Secretary (Amber Rudd) resign?
After she admitted that she had misled the home affairs select committee and the House of Commons when she stated that there were no home office targets for removing illegal immigrants and as a result sustained attacks from the Labour Party and the media
What are key scandals that ministers have faced that has led to resignation?
- Chris Huh e, energy secretary, 2012 was forced to resign from the coalition over media claims that he had perverted the course of justice by colluding with his former wife so that she took responsibility for his speeding offence and both were sent to prison
- priti patel, international development secretary, 2017 resigned from May’s government over a series of private meetings that she had held with Israeli ministers (including Netanyahu) and her failure to report these put her in conflict with the codes requirement that ‘any significant content should be passed back to the dept. ASAP
- Stella Braver,an, Home Secretary, 2022, resigned after having used her personal email to send an official document to a colleague. After her resignation she then launched an attack on the Prime minister (Liz Truss) expressing her concerns on the direction of government and Sunak appointed her back 25 days after Truss’ resignation
How can a prime minister influence a ministers’ position?
If the prime minister supports them, despite the conventions that says ministers should resign on certain basis’, the PM can salvage a ministers career if they stand by them
Why might a Prime Minister not have the power to back a minister?
If they are a weak/weakened PM
What is a key example of how a weakened PM couldn’t save a ministers’ role?
In 2018, Theresa May had already been weakened by her failure to achieve a majority government in the 2017 election (with only 317 seats), and under her leadership there were continued divisions over the EU withdrawal and the Grenfell tower disaster, so she had little choice to accept Amber Rudd’s resignation as Home Secretary
What were the continued EU divisions/disputes under Theresa May?
How did Theresa May fail to handle to Grenfell disaster?
What is a key example to show that a strong Prime Minister can save the career of a minister?
In 2020, a cabinet office report stated that Priti Patel’s treatment of Sir Philip Rutnam hadn’t met the standards of the ministerial code of conduct regarding the treatment of civil servants, making a strong case for her to resign. However at the height of his power, Johnson continued to give his full support and she didn’t resign
What is the ‘good chaps’ theory?
The principle of individual ministerial responsibility depends on the PM being prepared to hold ministers accountable as well as not breaching of code of conduct themselves
In 2022, when was the ‘good chaps’ theory tested?
When Boris Johnson was accused of misleading parliament over whether he had attended Downing Street parties during lockdown restrictions
What shows the smooth operation of individual ministerial responsibility is dependant of the conduct of the PM?
What is collective ministerial responsibility?
All members of government are expected to publicly support something, and if a minister cannot do this the should resign, they should not disclose the contents of private ministerial discussions and if the government loses a vote of confidence, the whole government must resign
What does collective ministerial responsibility also require?
- a minister to agree with government policy otherwise they will have no choice but to resign and return to the backbenches
What are key examples of high profile ministerial resignations over collective responsibility?
- robin cook, leader of the HOC, 2003
- Boris Johnson, foreign secretary, 2018
- Rishi Sunak, Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Sajid Jarvis, health secretary, 2022
