SPECIAL ADVISERS: THEIR PLACE IN BRITISH GOVERNMENT 
A Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 
by 
Stephen Robert Hanney 
Department of Government, Brunel University 
Brunel University, Uxbridge; Government Department; 
Stephen Robert Hanney; 
Special Advisers: Their Place in British Government; 
1993; Ph. D. 
ABSTRACT 
This thesis examines the recruitment, role, and effectiveness of special 
advisers to departmental ministers between 1970 and 1987 and attempts to 
establish whether their place in the British system of government has 
become institutionalized. Interviews with 160 advisers, ministers and 
former officials, a questionnaire completed by advisers, and relevant 
contemporary literature, provided the principal data. 
The literature, with its diverse theories on ministers' roles and 
relationships with the permanent bureaucracy, supplied a framework 
within which modelling was conducted on both the potential place for 
advisers in the system and the needs of ministers for extra assistance. 
An exploration of reasons given by ministers for appointing advisers 
shows how far ministers felt these needs. 
Evidence from the questionnaires and interviews reveals the wide 
range of activities in which advisers engage and that their role and 
place are products of the interplay of various factors. Variations in 
the effectiveness of advisers are analysed along with case studies 
illustrating their occasional impact on policy making. Limitations on 
advisers, and the characteristics of effective ones, are identified. 
Most features of the advisers' potential place within the system 
are shown to exist, along with an increased formalization of the role. 
Although they are only a partial solution to ministers' problems, the 
issue seems to have become not whether they have a place, but how it 
might be extended. 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 
1: INTRODUCTION AND METHODOLOGY 
A: Setting the Scene 
B: Methodology 
C: Plan of the Thesis 
Page No. 
I 
I 
3 
11 
2: HISTORY, DEFINITIONS, AND CATEGORIES 13 
A: Pre-1970 
B: Developments since 1970 
C: Definitions, Outline of Functions, and Terms 
of Employment 
13 
16 
21 
D: Categories of Special Advisers 36 
3: THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES; MODELS; AND 
INTERNATIONAL COMPARISONS 41 
A: Roles of Ministers 41 
B: Assistance to Ministers 49 
C: Relations Between Ministers and the Bureaucracy 53 
D: Model Showing the Place of Special Advisers 75 
4: REASONS FOR THE APPOINTMENT OF. 
SPECIAL ADVISERS 85. 
A: Ministers' Perceptions of Needs 
B: Ministers' Reasons as 
Seen by Others 
86 
112 
C: Appointment of Special Advisers for Reasons other than 
Needs Perceived by Ministers 128 
5: SELECTION OF SPECIAL ADVISERS, AND 
SUPPLY AND DEMAND 
A: Selection 
143 
143 
B: Supply and Demand 148 
6: FUNCTIONS OF SPECIAL ADVISERS 156 
A: How they Spend Their Time 156 
B: Role of the Prime Minister's Policy Unit 190 
7: INFLUENCES ON THE ROLE OF SPECIAL 
ADVISERS AND HOW FAR A PLACE HAS 
EVOLVED FOR THEM IN THE SYSTEM 198. 
A: The Minister's Developing Needs and Wishes 199 
B: Capabilities of Special Advisers 202 
C: Capabilities, Expectations and Attitudes of People 
Already in Post 
How Far is There a Place for Advisers? 204 
D: Advisers' Exercise of Discretion 234 
E: Evolution and Formalization 239 
8: ASPECTS OF EFFECTIVENESS AND 247 
LIMITATIONS 
A: Activities in Which Advisers Were Effective 
Overall 248 
B: Effectiveness of the Advisers' Network 260 
C: Limitations as Experienced by Advisers 264 
D: The Ambivalent Attitude Adopted Towards Advisers 
by Politicians and Consequent Difficulties 274 
E: Response of the Civil Service 279 
F: Ambiguities in the Role 293 
9:. EXAMPLES AND CHARACTERISTICS OF 
EFFECTIVENESS 299 
A: Impact on Policies 299 
B: Examples of Effective Advisers 315 
C: Characteristics of Effective Advisers 319 
10:. ASSESSMENTS AND PROPOSALS 336 
A: Overall Effectiveness of Individual Special Advisers 
and Criticisms of Their Work 336 
B: Growing Acceptance and Cyclical Phases 341 
C: Appropriateness of the Model of the Place and 
Role of Advisers 349 
D: Effectiveness of Advisers' Contributions to the System 
of Government 353 
E: Proposals for Reform 364 
APPENDIX 1- THE QUESTIONNAIRE SENT 
TO SPECIAL ADVISERS 375 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 381 
LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES IN THE TEXT 
Following 
Page No. 
Figure 
1: Bilateral Relationships Maintained by the 
Minister 44 
2: People who Assist the Minister 49 
3: Bureaucrats and Politicians: Evolving Roles 71 
4: The Place of Special Advisers 75 
5: Meltsner's Typology of Policy Analysts 83 
6: Special Advisers as Research Brokers 193 
Table 
1: Questionnaire Findings on Reasons for Appointment 
- Percentage Response 112 
2: Questionnaire Findings on the Reasons for Appointment 
- Percentage Response Broken Down byParty in 
Government 
3: Questionnaire Findings on Frequency of Contact 
with Various People 
- Percentage Response 
119 
157 
4: Questionnaire Findings on How Time was Spent 
- Percentage Response 157 
5: Questionnaire Findings on Effectiveness 
- Percentage Response 248 
6: Questionnaire Findings on Limitations on Effectiveness 
- Percentage Response 264 
7: Summary of Various Proposals for Reform of 
Special Advisers' System 364 
8: Summary of Functions of each of the Units in Various 
Proposals for Reform 364 
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 
The research project on which this thesis is based was originated by Dr 
William Plowden, former Director-General of the Royal Institute of 
Public Administration (RIPA). I acknowledge with gratitude his 
knowledgeable advice and unfailing encouragement. He secured funding 
from the Leverhulme Trust, to whom considerable thanks are due, and 
gathered an expert steering group to supervise the project. Chaired by 
Professor Maurice Kogan it consisted of: David Lipsey, Sue Richards, Sir 
Adam Ridley, Bill (now Lord) Rodgers, and Norman Warner. Their 
assistance and advice, given both collectively and individually, were 
invaluable. In particular, I am grateful to Maurice Kogan who was also 
my Ph. D supervisor at Brunel and was a frequent source of guidance and 
support. 
I am indebted to the 160 former advisers, ministers, and civil 
servants whose participation in the project in 1987 and 1988 made the 
study possible. Even though not all are mentioned they each supplied me 
with valuable information. 
The RIPA provided a hospitable base from which to conduct the 
research. Ivor Shelley was a particularly valuable source of advice as 
were various visitors to the Institute. Finally I would like to thank 
Judy Wallace for secretarial assistance, and Janine Thomas for expertly 
transcribing the interviews and typing successive drafts of the thesis. 
CHAPTER ONE. INTRODUCTION AND METHODOLOGY. 
SECTION A. ETTI THE SCENE. 
The introduction of special advisers into the permanent, 'neutral', 
civil service still based on the nineteenth century Northcote-Trevelyan 
reforms intended to abolish patronage and jobbery caused strong and 
varied reactions. Diverse views were expressed on both the influence 
and desirability of special advisers: 
It's the most important development in modern government in 
Britain (Bernard - now Lord - Donoughue - in Young and Sloman, 1982, p. 88). 
At best they're a minor cosmetic on the great granite face of 
the body politic (Young and Sloman, p. 91). 
The invasion of Whitehall (Sunday Times, 21 April 1974). 
They've not really made any great contribution to British 
public life ... A high percentage of special advisers have been killed off by not getting the data. (A former civil 
servant). 
It absolutely transformed my life in the department ... greatly strengthened the position of the minister in 
controlling the department (Tony Benn - interview). 
All that seems special to me about these new advisers is that 
their position combines the functions of lesser politicians 
with the salaries of higher Civil Servants (Lord Rothschild, 
1977, p. 170). 
This study will suggest that these views are exaggerations in one 
direction or the other. 
The system of special advisers has existed for a number of years 
and despite the variety of reactions to them there has been no major 
study of the role they have played. In Australia, by contrast, the 
Royal Commission Q11 Australian Government Administration (1976) 
established by the Whitlam Government in 1974 commissioned a report on 
how the new system of 'ministerial advisers', introduced at the end of 
1972, had been operating (Appendix, Vol. 1). As the system has become 
more established in the UK there has been increasing discussion about 
whether it should be extended. In particular, it has been suggested 
1 
that ministers should be assisted not just by one or two advisers but by 
larger and more systematically structured cabinets on the continental 
model. 
This study should help to inform the discussion and shed light on 
the debate about how far the special adviser system should be a step 
towards a cabinet-type system rather than a finished product in its own 
right. Whichever of these two positions is adopted it is of value to 
know how well the system has worked. An analysis of situations in which 
some special advisers have worked most satisfactorily might indicate 
ways in which others could operate more effectively. 
Some of the themes and key questions running through this study 
reflect the comparatively recent development of special advisers and the 
fact that their place in the system of government was still a matter of 
conjecture. The main themes and questions include: What functions do 
special advisers perform? What factors determine the role of special 
advisers? Is there room for them at the point where the political and 
administrative systems meet? How effective have special advisers been? 
Is the role becoming more formalized? Is there a need, and room, for 
the system of special advisers to develop or has it reached an optimum. 
Overall these themes and questions relate to the central hypothesis 
being explored, namely, that special advisers have become sufficiently 
institutionalized for there to be a recognized place for them in the 
British system of government, and that they can play an effective role. 
The hypothesis was refined and developed as a result of discussions on 
the emerging research findings with the steering group. 
It is argued that a multi-theoretical approach should be adopted in 
research into public administration (see, for example, Rhodes, 1991). 
In developing a model of the place of special advisers many theoretical 
perspectives have been drawn upon including some of the language and 
concepts of systems theory. An emphasis on flows of information 
stresses the importance of the role of people who can cross boundaries 
both between the political system and the environment, and within the 
political system itself. The model developed in Chapter 3, and later 
analysed, makes a contribution to a variety of theories about the 
functioning of a system of government in which there are many channels 
2 
of information to and from the political decision makers who are largely 
dependent upon a permanent, neutral, civil service to assist them 
perform their many roles. Overall, however, this study is a micro 
analysis of an historical development rather than being a large scale 
theoretical work. The part played by various theories referred to in 
the study has therefore been primarily as a source to draw upon when 
modelling the potential place of advisers. The individual nature of the 
role of advisers has limited the ability to generalize in ways that 
could make major contributions to theories of government. Furthermore, 
although systems theory provides a useful framework in which to analyse 
the structural forces, especially overload, at work on actors in the 
political system, it is also desirable to attempt to gain an 
understanding of how these forces were perceived by individuals. As 
Pollitt (1984) argues 'action' and 'structure' approaches are not 
incompatible: 'A growing number of published analyses at least lay them 
alongside each other, and with greater or lesser success attempt to 
integrate motivational/intentional with structural elements in a single 
explanatory framework' (p. 177). 
SECTION. METHODOLOGY. 
The literature search revealed that although only a handful of articles 
has been written specifically on special advisers, there are some 
references to advisers in: official reports; Parliamentary Papers; 
politicians' memoirs; and articles and books on topics such as the role 
of ministers, their relations with officials, and policy making. 
Furthermore, the role of special advisers has to be set in the context 
of widely discussed concerns such as civil service reform and how far 
the wishes of ministers are carried out. Some of these issues have 
been popularized by the yz Minis series (Lynn and Jay, 1984,1986, 
and 1987), to which many participants in this study referred. 
References to advisers occur much more frequently in the diaries of some 
ministers, such as Tony Benn and Barbara (now Baroness) Castle, than 
they do in the memoirs of others. Although this is probably partly a 
reflection of the greater length of the diaries and the considerable use 
made of special advisers by those particular diarists, it might also 
illustrate the ever present but background nature of the role played by 
3 
some advisers. Lord Callaghan noted in his autobiography that the role 
of the parliamentary private secretary (PPS) was to be with ministers 
frequently and 'to be observant but usually to be silent - except when 
they are alone together. For this reason ... [they] ... hardly feature 
in this account in their capacity as Parliamentary Private Secretaries; 
but this does not lessen my immense debt to them for all their personal 
and political advice' (1987, p. 14). A somewhat similar role was played 
by many special advisers which reinforced the need to conduct interviews 
to reveal the nature of their contribution. 
The interviews themselves resulted in some further unpublished 
reflections being supplied by former advisers. These, along with the 
many books, articles and official documents consulted, were particularly 
valuable in the historical and theoretical chapters (2 and 3). 
The written material alone, however, was not sufficient. In 
studies such as this which include elite political actors, interviews - 
as open ended as is feasible - are seen as especially appropriate 
sources of information (Dexter, 1970; Kogan, 1975; Young and Mills, 
1980; Aberbach gn1 , 1981; Pollitt, 1984; Pridham, 1987). 
About 160 interviews were conducted with former special advisers, 
former and serving ministers and former officials - mostly permanent 
secretaries and principal private secretaries but also some deputy 
secretaries and chief information officers. The numbers interviewed in 
each category were: 84 former special advisers (five of whom served as 
advisers solely at Number Ten); 51 former officials; and 43 serving and 
former ministers. When added together they total well over 160 because 
some people served in more than one capacity. Serving officials and 
special advisers were forbidden from taking part in the study. Virtually 
all former special advisers who had served at any time between 1970 and 
1987 and who were living in the UK agreed to take part. For one reason 
or another about 26 of the departmental advisers who had served during 
this period did not participate. Probably a slightly higher proportion 
of the 26, than of those who did participate, played a specialist role. 
Nevertheless, evidence gathered in the study about their functions 
suggests that overall their roles were sufficiently varied to mean that 
their lack of participation did not markedly distort the findings. 
4 
The vast majority of the interviews were tape recorded. Although 
some researchers argue against (see, for example, Headey, 1974; Philip 
Williams, 1980) on balance the advantages seem to lie in favour of using 
recorders (Young and Mills) with Dexter moving away from his original 
opposition. The basis upon which the information could be used 
varied. Some interviews were attributable, a few were entirely 
off-the-record and many - especially with former officials - were 
conducted on a non-attributable basis but with the understanding that 
permission could be sought to use information in an attributable or 
identifiable way. When this permission was sought it was given in the 
overwhelming majority of cases. Partly to maintain confidentiality, 
material from the interviews has been used without references, apart 
from the name of the interviewee in cases where material could be used 
on an attributable basis. The vast majority of participants were male; 
therefore, to help preserve anonymity, the male form has been used throughout 
apart from references to specific females. To reduce the inevitable 
congestion of names arising in studies such as this, current titles 
(or last - for all but deceased former prime ministers) have, with a few 
exceptions, been given only at first reference. Furthermore, peers' full 
titles have been applied only where they are necessary to avoid confusion. 
Similarly, where authors are cited and just one of their publications included, 
the date has normally been used only for the first reference to that 
publication. 
There was a positive response to the initial letter from William 
Plowden, then Director-General of the RIPA, in which he invited 
participation. The fact that not only were the interviews to be 
conducted under the auspices of the RIPA, but also most interviewees 
knew at least one member of the steering group, helped provide the 
element of neutrality which is sometimes seen as important in this type 
of research. All the former permanent officials approached agreed to be 
interviewed, as did most of the former ministers. A semi-structured 
approach was adopted and overlapping standard guideline sets of 
questions prepared for each of the three categories - ministers, 
officials and advisers - on the basis of: William Plowden's original 
grant application; initial reading; and discussions, individually and 
collectively, with members of the steering group and other key sources. 
5 
The problems of using material from interviews are well aired by 
those who advocate the approach. The difficulties revolve especially 
around two issues. First, there are doubts about the reliability of 
such evidence. Pollitt said of his research involving a similar (and in 
some cases identical) list of ministers and officials: 'with all the 
interviews there was to greater or lesser extent the danger that the 
interviewee's memory was faulty or misleadingly over-selective, or that 
he or she was "improving history"' (1984, p. 7). 
One of the standard techniques for alleviating this difficulty - 
the use of triangulation (see, for example, Denzin, 1978) - was 
particularly apposite for this study because, the role of each adviser 
was different and, therefore, had to be specifically examined using an 
historical approach which involved attempts to find corroborative 
evidence - from both other interviewees and other sources - for the 
examples given. Consequently, the structure of each interview - 
especially the later ones with ministers and officials - was to varying 
degrees directed towards the testing of specific points about particular 
advisers either appearing in written sources or raised by previous 
interviewees. As far as possible advisers were interviewed first so 
that their perceptions could be fed into later interviews. Where 
earlier interviews had been conducted on the basis that permission had 
to be sought before remarks were attributed, care was taken to 
generalize comments that had, in fact, been made by the specific adviser 
or his minister. 
This triangulation, in turn, however, exacerbated the second 
problem - the complexity of analysing material from interviews other 
than those with a uniform set of questions requiring only short, 
relatively easily coded, answers (see, for example, Aberbach ga al., 
1981). A further factor creating a lack of standardization in the 
interviews was that the experience of ministers and officials ranged 
from working with anything from one up to a dozen advisers. The 
approach in the latter case had to be different from that used in the 
former because each adviser played a unique role. 
6 
Parts of the interviews lent themselves more readily than others to 
systematic analysis. These included ministers' statements of the 
reasons for appointing advisers, and ideas for the development of the 
system. On some such issues it was possible to record the opinions of 
all relevant interviewees which could then be presented in a reasonably 
precise manner. 
For some highly controversial subjects (for example, the advisers' 
role in briefing ministers for Cabinet) it was desirable to collate as 
many opinions as possible. On other topics (for example, the advisers' 
role in speech writing), once a framework for chapters, sections, and 
sub-sections had been provisionally devised on the basis of an initial 
analysis, it was necessary to collate the comments only of certain 
people. These were selected on the following bases: typical and strong 
examples of the particular point; interesting examples showing a wide 
range of opinions; examples where the issue was a major activity of the 
interviewee under consideration; examples illustrating how the All- 
rounder and Highflier categories of effective advisers were developed; 
and instances where use of memory had suggested there were matching 
comments from several witnesses in the same situation (for example, Home 
Office ministers, officials and advisers all stressing the importance of 
the advisers' contributions to speech writing). Similar criteria were 
adopted when deciding which examples, out of the frequently numerous 
ones collated, to include in the study to illustrate particular 
arguments. With the role of advisers varying so much, and often 
depending on the specific requirements of the minister, the widespread 
use of attributable quotations and opinions was appropriate and gives 
authenticity to the study. 
A further criteria used to determine the selection of examples was 
that frequent use was made of material from members of the steering 
group thus enabling account to be taken of their expert comments on the 
analysis of their experience. 
One justification for the inevitably selective approach in the 
collation of material is that systematic evidence on a range of items 
came from the use of a questionnaire. 
7 
Some of the advantages of using a questionnaire in addition to more 
open-ended interview techniques are described by Aberbach gL1: 
a short answer questionnaire was used to supplement, and in 
some respects validate, responses from the open-ended 
questions ... Had we known then what we 
have subsequently 
learned, we very likely would have standardized more short- 
answer questions across a wider array of samples. For our 
purposes, however, neither technique alone could have yielded 
the combination of nuance gleaned from open-ended materials 
and the highly standardized data developed from the short- 
answer questions. (1981, p. 34-5). 
In this study the questionnaire (which is reproduced as Appendix 1) 
was sent to departmental advisers, and usually completed, prior to the 
interview. The questionnaire was designed using the same procedures 
adopted for the development of the interview schedules. Of the 79 
departmental advisers, 75 answered the questionnaire (one completed it 
but then pulled out of the interview because of illness and died shortly 
afterwards). The most important aspects of it were tick boxes rather 
than short-answer questions. The questionnaire ensured that basic 
information about advisers was obtained. This not only often saved 
interview time, but also meant material could be systematically collated 
and presented on: the frequency of contact between advisers and various 
people; reasons for appointment; functions; assessments of 
effectiveness; and limitations. This was especially worthwhile given 
that a large proportion of the total possible population was included 
and the difficulties involved in getting a representative sample did not 
really arise. The questionnaires, particularly those returned prior to 
the interview, often provided the basis for follow-up questions which 
might not necessarily have arisen naturally during the course of the 
interview. Furthermore, sending out questionnaires encouraged advisers 
to think about the items to be discussed, which in many cases were 
events taking place some years earlier. 
The final point, however, is perhaps the most contentious of the 
suggested advantages of using questionnaires because such an approach 
would be criticized by those who believe that it inhibits the 
respondents' ability to give a spontaneous recall of the situation 
(Dexter, for example, refused even to provide examples of the questions 
he was proposing to ask). Some of the further objections to 
8 
questionnaires are not so great in this study as they are for others. 
Headey (1974) suggests that in his research on ministers a questionnaire 
- type approach would have been inappropriate. Ministers might have 
thought they were constitutionally expected to fulfil certain role and, 
therefore, if asked to rank a list of functions might, for example, have 
placed playing a particular role high even when this was not the case 
because they felt it would be expected of them. The lack of 
standardization in the role of advisers means that such a danger was 
absent from this study. Furthermore, Headey's objection that in 
interviewing political leaders, 'the researcher typically does not have 
a strictly representative, let alone a random sample' (p. 57) does not 
apply, as was described above. 
There were, inevitably, further difficulties with the construction 
of the questionnaire and analysis of its results. An attempt was made 
to pilot the questionnaire by arranging a meeting of the project's 
steering group to discuss progress after 15 questionnaires (and rather 
more interviews) had been conducted. However, because those advisers 
included at the pilot stage constituted about a fifth of the total 
population to whom the questionnaire was to be directed, it did not seem 
appropriate to change any of the questions. This meant, in particular, 
that question 16j) remained unaltered even though its ambiguity soon 
became obvious. Instead of changing questions, a few more points were 
added to the ends of questions 14,15, and 18. Another reason for the 
total number of responses to the questions varying was that, in a few 
cases, advisers who had experience of more than one department and/or 
minister ticked more than one box for certain questions but not for 
others. Furthermore, where some questions on a page were not answered 
but others were, those not answered were assumed to be in the 
negligible/never/insignificantly box and counted accordingly. This 
seems appropriate even though on a few occasions the question had 
probably been overlooked rather than being deliberately not answered 
because of its insignificance. A few of the 75 questionnaires returned 
contained no answer at all to any of the tick-box questions on certain 
pages - particularly to question 17), on effectiveness. In such cases 
nothing was recorded for those questions. 
9 
One adviser had completed the questionnaire prior to the interview 
but then could not find it and so completed another one. He 
subsequently found the first and sent it to enable a comparison to be 
made between the two sets of answers. The match was reasonable, 
although far from perfect. This, combined with comments made during the 
interviews, suggests that there was some ambiguity about the meaning of 
certain questions and a degree of unreliability in the responses given. 
This factor, in addition to the failure of some advisers to answer 
certain questions at all, indicates that it was correct to assume that 
given the much greater salience of these questions to advisers than to 
ministers and officials, the questionnaire should be limited to 
advisers. 
There was often a good correlation between the results from the 
questionnaire and the picture portrayed in the interviews. Where, 
however, the early impression gained from the interviews suggested (as 
with the proportion of time spent discussing issues with the minister) 
there was a conflict, particular attention was given both to collate 
material on this and search for possible explanations. Similar care was 
taken - both during the later interviews and in the analysis of all of 
them - to gather opinions on matters where questionnaire evidence was at 
variance with other sources. Attention was paid, for example, to why 
comparatively few advisers thought lack of proper position within the 
administrative chain of command was a serious problem at a time when 
several reports were calling for advisers to be given a more formal 
position within departments. 
The limitations, but also advantages, of using a questionnaire 
highlight the appropriateness of the conclusion, as reached by Aberbach 
cl al., that a combination of interviews and questionnaires is a most 
productive method to adopt. 
10 
SECTION f., j PLAN OF THE THESIS. 
Although the period examined in this study starts in 1970, people have 
always been used in various personal advisory capacities by ministers, 
especially prime ministers. A brief examination of these earlier roles, 
and the various phases in the development of the system of special 
advisers since 1970, helps establish a definition for them, and assists 
in identifying the main categories. In contrast to the dearth of 
material solely relating to the role of special advisers, there is a 
considerable literature and a variety of theoretical perspectives on the 
role of ministers and their relationship with the permanent bureaucracy, 
and many international comparisons can be made. A review of this 
material provides a framework within which the various themes and 
questions can be addressed and some modelling attempted on the potential 
place for advisers in the system of government. 
Theoretical perspectives and international comparisons provide 
various pointers to the potential needs of ministers for additional 
assistance. An exploration of reasons given by ministers for appointing 
special advisers shows how far, in practice, ministers perceived these 
needs. The appointment of advisers by some ministers also reflects the 
encouragement they received from other people, including party officials 
and members of the Prime Minister's Policy Unit. Evidence from the 
questionnaires and interviews reveals the range of activities in which 
special advisers engage. The role or place of special advisers is a 
product of the interplay of various factors which are examined 
including: reasons for appointment; ministers' continuing needs; 
advisers' capabilities; and how far other people already in post carry 
out the functions performed by special advisers. 
Various aspects of the effectiveness of advisers and limitations on 
them are examined. Some case studies illustrate the impact advisers can 
sometimes have on policy making, and an analysis of the contributions 
made by some successful special advisers allows the characteristics of 
effective advisers to be identified. Most features of the advisers' 
potential place in the system are shown to exist, along with an 
increased institutionalization of the role. An examination of proposals 
for reform is informed by an analysis of how the current system is 
11 
working and the extent to which it supplies solutions to ministers' 
problems. 
12 
CHAPTER TWO: HISTORY. DEFINITIONS. AND CATEGORIES. 
SECTION A PRE-1970. 
Analysis of the history and definitions of special advisers reveals that 
their place in the system of government is not always easy to define. 
There have always been some 'outsiders' appointed as temporary civil 
servants. This was particularly the case during, and following, the 
Second World War as shown by Hennessy and Hague (1985) in: How Adolf 
Hitler Reformed Whitehall. They suggest that the people brought in were 
used, 'in almost every capacity except that of a Minister' (p. 31). 
Clearly many of them were used in roles different from those filled by 
today's special advisers. 
However, at various times three categories of people played a role 
which might be thought somewhat analogous to that of those who are now 
called special advisers: 
(i) people brought into work for prime ministers; 
(ii) people brought into the private offices of departmental 
ministers; 
(iii) specialists (often politically committed) introduced into 
departments. 
People Brought in IQ ý fQr Ed= Ministers. 
Until the 1920s there were always some personal and political appointees 
serving in the Prime Minister's private office (Jones, 1978). Most 
later prime ministers also brought at least one person into Number Ten 
in a staff capacity, for example, in 1964 Harold Wilson (now Lord Wilson 
of Rievaulx) appointed Marcia Williams (now Baroness Falkender) as his 
Personal and Political Secretary (Marcia Williams, 1975, p. 24); and John 
Wyndham (later Lord Egremont) joined Harold Macmillan's private 
secretaries at Number Ten in 1957. The informal and ill-defined nature 
of the role is well illustrated by Wyndham's description of a meeting 
after he had agreed to join Number Ten: 
13 
I met my future colleagues to fix up the job. They asked what 
conditions I had in mind to make. They were a bit surprised 
when I quoted them the story of the Duc d'Aumale and Sarah 
Bernhardt. The Duc sent her a message from his box in the 
theatre where she was acting: 'Ou, quand, combien?. ' In the 
interval Sarah sent back a note: 'Chez moi, ce soir, pour 
rien. ' (Egremont, 1968, p. 162). 
The Prime Minister's Policy Unit also had precedents including: Lloyd 
George's 'garden secretariat' under Professor Adams; the statistical 
section of Professor Lindemann (later Lord Cherwell) which served 
Churchill during the Second World War; Douglas (later Lord) Jay who 
advised Clement Attlee on economic matters in the first year of the 1945 
Labour Government; and a team of academics under the guidance of Thomas 
(later Lord) Balogh who worked for Harold Wilson from 1964 (Jones, 
1978). According to Turner (1980) Lloyd George's 'Garden Suburb was the 
earliest of a number of attempts to strengthen the Prime Minister's hold 
over central government. ' (p. 1). The developments since 1964 were also 
seen as marking an important change: 'In this period [1964-1976] 
attempts were made by prime ministers to counterbalance the long- 
established predominance of civil servants at Number Ten through the 
introduction of a more explicit personal and political set of advisers. 
Indeed, it might be said that they sought to return to the older 
tradition of having their personal adherents with them. ' (Jones, 1987, 
p. 46). 
Outsiders Brought jn Ministers' Private Offices. 
There is a long tradition of some departmental ministers introducing 
advisers into their private office or appointing them in a personal 
staff capacity. Lloyd George for example brought outsiders into his 
private office at the Board of Trade and Hennessy (1988) described John 
Rowland as 'his special adviser in today's terminology' (p. 58). Of all 
departments the Foreign Office has had the most consistent tradition of 
ministers appointing 'outsiders'. Philip (later Lord) Noel-Baker was 
appointed as private secretary by Lord Robert Cecil and later Lord 
Parmoor when they had ministerial responsibilities for the League of 
Nations (Parmoor, 1936). In 1925 the Labour Party's International 
Advisory Committee, suspicious of the Foreign Office's role in the 
Zinoviev Letter incident, proposed that any Labour Foreign Secretary 
14 
should have a 'political' private secretary who should be a Labour Party 
member and in 1929 Arthur Henderson also appointed Philip Noel-Baker to 
be his PPS but he was described as 'a prototype special adviser' by 
Theakston (1988, p. 13). Others brought into the Foreign Office as 
personal appointments - but not always in the private office - include: 
Stuart Hampshire for Philip Noel-Baker (Healey, 1989, p. 107); John 
Wyndham for Harold Macmillan; Bill Grieg, who continued as personal 
press adviser for George Brown (later Lord George-Brown) when he moved 
to the Foreign Office from the Department of Economic Affairs; and John 
Harris (now Lord Harris of Greenwich) for Patrick Gordon Walker (later 
Lord Gordon Walker) and Michael Stewart (later Lord Stewart of Fulham). 
John Harris later worked as special assistant to Roy Jenkins (now Lord 
Jenkins of Hillhead) in the Home Office and the Treasury. During the 
war the temporary civil servant, Hugh Gaitskell, was appointed as 
'Principal Private Secretary and, in effect, Ch ff dg Cabinet' by Hugh 
(later Lord) Dalton (Pimlott, 1985, p. 283). 
Specialists (often Politically Committed) introduced ir 
Departments. 
Prior to 1964 some specialists were brought in to departments by 
ministers, for example, Sir Percy (later Lord) Mills was appointed to 
advise on, and lead, the house building programme by Harold Macmillan, 
Minister for Housing (Macmillan, 1969, pp. 385-402); and Professor 
Lindemann was first appointed by Winston Churchill when he was First 
Lord of the Admiralty in 1939 (MacDougall, 1987, p. 20). However, this 
third category of pre-1970 appointments illustrates the case that could 
be made for suggesting 1964 rather than 1970 saw the start of special 
advisers. Young and Sloman, for example, claim that, 'as long ago as 
1964 a new Whitehall species was born: the political or special adviser, 
half-politician and half-official' (1982, p. 88). The mid 1960s, 
especially 1964, is also the starting date referred to by several other 
commentators including Fry (1986); Hennessy (1986); and Drewry and 
Butcher (1988). A similar view is taken by some former permanent 
secretaries including Ian (now Lord) Bancroft who was private secretary 
to the Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1964 and claims that, 'the special 
advisers came along first of all in force in 1964'. 
15 
Most of the sizable number in this category were appointed by 
Labour ministers in the 1960s and many were politically committed to the 
Labour Government (see, for example, Brittan, 1969, and 
1971; Kogan, 1971; Crossman, 1975, and 1977; Chester, 1982; 
Castle, 1984). They include: Brian Abel-Smith, Peter Lederer, David 
Piachaud appointed by Richard Crossman; Bill (now Lord) McCarthy by 
Barbara Castle; A. H. Halsey by Anthony Crosland and many 
economists by these and other ministers. The economists include: 
Wilfred Beckerman, Ian Byatt, Christopher (now Sir Christopher) Foster, 
David Henderson, Nicholas (later Lord) Kaldor, Robert Neild, Michael 
Posner, Derek Robinson, Dudley Seers, Paul Streeten, Gordon Wasserman. 
A team of Industrial Advisers under Frederick (now Sir Frederick) 
Catherwood, and later Campbell (now Sir Campbell) Adamson, were 
recruited for George Brown's new Department of Economic Affairs and 
their role is described in Adamson, 1968. 
Some ministers also had a circle of friends, including academics 
and specialists, with whom they would discuss issues. Both Crosland and 
Crossman (for whom Arnold (later Lord) Goodman was particularly 
influential) are examples. One of the roles played by some later 
special advisers, including John (now Sir John) Cope for Peter (now 
Lord) Walker at the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and Robbie 
Gilbert for Jim (now Lord) Prior at the Department of Employment, was to 
maintain links with equivalent groups of people or organize meetings 
between them and the minister. 
SECTION Ik DEVELOPMENTS SINCE 1970" 
This study concentrates on the period since 1970, whilst recognizing the 
importance of the previous developments, especially between 1964 and 
1970. In 1970,1974, and 1979 there were noticeable changes in the 
number and the nature of 'outsider' appointments following the change of 
government. In 1974 Rose, in Problems Qf ENU Government, claimed 
that, 'In constituting the 1970 Conservative government, Edward Heath 
imported irregulars to government in a more systematic and larger 
number' (p. 399). Although the degree of systematization might have been 
exaggerated by Rose, this statement indicates why 1970 was thought to be 
an appropriate starting point for this project. He argued that in 1970 
16 
the Conservatives differed from Labour in two significant ways. First, 
'the Conservatives had worked out more legislative policies in detail. 
Secondly, the Conservatives brought into Whitehall a group of special 
advisers and political secretaries who had been working under the aegis 
of the Conservative Research Department' (p. 420). Writing in 1977 in 
Australia, R. Smith, noted that in the UK, 'In opposition the 
Conservatives have been critical of Labour's use of advisers even though 
Labour merely expanded a Conservative experiment' (p. 139). 
Lord Hunt of Tanworth (1987) suggests that an important element in 
the realization of the need for more advisory capacity for ministers 
occurred towards the end of the Wilson Government in the 1960s. There 
was, 'considerable dissatisfaction among ministers with the advice they 
had been given; they had the feeling that they were being blown off 
course needlessly' (p. 67). Such thinking was reflected on by the Tories 
in Opposition and partly as a result several varieties of irregulars 
were appointed in 1970. Of the small group of political secretaries 
two, Douglas Hurd and later William Waldegrave, worked for the Prime 
Minister. Even after a slight increase in 1972-3 this group only 
numbered seven. Some of them were located in their minister's private 
office, most had been at the Conservative Research Department (CRD) and 
most continued to be paid by the Conservative Party. Rose referred to 
John Harris as the 'precursor' of this group but claimed that, 'Harris's 
appointment was not part of a general strategy of the first Wilson 
administration' (1974, p. 451). In interview several permanent 
secretaries agreed with this analysis. Another group of irregulars were 
'the Businessmen's Team' who had been recruited in Opposition and who, 
along with the Central Policy Review Staff (CPRS), were more explicitly a 
product of thinking developed in Opposition than were the political 
secretaries. The team of businessmen, who included Derek (now Lord) 
Rayner and Richard (now Sir Richard) Meyjes, had no specific 
departmental responsibilities l sc but were all located in the Civil 
Service Department (CSD) and were concerned with a number of projects 
(see Pollitt, 1984, pp. 85-103). 
Illustrating the very ill-defined nature of these two categories of 
irregulars, Arthur (now Lord) Cockfield, a former Commissioner of the 
Board of Inland Revenue and senior businessman, was appointed to be 
17 
'Adviser on Taxation Policy to the Chancellor of the Exchequer'. He was 
called that, 'for want of any other title', and seems to have played a 
role more akin to that of some later senior special advisers than did 
any of the Businessmen's Team of which he was not technically a member 
anyway. 
There was a large increase in the number of special advisers 
following the election of the Labour Government in 1974. Illustrating 
how this could be interpreted as a continuation of the Conservatives' 
introduction of political secretaries rather than a return to the Labour 
approach of 1964, Rose (1974, p. 444) claimed, 'the advent of the second 
Wilson government demonstrated that the Conservative innovation of 1970 
has bi-partisan support, for many departmental ministers promptly 
announced the appointment of a political secretary or adviser within 
their private office. ' Harold Wilson claimed that in 1974 the system 
had been, 'regularized' (Wilson, 1976, p. 98). One of the major themes 
of this study is to consider whether the appointment and use of special 
advisers has been formalized sufficiently for the phrase, 'the system of 
special advisers' to be appropriate. To the extent that this has taken 
place, then the system is probably most accurately described as dating 
from 1974. 
It is sometimes claimed that as far as Labour ministers were 
concerned there were two distinct phases in the development, with the 
1960s seeing the more specialist or technical adviser and the 1970s the 
addition of the political adviser. In 1973 Barbara Castle reflected on 
her ministerial experience in the 1960s in a talk given, at Sunningdale, 
to senior civil servants. It was written up in jg Sunday Times on 10 
June under the heading Mandarin Power. In it she both described how the 
special advisers of the 1960s were not fully integrated into the team 
surrounding the minister, and advocated the introduction into the 
private offices of future Labour ministers of a new type of political 
adviser in addition to the specialists. 
In 1974 numbers went up to almost 40, a quarter of whom were in the 
Prime Minister's Policy Unit headed by Bernard Donoughue. They were 
virtually all appointed to be temporary civil servants and the term 
'special adviser' was commonly used for the first time. The figure 
18 
dropped to 24 by the middle of 1976 and remained at about that level 
until 1979. The numbers are illustrated in the following exchange on 21 
June 1976 when the Minister for the Civil Service replied to a 
Parliamentary Question from Ian Gow, the most persistent Tory critic of 
advisers, about the number of special advisers and their cost: 
Mr Charles R. Morris: Twenty four special advisers are 
currently employed by the Government, at a total annual cost 
of x160,000. 
Mr Gow: Will the Minister accept the congratulations of the 
House that the number of special advisers has been reduced 
from the figure of 29 in January, and their salaries from the 
figure of £196,000 in January? (Official R Q=. Vol. 913, 
cols 1090-1). 
A limit of two special advisers to a department was soon imposed - 
although the Department of Health and Social Security (DHSS) already 
had, and retained, more than that. Roger Darlington wrote in The Times 
on 18 July 1978 that, 'since July 1975 there has been a rule (in a 
minute from Harold Wilson) that Cabinet ministers should not employ more 
than two special advisers. ' Donoughue and Tom McNally agree that the 
limit of two was introduced to stop Tony Benn, in McNally's words, 
'staffing up a private army. ' Despite some contrary opinions the July 
1975 date for the introduction of the limit of two is supported by Tony 
Banks. He lost his special adviser's position in July 1975 when Judith 
(later Baroness) Hart was dropped as Minister for Overseas Development. 
Benn offered to appoint him as his third special adviser at the 
Department of Energy but the Prime Minister prevented this on grounds of 
numbers. 
In some departments a clear distinction could be made between 
specialist advisers and political advisers. The former are people 
chosen primarily for their subject expertise and the latter (generally 
younger than the specialists) are chosen for the contribution they can 
make based on their partisan loyalty to their minister rather than on 
any substantial policy expertise. Following the election of Margaret 
(now Baroness) Thatcher in 1979 there was a significant drop in numbers 
to about a dozen, of whom only two were in the Policy Unit. The total 
figure was probably less, Sir John Hoskyns suggested, 'than the number 
of people employed in storing and changing the pictures in ministers' 
19 
offices' (1982, p. 15). 
Since 1979 there has been a gradual increase in numbers so that 
prior to the 1987 election there were about 25, with the Policy Unit 
back to its 1970s strength although several of its members were not 
special advisers but permanent officials seconded from departments. The 
increase tended to be in the number of political, as opposed to 
specialist, departmental advisers. With a few exceptions there has been 
an informal limit imposed by the Prime Minister of one special adviser 
to a department. The Seventh Report from the Treasury and Civil Service 
Committee, Session 1985-86, was entitled Civil Servants Alld Ministers: 
Duties and Responsibilities (1986). Considerable evidence was gathered 
for the Select Committee by a sub-committee. In its response the 
Government stated that the appropriate number of special advisers 
depends upon the size and range of the department and the minister's 
wishes but, 'the Government believes that the number of such advisers 
should generally not exceed one per department, and that, as a general 
rule, only Cabinet Ministers (and in exceptional cases other Ministers 
in charge of departments) should need a Special Adviser. ' (Cmnd. 9841, 
1986, para. 34). The Treasury however has consistently maintained three 
special advisers throughout this period. The assumption by Treasury 
ministers that they would maintain the team of three advisers is 
illustrated by Douglas French. He says that when Peter Cropper went 
from being a Treasury adviser to being Director of the CRD, the 
Chancellor asked him (French) to take over the special adviser position: 
'I suppose he rang me because when he was in Opposition I had worked 
with him [up until 1976]. ... So he knew me and he knew the post he 
wanted to fill and I suppose he felt the two went together. ' 
Although the period covered by the present study finished with the 
1987 General Election it is relevant to note several developments since 
then. The number of departmental special advisers has continued to 
increase and special advisers have been given their own pay spine - 
something which had been sought for a long time. 
20 
ENC DEFINITIONS. OUTLINE QE FUNCTIONS. AND 
TERMS QE EMPLOYMENT. 
In the 1960s the term 'irregulars' was used but an authoritative 
definition of such people was elusive. According to Sam Brittan, 
The 'irregular' official or adviser, who has been a feature of 
the Whitehall scene under Labour is not the same thing as the 
traditional 'temporary'. Many years before 1964 there were 
temporary civil servants in the professional grades, recruited 
for specific purposes. The Economic Section of the Treasury, 
for example, was for long recruited on this basis ... The basic difference between the temporaries and the 'irregulars' 
is that ministers are much more involved in the appointment of 
irregulars than of temporaries. The 'irregular' does not owe 
his appointment to the civil service machine, and his place in 
the hierarchy is less closely defined... In practice the 
distinction is blurred at the edges. There are many people of 
whom it is quite impossible to say whether they are 
temporaries or irregulars (1969, p. 331). 
A sharp distinction must be drawn, Klein and Lewis (1977) however argue, 
between special advisers and 'the much larger and more heterogeneous 
category of "irregulars" ... This category covers a variety of advisers 
and experts brought into government departments (as distinct from being 
personally attached to Ministers) by both the 1964 Labour and the 1970 
Conservative Administrations. Special advisers, in effect, are a 
particular sub-group of the species "irregulars" ' (pp. 3 and 24-5). 
Klein and Lewis argue that the special advisers' role is different from 
that of the economists imported into the Department of Economic Affairs 
by the Labour Government in 1964 or from the businessmen recruited by 
the Heath Administration. 
Various categories of 'outsiders' are not usually considered to be 
special advisers. They include: the CPRS; most of those recruited into 
the civil service during the war, some of whom continued serving 
governments of different parties after it for example Oliver (later 
Lord) Franks and Edwin (now Lord) Plowden; most of the economists 
recruited to the civil service by the 1964 Labour Government. In his 
autobiography, Sir Donald MacDougall, who was recruited to the 
Department of Economic Affairs in 1964, attempted to distinguish between 
various economists most of whom were appointed at the same time. He 
reported that he chaired a group of Economic Advisers consisting of six 
21 
people: Alec Cairncross, John Jukes and himself were non-political but, 
'three might be termed "political" advisers. ' They were Neild, Kaldor 
and Balogh (MacDougall, 1987 p. 151). Most, if not all, of the 
economists recruited to departments such as the Ministry of Overseas 
Development (ODM) soon became accepted by ministers and other officials 
as a permanent part of the department so that in none of her three 
periods as political head of the ministry did Judith Hart regard the 
economists as being her personal advisers: 'they were totally integrated 
into the department. ' The report on the 'irregulars' appointed after 
1964 which was prepared by the Fabians for the Fulton Committee argued 
that many irregulars were economists and 'helped to build up the 
Government's staff of economics and statistical experts' (Fulton Report, 
1968, Vol 5 (2), p. 559). Evidence that the development of such 
specialist staff involved far more than just the provision of personal 
support staff for ministers came where the Fabian Society advocated that 
only 'in some more senior cases' (p. 565) should the 'irregulars' enjoy 
access to the minister. 'Irregulars' not enjoying regular access to the 
minister would not usually be classified as special advisers. 
For some groups included in the historical analysis in Sections A 
and B it is less clear whether they would now be regarded as special 
advisers. In some ways it is rather contrived to attempt to impose 
later categorization on people who were performing or developing roles 
considered important by the minister for whom they were working. The 
difficulty, and to some extent artificiality, in drawing a sharp 
distinction in practice between special advisers and other 'irregulars', 
especially for the 1964-70 period, again indicates why 1970 is a more 
appropriate starting date for this study. Nevertheless, it is important 
to define the people who have been regarded as central figures in this 
analysis, and an examination of various groups helps when compiling a 
list of features to include in the definition of special advisers. 
Of the pre-1970 categories, many of the individuals named in 
Section A would later have been regarded as special advisers. Indeed a 
few of them, i. e. Abel-Smith, Kaldor, and Lynes were officially 
designated as special advisers to ministers in the 1974 Labour 
Government, and Piachaud became a special adviser in the Policy Unit. 
Similarly two of the economists appointed to work for Balogh in the 
22 
1960s (Stuart Holland and Michael Stewart), and Francis Cripps who 
worked for Kaldor, became special advisers in 1974. In subsequent 
writing a number of these 1964 advisers are referred to as special 
advisers. Hennessy (1988, p. 172) says, for example, that Neild, 
'entered the Treasury with Labour as a special adviser in October 1964, ' 
and Neild writes that Kaldor, 'was special adviser to the Chancellor of 
the Exchequer during the Labour governments of the 1960s and 1970s' 
(Guardian. 2 October 1986). In reality in 1964, as one of the Treasury 
officials of the time argued, there was a great influx of economists and 
special advisers and they were often the same people. 
However, several of the 1960s economists were given more specific 
posts within the civil service than those occupied by later special 
advisers. For example: Neild, whom Brittan (1969, p. 336) called, 'the 
most effective of the original irregulars', became Economic Adviser to 
the Treasury in 1964; Foster became Director-General of Economic 
Planning at the Ministry of Transport in 1966; and Seers became 
Director-General of Economic Planning at the ODM in 1964. Similarly the 
'Industrial Advisers' probably occupied more of a role as advisers to 
the department, rather than the secretary of state, than did later 
special advisers. Such an interpretation is supported by the words of 
Sir Douglas Allen (now Lord Croham). In 1967 he described the role of 
'the ft=ent's small but highly expert team of Industrial Advisers' 
(p. 353 - emphasis added) despite the fact that R. G. S. Brown (1965, 
p. 330) referred to Catherwood as being a 'personal adviser' to the 
minister. 
Blackstone (1979) includes the 1970 Conservative Government's 
businessmen with the special advisers category and in the House of 
Commons on 10 May 1976, Tim Sainsbury, a former member of the 
Businessmen's Team who had subsequently been elected to Parliament, 
implied that he regarded himself as having been a special adviser: 
Mr Sainsbury asked the Minister for the Civil Service what 
advice is now given to special advisers with regard to their 
political activities. 
Mr Charles R, Morris: In December 1974 the previous Prime 
Minister issued a memorandum of guidance to Ministers in 
charge of Departments about the terms and conditions of 
employment of special advisers. This guidance still stands. 
23 
Mr Sainsbury: Is the Minister aware that when I was a special 
adviser I was expected to, and did, resign from my ward 
committee to conform to the strict rules that were then in 
force and that should still be in force? Is he satisfied that 
those same strict rules are enforced now? 
Mr Morris: Yes ... (Official $g . Vol. 911, col. 23). 
By contrast Charles Morris had only a few months earlier on 23 
February replied to another of the numerous Tory attacks on the cost of 
special advisers by pointing out that under the Heath Government, 'in 
addition to special advisers the civil service administration had to 
live with businessmen's teams. ' (Official Report. Vol. 906, col. 21). 
As in Klein and Lewis's study therefore, the businessmen will not be 
counted as special advisers. 
Definition 4f dial Advisers and Outline Qf Their Current Role. 
Various features distinguish special advisers although not every point 
applies to all: 
(i) They are appointed by the minister for whom they work: 'a Political 
Adviser is the personal appointment of his Minister. ' (Wilson, 1976, 
p. 203)) 
(ii) They are appointed to serve in a full time or part time capacity in 
their minister's department. Even if they are not paid they have an 
official status that distinguishes them from friends of the minister 
whom he might consult on particular issues, for example William (now 
Lord) Wedderburn who advised Michael Foot in an unofficial capacity on 
Trade Union legislation. The vast majority of special advisers become 
temporary civil servants; most are paid directly but in a few cases 
their employer receives compensation from public funds. Even though 
Lord Glenamara (formerly Ted Short) suggested that calling special 
advisers civil servants was only a device for paying them, they are 
generally expected to adhere to civil service regulations. In 1986 the 
Treasury and Civil Service Committee made the accepted position clear by 
stating that the Head of the Civil Service, Sir Robert (now Lord) 
Armstrong had told them that special advisers 'are civil servants and 
they are bound by all the conventions of civil servants' (Vol. 1, para. 
5.21). 
(iii) They serve for only as long as the individual who appointed them 
24 
remains the minister in the department and wishes them to continue in 
post; although if the party remains in power they can be reappointed by 
a new minister in the same department or be appointed to serve in a 
different department. Edward Bickham, for example, was appointed by Jim 
Prior, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, in 1983. He was 
reappointed to be special adviser in the Northern Ireland Office (NIO) 
by Douglas Hurd when he became Northern Ireland Secretary in 1984 on the 
resignation of Prior. Hurd subsequently took Bickham with him as 
special adviser when he became Home Secretary in 1985. Following the 
reappointment of Hurd as Home Secretary in the new Government formed by 
Mrs Thatcher after the June 1987 General Election, Bickham was 
reappointed as special adviser. The potentially precarious nature of 
the position is illustrated by several examples. David Coleman was 
given up to two years leave of absence from Oxford University to take up 
a post as special adviser to the Home Secretary, Leon (now Sir Leon) 
Brittan, who wished him to start almost immediately. Initially, 
therefore, in April 1985, he began part time, and had not cleared his 
university office for his replacement before Brittan was moved from the 
Home Office in the July reshuffle, resulting in Coleman having to clear 
his room in the Home Office as the new Home Secretary brought Bickham 
with him. Coleman became adviser to the newly appointed ministers of 
state in the Department of the Environment (DoE). Michael Stewart took 
up his appointment as special adviser to the Foreign Secretary only a 
few days before Tony Crosland's death. However, the new Foreign 
Secretary, Dr David (now Lord) Owen, 'wanted him to stay and thought it 
was quite a generous decision on his part to stay. ' 
(iv) They work directly to the minister. G. S. A. Wheatcroft is an 
example of a borderline case who would not really count as a special 
adviser partly because he did not work directly to the minister. 
Although he had helped the Conservative Opposition develop its Value 
Added Tax (VAT) proposals in the late 1960s and was appointed by the 
Chancellor, his appointment was as honorary adviser to Customs and 
Excise Department on technical VAT problems. Johnstone (1975) said of 
his work: 
25 
The situation created when an 'outside' adviser comes to 
occupy a room in a government department and look over the 
shoulders of a group of civil servants going about their 
professional avocations is always potentially delicate, but 
its handling by Ash Wheatcroft ... was an object-lesson in 
wisdom, tact and charm - assisted possibly by the fact that he 
was officially attached to the department itself and not to 
its Minister (p. 15). 
(v) They are cleared to see official papers and they have to be 
positively vetted although at least one refused. 
(vi) They cover a broad field of work. 
(vii) They do not have executive functions or authority over civil 
servants. 
In various Labour Party/Fabian publications (for example, Labour's 
evidence to the Fulton Committee (Vol. 5 (2) pp. 652-673); ßh 
Administrators (Fabian Society, 1964); Labour's Eij= Hundred Days 
(Pimlott, 1987)) at least two types of political appointment have been 
advocated. First, political advisers who would work very closely with 
ministers and would clearly be counted as special advisers. Second, 
policy experts who would work more in an executive capacity within the 
civil service machine. To the extent that Labour ministers followed 
this second approach, some appointments, especially in the 1964-70 
period, are on the borderline of fitting the above definition of special 
advisers, for example, Christopher Foster, Dudley Seers and Robert 
Neild. Chester suggests (1982) that although Kaldor, Balogh, and Neild 
were all political appointees, only the first two were clearly seen as 
being sufficiently special and distinctive not to raise problems about 
the relationship with the Economic Section. 
Terms Used. 
A bewildering variety of sometimes overlapping terms have been used to 
describe the people appointed by ministers to work closely with them in 
departments. Of the two above categories used by Labour the first are 
political advisers but the use of that term is not restricted to 
politically committed, often young, people working very closely to the 
minister. The term is also sometimes used to cover the whole category 
that others refer to as special advisers. Joan Mitchell (1978), former 
26 
special adviser to Shirley Williams, thought that political adviser was 
the parliamentary term and special adviser was the civil service term. 
From 1970-4 the term political secretary was favoured, and is still used 
by the Prime Minister for the Number Ten adviser responsible for matters 
such as party liaison. 
In his 1975 statement to the Commonwealth Heads of Government 
Conference, Harold Wilson referred to, 'The "Political Advisers" 
Experiment. ' (see Appendix 5 to Ig Governance Qf Britain. 1976, 
pp. 202-5). By then, however, as noted above, the official guidelines 
from Number Ten were already using the term special advisers. In a 
Written Answer to a Parliamentary Question on 10 April 1984, Mrs 
Thatcher made a distinction between: special advisers, who 'are civil 
servants', and political advisers who, 'are not civil servants and are 
not paid from public funds. ' (Official Report. Vol. 58, cols 155-6). 
This distinction, however, is somewhat inappropriate because the only 
departmental political adviser included in the list given in the 
Parliamentary Answer, which covered the period 1979-84, was Robbie 
Gilbert. He was adviser to Prior, Secretary of State for Employment, 
and he fits the above description of a political adviser because he was 
still being paid solely by his employer, Shell, for whom he continued to 
work part time and there was a small expenses budget paid for by the 
party. Nevertheless, at that time the political aspects of the 
adviser's role were performed by Prior's other special adviser, Rob 
Shepherd. By contrast Gilbert brought, according to Prior, the 
practical experience of a manager in Shell and he commented on the 
likely reactions of industry to proposals under consideration. 
Other terms used include: policy adviser; special assistant (the 
American term deliberately adopted by John Harris and later also used by 
Adrian Ham, special adviser to Denis (now Lord) Healey in the Treasury 
and by John Cope, special adviser to Peter Walker at the DTI); economic 
adviser; political assistant (the term used by Maggie Sidgreaves, 
special adviser to Judith Hart); consultant adviser in industrial 
relations to the Secretary of State (the title adopted by Roger Dyson, 
special adviser to Patrick (now Lord) Jenkin at the DHSS); research 
assistant (the phrase used by several ministers including Merlyn Rees - 
now Lord Merlyn-Rees - and Nicholas Edwards - now Lord Crickhowell). 
27 
Some of the advisers express unease at the use of the term 'political 
adviser' in relation to their role for senior, experienced politicians. 
Evidence from the questionnaires reveals an even greater consistency in 
use of the term special adviser since 1979. In this report, special 
adviser will be the term predominantly used. 
In 1986 the Treasury and Civil Service Committee Report listed all 
the people thought to have been special advisers since 1974 on the basis 
of information supplied by the Management and Personnel Office. (Vol. 2, 
pp. xliii - liii). This shows that a variety of people in a wide range 
of roles have been officially designated as special advisers. It 
includes three people who worked for the Government Chief Whip in an 
almost secretarial capacity: Felicity (now Dame Felicity) Younge (1979- 
83); Alison Ward (1984-5); and Robina Finlay (from 1985). Sir Robert 
(Robin) Cooke is also listed. He was special adviser for a succession 
of Secretaries of State for the Environment from 1979 onwards and took a 
special interest in the buildings of the Palace of Westminster. 
According to Michael Heseltine, who appointed him in late 1979, Cooke 
was already 'actually doing the job in an unofficial capacity and we 
really legalised it and gave it form. ' He was reappointed by Tom King 
who thought the appointment was 'horses for courses' and by Patrick 
Jenkin who used the phrase, 'an absolute round peg in a round hole. ' 
Some of the borderline cases illustrate the breadth, and the 
limitations, of the term as used in the official list. According to 
this list Ken Griffin became a special adviser to Tony Benn in 1974 in 
the Department of Industry despite already being an adviser to the 
department and despite the fact that Benn did not really regard him as a 
special adviser. Griffin, a trade unionist, had been an Industrial 
Adviser to the department since 1970. Recruitment of Industrial 
Advisers was conducted by the existing Coordinator of the advisers and 
the department but had to be approved by the minister because they were 
directly responsible to him. Griffin had been proposed prior to the 
1970 election whilst Benn, as Minister of Technology, was running the 
department. John Davies, the Conservative Secretary of State for Trade 
and Industry approved the appointment and Griffin, by this time 
Coordinator of the Industrial Advisers, was still in post when Benn 
returned to the department. Griffin continued in his role as Industrial 
28 
Adviser and maintained that title but also became a special adviser to 
Benn. He felt he was much more closely involved with the Secretary of 
State after he became special adviser than he had been under the Tory 
ministers. Although Benn thought that Griffin was making a valuable 
contribution he distinguished Griffin's role from that of his two 
special advisers, Francis Cripps and Frances Morrell: 'I never put him 
in exactly the same category ... he was an adviser to the department. ' 
The permanent secretary, the late Sir Antony Part, however, thought that 
Griffin became a special adviser to Benn whilst remaining an Industrial 
Adviser to the department. 
Further examples of fuzzy boundaries around the place occupied by 
special advisers and uncertainties in the definition of their role are 
provided by Michael Heseltine's use of advisers. In his book Where 
There's a Will he states: 
I introduced three exceptional men into the world of Whitehall 
to help us in specific policy areas for limited periods. Tom 
Baron, Peter Levene and Ed Berman had each experienced the 
effect of Government policies on their daily work in different 
areas. They knew the limitations of the official mind, the 
timidity of politicians at national and local level, the 
weaknesses in the Whitehall systems (1987, p. 44). 
All three appointments were unlike most appointments of departmental 
special advisers in that they were for fixed periods, and, at less than 
a year, they were even shorter than the few other special advisers on 
fixed period secondment. Ed Berman, having agreed a set of specific 
tasks with the Secretary of State, then had, for a special adviser, 
comparatively little contact with him. His role, therefore, was more 
akin to that of a consultant or specialist appointed by a department in 
a short- term contract than it was to that of most special advisers. 
Nevertheless, Baron and Berman are the two listed as special advisers 
whereas Peter (now Sir Peter) Levene does not appear in the Treasury and 
Civil Service Committee list. Levene describes himself, during this 
six month period before he was appointed as Chief of Defence Procurement, 
as being 'Personal Adviser to the Secretary of State' o's Who. 
IM. Elsewhere he is described as Heseltine's 'former special adviser', 
(RIPA, 1987, para. 4.23; Hennessy 1988, p. 371). Heseltine's answer to 
29 
the question as to whether Levene was clearly a special adviser during those 
six months was, 'Absolutely. Exactly the same as Tom Baron. ' 
Angela Byre was, in effect, recruited by Anthony Lester in 1974 as 
'special adviser to the Home Office' to give advice on the preparation 
of the White Paper, Equality fQr Women (Cmnd. 5724), and subsequent 
legislation on sex discrimination. Her name does not appear in the 1986 
Treasury and Civil Service Committee list and she did not regard herself 
as a political appointee: 'I was not a political adviser ... I was there 
for a specific task. ' Nevertheless, she shared an office with Lester, 
one of the Home Secretary's two special advisers, and she was made to 
feel very much part of that team. 
The importance of the above analysis is that the difficulties in 
defining precise boundaries and in stating exactly who may be considered 
to be a special adviser underline the comparatively recent development 
of the role and its informality. There is probably no other category in 
Whitehall about which there is such uncertainty. Furthermore, a degree 
of imprecision will be argued to be one of the important beneficial 
features of the special advisers' system in that it provides 
flexibility. The label 'special adviser' has occasionally been used to 
give an official title and thus a salary and/or access to official 
information to people fulfilling useful functions for ministers, for 
example Robin Cooke, Peter Levene, and Felicity Younge. On the other 
hand, the fact that the vast majority of special advisers since 1974 are 
clearly identified in the lists indicates that there has been a degree 
of systemization and formalization in the concept when compared with the 
1960s. A wide range of functions are generally accepted as being 
legitimate activities for special advisers. These will be fully 
discussed in Chapter 6 but may be briefly listed here in their 
approximate order of importance according to the findings of the 
questionnaires completed by special advisers. There is inevitably some 
overlap between various activities: 
30 
(i) examining papers going to the minister and commenting on 
some of them; 
(ii) advising the minister on, and involvement with, presentation; 
(iii) discussing issues with the minister; 
(iv) attending departmental meetings and visits with the 
minister; 
(v) speech writing; 
(vi) preparing reports on departmental policy; 
(vii) attending meetings of all the politicians in the department; 
(viii) corresponding with party MPs and officials/attending 
party meetings/receiving party deputations, on behalf of 
the minister; 
(ix) preparing briefs on non-departmental agenda items for 
Cabinet and Cabinet Committees; 
(x) attending departmental meetings/talking to groups/and 
receiving deputations, on behalf of the minister or at least 
when he is not present; 
(xi) chasing up progress on implementing the minister's wishes. 
Terms 4f Employment. 
Whereas most of the Tories' political secretaries in the early 1970s 
were paid by the Conservative Party, the overwhelming majority of 
advisers since 1974 have been paid from public funds and become 
temporary civil servants. In 1974 the terms of employment to be issued 
by departments were set out in the memorandum of guidance issued by 
Number Ten following discussions with the CSD. These were changed when 
necessary. 
Negotiations over starting salary and increments, and in some cases 
pensions, were initially held ad hoc between the individual adviser and 
the relevant department. Then approval for each agreement had to be 
sought from the CSD. Ian Bancroft, former permanent secretary of the 
CSD, admits this approval was not 'totally automatic' and the CSD was 
probably 'a bit meaner in terms of pay. ' Over the years the CSD tried 
to secure consistency. 
31 
Nevertheless, considerable variations remained. Some of the 
senior, experienced advisers, including some of the university 
professors, were given a salary and/or status equivalent to that of a 
deputy secretary. At the other end of the scale at least one special 
adviser was given the salary equivalent to an executive officer. 
Although some of the differences reflected variations in age and 
seniority of special advisers, sometimes advisers of similar backgrounds 
were treated very differently. The salary and consequent status of a 
special adviser are thought to be important for reasons beyond monetary 
considerations - the grade of an individual often determines the units 
to which he is entitled for office accommodation and furniture. In a 
hierarchical organization such as the civil service the way in which an 
individual is treated by others might depend partially upon his official 
status. According to Brian Abel-Smith, 'grading is important, it 
normally determines what access you have. ' Similarly Barbara Castle's 
other main special adviser, Jack Straw, was pleased that she telephoned 
Number Ten and insisted that, although only 27, Straw be put on the 
assistant secretary scale. He felt it was 'a signal to the department 
that I was to be taken seriously. ' 
Terms and conditions, and later the progress of the salary 
negotiations held with the CSD, were a major topic of discussion at a 
number of the infrequently held meetings of Labour special advisers. A 
note produced by these special advisers about nine months after the 
initial appointments suggested that variations in terms and conditions 
did not appear to be related in any systematic way to differences in the 
nature of particular appointments and responsibilities involved. There 
was little consistency in the payment of London Weighting allowances, 
thresholds and regular increments. Under Labour, negotiations over 
salary increases were protracted and at times complicated by the need to 
adhere. to changes in the government's own pay policy. During the 
negotiations the Head of the Policy Unit, Bernard Donoughue, to some 
extent acted as shop steward for the special advisers. Even by the nine 
months stage however, most special advisers had been given salaries 
equivalent to those of either principals or assistant secretaries and 
many of the worst anomalies in salaries had been rectified. 
32 
Nevertheless, the full variations in treatment had not been 
resolved by 1979 and some of the Conservative special advisers were 
similarly dissatisfied with the vagaries in treatment over salaries and 
pension arrangements. At one time a five per cent rule was applied to 
Tory special advisers which meant that they could not be paid more than 
five per cent above their previous pay and this was a source of 
contention because many of the special advisers were recruited from the 
CRD where salaries were low compared with what most of the staff could 
have expected elsewhere. 
Several factors help account for advisers' dissatisfaction at their 
salary levels, especially during the Labour Government. First, their 
salary negotiations often took place against a backdrop of attempts to 
restrain civil service pay. Bancroft was, 'not surprised there should 
have been this rumbling discontent amongst the advisers, mirrored by the 
rumbling discontent amongst the civil servants. ' Second, there was a 
general feeling in some quarters of the civil service, and especially 
amongst backbenchers and sections of the press, that far from being 
underpaid some advisers received too much and the total amount spent on 
them was exorbitant. This feeling is reflected in the earlier 
quotations and played a major part in the campaign against advisers 
unofficially led by Ian Gow. Individual salaries were not generally 
disclosed. However, after Gow had been told in Parliament on 5 November 
1975 that Kaldor's salary was 914,000, he campaigned for other salaries 
to be disclosed and on 23 March 1976 intensified his attack on Kaldor 
and on the total amount spent on advisers: 
I sometimes think that the quality of advice that the 
Government have been receiving from their selected 
special advisers is an indictment of the judgment of the 
Ministers who make these appointments. I sometimes think that 
it would be better if Ministers were to accept rather more 
advice from my right hon. and hon. Friends, which they would 
get free, gratis and for nothing, rather than that they should 
pay out X196,000 a year to get advice that is leading the 
country to economic disaster (Official B. Vol. 908, col. 
365). 
The rules governing the political activities of civil servants 
were generally applied to special advisers. Several special advisers, 
therefore, had to resign following their selection as prospective 
33 
parliamentary candidates. Although an initial attempt was made to 
prevent special advisers from continuing to serve on local councils, Roy 
Jenkins and Barbara Castle successfully insisted in 1974 that Matthew 
Oakeshott and Jack Straw should be allowed to remain on Oxford City and 
Islington Borough Councils respectively. Nevertheless, certain ground 
rules were established to cover their activities and when, in 1984, the 
Leader of the Conservative Group on Lambeth Council, Peter Davis, was 
chosen to be special adviser to the Minister for Local Government he had 
immediately to resign his council seat. 
Restrictions on party political activities were probably most 
strongly applied in the Heath Government, to the advisers who became 
temporary civil servants - Mark Schreiber (now Lord Marlesford) and 
Brendon Sewill. They were not able, for example, to go to party 
conferences and, despite being former Director of the CRD, Sewill was 
not permitted to go to the party offices. Schreiber did, however, have 
the civil servant's right, denied to later special advisers, to see the 
files of previous administrations. In practice, under Labour in the 
1970s, as Darlington told The Times on 1 July 1978, 'a few special 
advisers ignore some of these restrictions. ' About 20 advisers 
subscribed to evidence submitted by Jack Straw to the Committee 4li 
Political Activities Qf Qv Servants chaired by Sir Arthur Armitage. 
The committee agreed with the advisers that 'the rules applicable to 
career civil servants are not applicable to Special Advisers' and 
concluded, 'that the guidelines and rules for the political activities 
of Special Advisers should be laid down by the Prime Minister; and that 
these should be separate and distinct from the rules applicable to 
career civil servants' (1978, para. 136). 
Some move towards this position might be indicated in Thatcher's 
Written Answer of 10 April 1984: 'their terms of appointment are similar 
to those of other civil servants and they are subject to the same rules 
of conduct ... apart from certain exceptions which reflect the special 
nature of their role. ' This slight recognition of the special nature of 
their position was reflected in the letter of appointment of some 
advisers serving ministers in the Thatcher Government. The letter 
stated, as had been the case under Labour, that advisers would be 
expected to abide by the provisions of the Civil Service Pay and 
34 
Conditions of Service Code with the exception of acceptance of outside 
business appointments after resignations or retirement. However, it 
went one step further and also allowed certain exceptions to the rules 
on political activities. These included giving permission, subject to 
the approval of their minister, for advisers: to attend party functions, 
although only as observers in the case of party conferences; to maintain 
contact with party members; and to take part in party policy reviews with 
the purpose of ensuring that those undertaking the review were fully 
aware of the Government's view and their minister's thinking. 
Despite such developments the traditional view still prevailed in 
Robert Armstrong's comment, noted earlier, to the Treasury and Civil 
Service Committee. Furthermore, the continuing restriction on advisers 
remaining in post if selected as parliamentary candidates caused the 
resignation not only of several advisers once they were selected, but 
also of some who were hoping to be selected and did not want to pass up 
good alternative job opportunities when they arose. 
It was feared in 1978 that several special advisers might have to 
resign in Spring 1979 because of the regulations relating to temporary 
civil servants not serving for more than five years without recourse 
to the Civil Service Commission (Tg Times. 31 May 1978). As a 
result of the issues raised by the consequent investigation, the 
Service Order Council 8 was made. Article 1(2)(d) _QyU 
of the Order excluded appointments limited to the duration of an 
Administration (such as special advisers) from the requirement of needing 
to receive a certificate of qualification from the Civil Service 
Commissioners (Civil Service Commission, 1979). Conservative special 
advisers who served for more than five years, for example Adam 
(now Sir Adam) Ridley, faced no difficulties in continuing in service. 
Some advisers made certain conditions before accepting their 
appointment. Lester set three: 'One was that I would have ready access 
to the Home Secretary; the second was that I would have ready access to 
all relevant documents; the third was that I would have adequate 
administrative back up. Those requirements were met pretty well. ' 
35 
SECTION Q. CATEGORIES QF SPECIAL ADVISERS. 
The two categories used in Labour Party and Fabian writings provide an 
important starting point. In its evidence to the Fulton Committee the 
Labour Party advocated that: 
Two pFficular kinds of temporary appointment should be 
explicitly recognised. First experts who are called in to 
help implement the particular policies of the government of 
the day. Here we envisage the recognition of a limited number 
of 'posts of confidence'. These appointments must be at a 
fairly high level or special provision must be made for access 
to the Minister .... The second proposal we would make is that a Minister on assuming office, should have the power to 
appoint a limited number of personal assistants (perhaps up to 
four) with direct access to him and to all the information in 
his department. These would form his personal 'Cabinet'. 
They would take no administrative decisions themselves. 
(Fulton Report, 1968, Vol. 5 (2), pp. 664-5). 
This categorization has not, in practice, been followed precisely by 
Labour or Conservative Governments although it still finds favour in 
recommendations from the Fabians, for example, Labour's EjW Hundred 
DUI (Fimlott, 1987), and radicals on the right including John Hoskyns, 
for whom the personal assistants would be policy advisers (1982). Two 
informal categories are often applied to the special advisers who have 
been appointed: 'political' advisers and 'specialist' advisers. Such a 
categorization - which has nothing to do with the previously described 
official attempt to distinguish between political and special advisers - 
was particularly clear in the case of some of the teams of advisers 
serving Labour ministers between 1974-9. 
This distinction is considered to be valid by many observers 
including several former advisers who have analysed the role - Roger 
Darlington, Joan Mitchell and Alastair Ross Goobey. Brian Abel-Smith 
and Jack Straw are often cited as the archetypal 'specialist' and 
'political' adviser respectively. Straw adds weight to the distinction 
by recalling that when asked to distinguish between them Barbara Castle 
said, 'I've hired Brian Abel-Smith for his brains and Jack for guile and 
low cunning. ' These two illustrate, however, some of the difficulties 
with a simple specialist/political dichotomy. Abel-Smith was seen as a 
committed socialist and his political role included serving on the 
36 
Social Policy Sub-committee of Labour's National Executive Committee 
(NEC), and Straw became involved in policy discussions in the 
department. 
Several commentators, including some who support the distinction 
between political and specialist advisers, believe that in practice 
there is a large variety of roles that can be played and some advisers 
could be classified as both specialist and political. Tim Boswell, for 
example, had both worked at CRD and been a farmer prior to becoming, in 
1984, adviser to Michael Jopling, Minister of Agriculture, a role which 
he performed part time whilst continuing to farm. He is now 
Conservative MP for Daventry. 
The advisers who served in the Department of Prices and Consumer 
Protection (DPCP) between 1974-9 illustrate the possible categories and 
the complexity of the issue. Joan Mitchell (an economist and former 
member of the Prices and Incomes Board) and John Lyttle worked for 
Shirley Williams, and provide perhaps the clearest example from any 
department of the specialist and political adviser categories that 
Mitchell herself described in 1978 in Public Administration: 
In practice there are two kinds of advisers, personified in 
the two which most (though never all) Cabinet ministers were 
allowed: those who act as an extra political arm, and those 
having technical or departmental expertise, usually 
economists. The special political advisers mainly function as 
party and pressure group contact men, as devillers chasing 
ministers' needs and wishes and possibly as speech writers. 
The special economic (or similar) advisers act mostly as the 
sieves, for papers originating in other departments as well as 
the minister's own, and as policy thinkers (p. 89). 
Even such a clear-cut example, however, has atypical features. 
John Lyttle had not only worked in Labour Party offices but had also 
been Chief Officer of the Race Relations Board at assistant secretary 
level. He was, at 41, more senior and experienced than most people 
appointed to the political adviser slot. Moreover, initially there was 
a third special adviser working for Shirley Williams. Timothy Josling 
was an economist who worked part time as did Mitchell. But whereas 
Mitchell explained that the adviser had to insert, 'the specifically 
political and social slant' on issues (p. 92), Josling's role was to 
brief as an expert on the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). After a 
37 
while Josling became 'part-time consultant to the department' although 
he continued functioning much as before. 
Possibly of all special advisers Josling came nearest to being an 
economic adviser to the department - as highlighted by his later change 
of title. Under Labour several specialists who were economists had the 
title Economic Adviser to the Secretary of State. It is important to 
note that they were specifically advising their minister and therefore 
count as special advisers in a way which economic advisers to the 
department do not. 
Roy Hattersley, who succeeded Shirley Williams at the DPCP, thought 
that, 'the perfect balance is a man of some considerable seniority with 
committed expertise - and I think that is exactly the phrase - and a man 
slightly more junior who has got an essentially political role. ' 
Although in Maurice Peston and David Hill respectively, Hattersley 
thought he had this balance, he did not think the terms 'specialist' 
adviser and 'political' adviser were entirely appropriate because 
Peston, 'was a combination of both. ' Furthermore, Hill was more 
interventionist in the DPCP than Lyttle had been. Peston emphasized the 
political role of even the specialist adviser by drawing a distinction 
between, 
the professional role and the political role. Economists who 
take leave from university to work temporarily in the civil 
service do so as professionals ... 
Their value lies in their 
technical skills and their knowledge insofar as they have any. 
Thus, in the early 1960s when I was in the Treasury the 
Chancellor was Reginald Maudling, but this was a complete 
irrelevance as far as my work was concerned ... All this is to be contrasted with th e special adviser who is a political 
appointee and has a political role to play ... [special 
advisers are] people who give advice, but who are politically 
committed. As an example of the contrast, when I was at DPCP, 
the department used another professor of economics to advise 
as a technical expert on the CAP (Times High r Educational 
Supplement (THO), 11 July 1980). 
Inevitably discussion about categories of advisers overlaps with 
that about the definition of advisers and Peston's clear distinctions 
would have been harder to make in the 1964-70 period. In practice, the 
political/specialist categories partly overlap with those advocated by 
the Labour Party/Fabians at the start of this section. But whereas in 
38 
Labour's evidence to Fulton it was the personal assistant who would 
'take no administrative decision', that limitation has applied in 
practice to both the 'political' advisers and the 'specialist' advisers. 
Campbell (1987) uses similar phraseology in referring to the distinction 
between, 'policy professionals with partisan ties and political 
operatives. ' (p. 266-7). He styles the former category 'amphibians'. 
Attempts were made, for example by Wilson (1976 p. 204) and Heclo and 
Wildavsky (1981 p. xlvii), to develop a three fold categorization of 
advisers. Often these were developed on the basis of the advisers' 
backgrounds rather than their roles. Whilst these are of some value, 
the heterogeneity of advisers and their roles have defeated attempts to 
develop an authoritative categorization into which all advisers could be 
slotted. 
Special advisers in the Number Ten Policy Unit really form a 
separate category and when the term 'policy adviser' is used it usually 
refers to them. The main focus of Klein and Lewis's study was on 
advisers attached to individual ministers rather than the 'special unit 
at Number 10 Downing Street' because, they claimed, that unit is 'very 
much the exception and no doubt reflects the special, because wide 
ranging, needs of the Prime Ministerial office in recent years' (p. 2). 
Advisers at Number Ten are not included in the main analysis in this 
study not only because their role is in many ways different from that of 
departmental special advisers but also because, as they have usually 
been the single largest group, their numbers would distort the picture. 
Nevertheless, they are included in the official lists of special 
advisers and have played an important role - which is specifically 
examined in Chapter 6, Section B. Their contribution is also analysed 
to the extent that, for example, they were part (possibly the centre) of 
a network of special advisers and comparisons can be made between their 
role and that of special advisers in departments. According to Pollitt: 
If the group under Dr. Donoughue at No. 10 was generally well 
received, the same could not be said of all the other two 
dozen or so political advisers ... In sum, a distinction needs to be drawn between the No. 10 unit and the other political 
advisers. The former quickly staked a firm claim to a place 
in the machinery of government .... The role of individual advisers to other ministers has been less well defined and 
less widely accepted (1984, pp. 110-11). 
39 
This chapter has worked towards a definition of the role of advisers to 
other ministers. The following chapters will suggest their role is now 
increasingly accepted. 
40 
CHAPTER THREE: THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES. MODELS 
AND INTERNATIONAL COMPARISONS. 
In analysing the place of special advisers within the British system of 
government it will be of value to set it against various theoretical 
perspectives on, and descriptions and models of, the roles of ministers 
and the adequacy of traditional sources of support for them in 
performing those roles. The analysis moves from a discussion of the 
general issues to an examination of the place of advisers. Section A 
examines the many roles of ministers and their consequent requirements 
for assistance. Section B considers the traditional sources of support 
for ministers and international comparisons are made. Section C reviews 
the relationship between ministers and the most important providers of 
assistance - the permanent civil service. Of the extensive material 
available the items selected are generally those most relevant to the 
eventual development of a possible model of the place occupied by 
special advisers. Section D combines the various elements and develops 
the model. 
SECTION QL ROLES QE MINISTERS. 
Special advisers are appointed by their minister and have direct access 
to him. It is, therefore, appropriate to start by analysing ministers' 
roles. Ministers have a wide range of roles to fill and this leads to 
considerable strain on them (Kogan, 1971, p. 15 and p. 156; Headey, 1974, 
p. 47 and p. 278; Blackstone 1979; Hoskyns, 1983; Hennessy, 1986, p. 184). 
British ministers are active members of the legislature, unlike their 
counterparts in America or France. In some continental traditions 
members of a minister's cabinet are permitted to carry out some of his 
functions of reporting to the legislature (Neville-Jones, 1983, p. 235). 
The British Parliament also sits for more hours each year than those of 
other democratic countries (Blackstone, 1979). The majority of British 
Ministers have seats in the House of Commons. The UK electoral system 
is not based on a list system and so there are strong demands on a 
minister from his constituency. 
41 
British ministers who head a department are responsible for 
providing policy leadership. In 1974 Headey (p. 59) reported that some 
regarded themselves as having a management role, and probably since the 
early 1980s even greater attention has been paid to it. Ministers have 
a vast amount of paper to read, many decisions to make and a large 
number of meetings and visits which, especially since the UK joined the 
European Economic Community (EEC), may include overseas trips. 
Furthermore, in the British unitary system, central government is 
responsible for more decisions than in federal countries. Their role in 
a department is extremely important to ministers because as Rose (1987, 
p. 4) argues, ministries provide them with a means of satisfying their 
political ambitions. A minister also has to defend and promote his 
department, himself and the whole government. He does so to various 
audiences - Parliament, the interest groups, the media and the country. 
There seems to be an ever increasing demand from the media, partly 
fuelled by a reduction in secrecy, for explanations from ministers. 
Some ministers, especially in Labour Governments, spend time on 
party committees (see, for example, Benn, 1989, and 1990; Castle, 1980, 
and 1984), again in strong contrast with members of American Cabinets. 
British ministers also attend meetings of Cabinet or its committees and, 
not only have to promote their departmental interests, but also have to 
share a stronger collective responsibility for the decisions taken by 
the Government than that in most countries (see, for example, Birch, 
1964). 
Alan Healey, the Chairman of the First Division Association (FDA), 
suggested in May 1986 at the Re-sidlling Government Seminar that 
ministers, 'have at least five full-time jobs to perform, and almost by 
definition therefore cannot perform any of them properly. ' (Institute of 
Directors (IOD), 1986, p. 30). In 1970 the newly elected Conservative 
Government produced a White Paper, fg Reorgranisation Qf Central 
Government, in which it claimed, 'This Administration believes that 
government has been attempting to do too much. This ... has also 
overloaded the government machine itself ... the weakness has shown 
itself in the apparatus of policy formulation' (Cmnd. 4506, para. 2). 
Although it is widely accepted that British heads of departments 
42 
are extraordinarily busy, even compared with ministers in other 
countries, one compensating factor is that there are far more junior 
ministers in Britain than elsewhere. In 1976 Britain accounted for a 
quarter of the total number of junior ministers in the world (Theakston, 
1987, p. 167). How far junior ministers are themselves overworked, and 
their capacity to relieve the burden on Cabinet ministers, are explored 
later. 
Given that ministers have so many functions to carry out, Headey 
argues, 'sheer pressure of work is seen as the basic reason why 
Ministers are forced, consciously or unconsciously, to give higher 
priority to some roles than others. ' (1974, p. 30). Ministers who 
attempted fully to play all the roles open to them would exhaust 
themselves and not tackle them properly. He identifies five main types 
of ministers: minimalists; policy selectors; policy initiators; 
executive ministers; and ambassador ministers. Ministerial minimalists 
give priority to their parliamentary tasks and to fighting their 
departmental corner in Cabinet and Cabinet Committees. Policy selectors 
provide policy leadership but do so by probing for weakness in advice 
and choosing from among the alternative lines of policy submitted to 
them. The policy initiator thinks of himself as providing policy 
leadership by defining and setting his own objectives. Executive 
ministers emphasize management roles and ambassador ministers emphasize 
public relations roles. Some ministers thought that nothing could be 
neglected and they refused to define their priorities at all (p. 65). 
Headey's work contributes to the conclusion that, to varying 
degrees, ministers are overloaded and do not have the time to carry out 
certain of their functions. Hennessy (1986) gathered considerable 
evidence to suggest that the collective Cabinet role was one that 
ministers, partly through lack of time, carried out least well (p. 185). 
Headey's evidence, however, raises doubts about how far greater 
involvement in wider Cabinet discussion was a role that ministers wished 
to adopt (pp. 58-60) - this may, of course, have been an implicit 
acceptance of the lack of time. 
43 
Nodal Point. 
The large number of roles a minister is expected to perform highlights 
the fact that he ought to maintain a relationship (entailing the flow of 
information and/or influence) with many institutions and people. These 
could include: his department; other departments; the Prime Minister; 
other ministers - either singly or collectively; Parliament; his party 
(including the parliamentary party, the party in country, and the party 
headquarters); pressure groups; the media; academics and other 
specialists; the public; his constituency. These key relationships are 
illustrated in Figure 1 but various intermediaries and people with 
closest contact with the minister will be added to the diagram later. 
Furthermore, some of the relationships are more complicated than 
straightforward bilateral relations, for example, a minister may meet 
representatives of an interest group but such a group is also likely to 
have a strong relationship with the department. The relationship with 
the department is the most important for a minister and officials help 
him with many of the other contacts. 
Simon (1976) suggested that theories of administration should take 
decision making as a central focus. He stressed that how decisions were 
made was influenced by the information available. The concept of the 
flow of information is central to systems theory. According to Easton, 
'we may visualize a political system as a gigantic communications 
network into which information in the form of demands is flowing and out 
of which a different kind of information we call a decision emerges' 
(1965, p. 72). Within systems theory the actual decision making occurs 
inside the black box. Much of this study focuses on the black box and 
the perspective of the political decision makers (i. e. ministers) at the 
heart of the whole process. 
With so many relationships to maintain it is perhaps useful to view 
British ministers as being at the nodal point of a vast array of 
information (formal and sometimes informal) flowing in from a wide range 
of sources. The buck then stops with the ministers who either 
individually, or collectively, have to make the decisions and have 
'unlimited liability' (Rose, 1987, p. 18) for any political mistakes 
44 
FIGURE 1: Bilateral Relationships Maintained by the Minister. 
/ 
/ 
/ 
/ 
/ i 
KY: 0< ----- > Flows of information and/or influence. 
11 Institutions and people with whom 
the minister maintains a 
relationship. 
made. 
Ministers also send information out to a wide variety of 
institutions and people. It is important for partisans to promote the 
policies once decisions have been made - especially if the decisions are 
unpopular. Hood (1983) shows how nodality is one of the key tools that 
ministers and government possess in carrying out the vital functions of 
'detection' i. e. taking in information and 'effecting' i. e. trying to 
make an impact on the outside world. 
A person in such a nodal position, who is overloaded with functions 
to carry out, will have various interlocking requirements: 
(i) Specific tasks will have to be carried out (for example: detailed 
policy options prepared, meetings arranged and serviced, speeches and 
press statements written) to assist him in carrying out the functions. 
(ii) He will not be able to maintain all the contacts himself and so 
intermediaries will have to conduct communications for him. In the 
terminology of systems theory the demands flow along communications 
channels and at various stages gatekeepers winnow out certain demands. 
The demands or statements of interest are further reduced through 
collection and combination into a more manageable form and issue 
formulation occurs. (Easton, 1965). Much of this process is far removed 
from the minister but the argument being developed here is that as the 
objective of all this activity is to transmit demands to the political 
decision makers it is profitable to examine the process from his 
perspective. It is possible, therefore, to see much of the activity as 
being on his behalf and considerable liaison occurs within the political 
system. Part of this is sometimes seen as brokerage. The concept of 
brokerage is variously interpreted. For some, the element of 
'authority' within it is important (Kogan and Henkel, 1983, p. 32) and in 
this sense a retiring permanent secretary, Sir Brian Cubbon, accepted 
the description of himself as being the 'broker' between the minister 
and the department (Ig Times. 4 April 1988). On the other hand, there 
may be situations (especially when dealing with a rigid hierarchy such 
as a government department, or a delicate party matter) where a minister 
feels it desirable to use an informal confidant to carry out brokerage. 
Whilst lacking constitutional authority such a person may be able to 
carry out brokerage because he is known to be both relaying the 
45 
minister's wishes and available to take information directly back to the. 
minister. 
(iii) The third requirement that a minister with such heavy demands on 
him is likely to have is for personal support of the type that can be 
provided by an aide or confidant. Young and Sloman (1982) refer to 
ministers' need for 'ego-boosting'(p. 88). As part of this personal 
support a few ministers may find the need for somebody to play a 
'medieval fool' role and be able to speak more bluntly to them than 
officials think appropriate for civil servants to do. 
The complex and potentially contradictory requirements of heads of 
government are examined by Dror (1987). He claims that many of the 
points are also relevant for other ministers. The absence, he argues, 
'of tension-reducing and support-providing historical court positions, 
such as court jesters and court priests, from the entourage of modern 
rulers makes supply of emotional support all the more important a 
function for advisers to rulers. ' This creates, however, the first in 
Dror's list of eight 'inherent' dilemmas because advisers are supposed 
to provide, 'objective estimates and professional analysis, the content 
of which is not adjusted to the emotional needs of the recipient or to 
his possible emotional reactions. ' (p. 193-4). 
Escalating Rcquirements. 
In the last two decades the demands on ministers have become greater, 
and their requirements more difficult to meet, for various inter-related 
reasons revolving around issues such as the increase in adversarial 
politics; the development of overload on ministers and the breaking down 
of barriers between existing institutions or roles. 
It was claimed in the 1970s that a reduction in consensus was 
occurring and that Britain was moving towards adversarial politics 
following the earlier consensus of the Butskellite era (Finer, 1975). 
Where there is adversarial politics a gulf develops between the 
policies of the parties with each undoing the policies of the former 
administration when they form a new government. Such a view is 
challenged by some authors, for example Jordan and Richardson (1987, 
46 
p. 80), who claim that the consensus of the Butskellite era is 
exaggerated as is the later conflict. They go on to suggest that people 
who claim that Butskellism has been replaced by conflict do not agree, 
'as to which period is what style: usually, indeed, 'today' appears to 
have adversarial politics and yesterday consensual - whenever 'today' 
happens to be' (p. 80). A minister who believes that there has been a 
reduction in consensus and that he has a mandate to introduce changes is 
likely to put different, and perhaps greater, demands on the system and 
possibly feel that the existing system is unable to meet his 
requirements. Writing in 1979 Brown and Steel argued that since 1971 
civil servants', 'ability to serve both political parties impartially 
has been brought into question by the appearance of differences in the 
parties' views on a number of major issues, which are probably greater 
than at any time since 1945' (p. 148). 
Whatever doubts there might be about the development of adversarial 
politics there is, as Hennessy (1986) shows, wide acceptance of the view 
put forward in the 1970s by, for example, King (1975), that the overload 
on government is increasing. This is seen as a world-wide phenomenon; 
the third Annual Meeting of the International Political Science 
Association in 1986 was entitled: 'Government Overload and Recent 
Developments in the Organisation of State Power. ' (Peele, 1986). 
Greater overload on government inevitably results in overload on 
individual ministers and, as we have seen, the range of functions that 
British ministers have exacerbates the problems. 
It is possible to distinguish between qualitative and quantitative 
overload (Dror, 1987). Qualitative overload is associated with the 
growing complexity of the issueson which ministers have to make 
decisions: 'the issues have become so, so much more difficult. ' (Sir 
Frank Cooper, quoted in Hennessy, 1986, p. 177). A British minister is 
less likely than many of his overseas counterparts to be a specialist in 
the subject dealt with by his department (Blondel, 1985). This problem 
is exaggerated by the ephemeral nature of many ministerial appointments. 
Crosland reckoned that, 'it takes you six months to get your head 
properly above water, a year to get the general drift of most of the 
field, and two years really to master the whole of a Department ... I 
had four separate jobs in five and a half years, which was far too 
47 
many. ' (Kogan, 1971, pp. 155 and 159). 
Time spent as a junior minister is not regarded as preparation for 
eventually becoming the Cabinet Minister in the same department 
(Theakston, 1987). Whilst, with the exception of length of time in 
post, these points are not new, the development of overload makes their 
impact more severe. 
Quantitative overload is associated with the growth in ministers' 
acitivites and in the number of decisions they have to take. A range of 
sometimes interlocking developments are linked to overload. They 
include: the increasing range of activities for which British 
Governments held themselves responsible (King, 1975); increasing 
willingness of backbenchers to rebel and to spend time on select 
committees investigating the activities of government (Norton, 1981; 
Drewry, 1985); increasing demands from the media for explanations from 
ministers of government actions and proposals; increasing leaks of, and 
demands for, official information; the growing number of pressure 
groups (Hurd, 1986); and the increasing demands by party members, at 
least in the 1970s and early 1980s, for a role in making the policy of 
the party (Kogan and Kogan, 1982). In some cases, such as increasing 
scrutiny of the executive by Parliament, there is some erosion of 
traditional boundaries. 
The overload is exacerbated by the difficulty that ministers have 
in defining their objectives and by an attempt to maintain the myth that 
ministers are instigators of all new policies (Blackstone, 1979). 
Furthermore, there is a tendency to force upwards to ministers decisions 
that used to be taken lower down (see, for example, Hennessy, p. 193). 
This partly reflects the politicization of more issues - another way in 
which traditional boundaries are eroded. 
The dangers of overload are much discussed in systems theory. 
According to Easton: 
The capacity to handle demands once they have entered a system 
is a function of the volume of demands and existing channel 
capacity. The members of a system can cope with overload 
either by reducing volume in some way or by increasing the 
capacity of the system to handle the existing volume ... [in the latter case] the problem becomes one, not of too many 
48 
demands and too few channels but of enough channels operating 
so effectively that they may let too many demands through. In 
this case it would not be the transmission channels that would 
be overloaded but the decision-making centers themselves 
(1965, pp. 119-20 and 128). 
Klein and Lewis (1977) suggest that ministers may feel 'swamped' 
(p. 7) and point out that: 'the emergence of the special adviser has 
coincided with the growing awareness of 'overload' in British 
government' (p. 2). 
It is possible to examine the bilateral relationships in Figure 1 
to see whether, in the light of escalating requirements, there are 
functions for a special adviser to carry out. Before this is done, 
however, it is important to examine the categories of people who are 
already providing assistance for ministers, and ministers' relationships 
with them. This is because places and roles for special advisers will 
only be revealed by combining analysis of ministers' many and growing 
needs with assessment of the appropriateness of traditional sources of 
assistance. 
SECTION D;, ASSISTANCE IQ MINISTERS. 
A minister needs a team of people to assist him. Even before special 
advisers were appointed a British minister had many people working 
closely with him, some in capacities not always found in other 
countries. Figure 2 illustrates, in a very simplified way, the place of 
some of the key people who help their minister to maintain the flows of 
information and/or influence identified in Figure 1 and carry out the 
tasks that have to be completed if the minister is to fulfil so many 
roles. These people are: the junior ministers, the PPS, the private 
secretaries, the permanent secretary, the information officers. 
Clearly, some of these people, especially junior ministers and the 
permanent secretary, have major responsibilities within the department 
and their role is more substantial than the aspect being concentrated on 
here - assistance given to the Cabinet minister. 
The relationship between a minister and his department is most 
important and the extent to which the officials' knowledge and value 
49 
FIGURE 2 People Who Assist the Minister. 
 
/ 
/ 
/ 
I 
Parliamentary private secreta yr 
i 
Kg: i) <-- -> Flows of information and/or influence. 
li 
Constituencv f 
secretarv 
Institutions and people with whom 
the minister maintains a 
relationship. 
iii) ate 
_(HrL% 
People who assist the minister. 
systems limit their minister's ability to exert his political will on 
the department is analysed in the next section. Despite the strength of 
the relationship that can develop between the minister and both his 
private office and his permanent secretary (see, for example, Playfair, 
1965; and Pooley in Young and Sloman, 1982, p. 101), he does not rely 
solely on them for liaison with his department. Often he develops 
powerful links directly with high ranking officials. Kogan (1971) 
discussed with Crosland and Boyle how they might use an under secretary 
as a sounding board. Much of the policy charge in a department might be 
carried by under secretaries and assistant secretaries. Unlike the 
various other bodies shown in the Figure with which a minister has to 
maintain a relationship, the department is working for him. The 
administrative divisions of the department gather and filter 
information; develop policy options; and help him in his dealings with 
the other groups. Therefore, some of the information and/or influence 
flows will be more complex than it is possible to show in a simple 
diagram - for example the findings of academics may be taken up by 
pressure groups who feed them into the department which in turn relays 
them to the minister. 
Commenting in 1965 on the absence in Britain of an equivalent to 
the cabinets which are found in many European countries Dutheillet De 
Lamothe wrote: 'One may wonder whether this difference is not a result 
of the absence of, or at least the very negligible part played on the 
Continent by Junior Ministers (Parliamentary Secretaries) or 
Parliamentary Private Secretaries and Permanent Secretaries, these 
people assuming in the British system tasks attributed in France, Italy 
and Belgium to the ministerial cabinets' (p. 366). 
Although British ministers have considerable assistance, the very 
nature of this assistance might generate further difficulties and not 
entirely meet all the ministers' requirements. With a minister being 
surrounded for much of his time by generalist civil servants, it is 
widely thought that the minister is insulated (Headey, p. 78) and 
'isolated' (for example Klein and Lewis; Lawson and Bruce-Gardyne, 1976; 
Drewry and Butcher, 1988). Rose (1986, p. 19) refers to a minister as 
being 'an island in a sea of civil servants. ' Two well known references 
to this phenomenon are Barbara Castle's reference to, 'the loneliness of 
50 
the short distance runner' (1973), and Richard Crossman's description in 
the first day of his Diaries Q in Minister to his minister's 
room as being, 'like a padded cell', in which he sat, 'insulated from 
the real world' (1975, pp. 21-3). 
Perhaps the major difference between the British system and that of 
many other countries is that, especially initially, a British minister 
is not surrounded in the most significant posts with people whom he has 
chosen. In the US over 3,000 senior positions within government 
departments are filled by political appointees with a variety of 
backgrounds who are usually changed following the election of a new 
president (Heclo, 1977). In West Germany the top two grades within the 
civil service are filled by 'political civil servants'. These are civil 
servants who are usually, but not always, recruited from amongst career 
officials in Federal, Lander or Local Government. They are expected to 
be in full accord with the governments' partisan goals and may be 
temporarily retired at any point. When there were changes of government 
in 1969 and 1982 almost half of these posts were available to be filled 
as a result of vacancies resulting from a variety of causes: natural, 
premature and temporary retirement; resignation; and reshufflement 
(Derlien, 1988, p. 60). In the Westminster type systems of Canada (David 
Brown, 1986) and Australia (R. Smith, 1977; James Walter, 1986), with 
their tradition of a permanent, neutral, civil service, there has been 
an institutionalization of positions equivalent to those of special 
advisers which give ministers an opportunity to appoint a few of 'their 
own people' as well. 
In Australia, furthermore, there have been moves towards a 
'Washminster' system (Uhr, 1987) in which a few senior civil service 
posts have been filled by political appointees (Wilenski, 1986). In 
France, and some other European countries, ministers choose - their own 
cabinets. French cabinets consist of between ten and 30 members, the 
majority of whom are appointed from amongst career officials of any 
department. Only a small percentage of members belong to a ministers 
party before joining his Win, and usually loyalty to the minister 
and administrative competence are more important than political views 
(Searls, 1987). 
51 
Cabinets originated as teams of people appointed to help a minister 
gain control over the powerful specialist civil service which had been 
inherited from the former absolute monarchs. In such systems, unlike 
Britain, 'there was no cult of enlightened gentlemen, nor deference 
towards a liberal arts-based education, and hence no predisposition to 
reserve a special place for the generalist administrator. ' (Drewry and 
Butcher, 1988, p. 47). 
We saw earlier that British ministers may have some categories of 
people assisting them which do not exist at all, or to the same extent, 
elsewhere. However, when it comes to appointing 'their own people' 
British ministers are not given the same scope as their counterparts. A 
group from the Fulton Committee visited France, Spain and the United 
States and 'in all three countries' one of the main points that struck 
them was 'the extent to which Ministers choose their own immediate 
staff (Vol. 1, p. 132). Many others have made similar comments and 
Ridley (1983, p. 29) claimed that, 'senior officials are the close - 
almost only - collaborators of a minister in Britain since he cannot, as 
in most countries, appoint his own confidants to policy-making posts. ' 
According to Walter Williams (1988, p. 61) the British system places 
permanent civil servants closer to the top within departments than 
almost any country and makes it difficult to remove a permanent 
secretary. 
Nevertheless, a minister in the 1960s who, somewhat exceptionally, 
analysed how to appoint a group of people from within his department to 
help him control it was Denis Healey, Secretary of State for Defence. 
In his recent autobiography he reports, 
As my work-load increased I decided to establish a body which 
would serve me as a minister in France is served by his 
'cabinet'. I called it the Programme Evaluation Group, and 
made it formally responsible to the Chiefs of Staff, though 
this device did not deceive them for a moment. Essentially 
its job was to make sure that I asked the right questions of 
the ministry and got relevant answers in time ... It consisted of officers from each of the three services, with a scientist, 
a civil servant and an economist (1989, p. 268-9). 
52 
Generally, however, apart from appointing their PPS, and sometimes 
choosing, or influencing the choice of, their own junior ministers and 
chief information officers, most British ministers initially have little 
say over who fills the important positions around them. Henderson 
(1984) shows how private secretaries are usually retained by an incoming 
minister and Barbara Castle (1984) and Jock Bruce-Gardyne (1986) have 
suggested how difficult it is to attempt to remove a permanent secretary 
or prematurely replace a recently established private secretary. When 
the time is appropriate to make a replacement, British ministers do 
choose their own private secretary and may influence the choice of a new 
permanent secretary. In both cases, however, the choice is usually made 
from amongst a relatively small pool of generalist civil servants who 
are considered - by their own official bosses - to be at an appropriate 
stage in their career. 
In Chapter 2, Section C, the numerous possible functions of special 
advisers were listed. To help explain the origin of these functions it 
is important to examine in more detail the literature on the 
relationship between ministers and civil servants to see what 
limitations ministers might have thought existed in the services they 
were receiving. 
SECTION Cj RELATIONS BETWEEN MINISTERS AND 
BUREAUCRACY. 
The relationship between ministers and civil servants is so important in 
any consideration of the place of special advisers that it must not be 
assumed to be unproblematic even though Harold Wilson did exclude it 
from the Fulton Committee's terms of reference. Many of the - 
sometimes contradictory - models developed to explain this relationship 
explicitly or implicitly show where there might be a place for special 
advisers (for example, Aberbach, Putnam and Rockman, 1981; Rose, 1974 
and 1986; Brown and Steel, 1979; Lipsey, 1982; Walter Williams, 1988). 
What determines the appointment of special advisers is the perception 
held by the minister and here, again, these vary. 
53 
Important work has been conducted in Australia. One of the main 
themes in James Walter's book, Ig Ministers' Minders: r sonal advisers 
in national government (1986), is the concept of political executives 
being frustrated by permanent bureaucrats and therefore turning to 
partisan irregulars. Examining the relationship between bureaucrats and 
politicians is difficult because of the many interpretations. 
Attempting then to fit special advisers into the picture adds further 
complications. Based on his work for the Royal Commission 4n Australian 
Government Administration, R. Smith had earlier argued that the 
position of advisers was anomalous: 
In both normative and practical terms, relations between 
ministers and their public service advisers do not provide for 
the easy inter-positioning of policy orientated ministerial 
staff ... in British and similar political systems ... their 
presence disrupts accepted patterns of bureaucratic 
influence ... no matter 
how skilled and tactful ministerial 
advisers were, their position could not be accommodated 
readily in either theory or practice. They were a response to 
anomalies generated by problems of contemporary government and 
their position was itself anomalous. (1977, pp. 149-50 and 
153). 
An early view of the relationship between politicians and civil 
servants was that politicians made policies and bureaucrats administered 
them. This political/administrative dichotomy was most clearly 
articulated in America by Woodrow Wilson: 'Administration lies outside 
the proper sphere of politics. Administrative questions are not 
political questions'; and by Luther Gulick who claimed, 'we are faced by 
two heterogeneous functions, "politics" and "administration", the 
combination of which cannot be undertaken within the structure of the 
administration without producing inefficiency. ' (Both quoted in 
Aberbach, Putnam and Rockman, p. 4). This 'arms-length' model (Rose, 
1986. p. 4) was also the conventional model in Britain and Continental 
Europe. 
Weber (1978) thought that the ideal relationship between elected 
politician and appointed bureaucrat was as described above but he 
recognized that in reality it was unlikely that the relationship would 
take that form. Today, the model is widely criticized as being an 
54 
inadequate account of the complex relationship. Brown and Steel 
(p. 201), for example, claim that it is a model which, 'hardly anybody 
now believes to be useful'. Suggestions as to why the model is 
inadequate and what constitutes a more accurate one are, however, varied 
and overlapping although even when the neutrality of the British civil 
service is questioned its non-involvement in overtly party political 
activities is widely accepted. 
Such is the variety of opinions on this topic that Gray and Jenkins 
(1985, p. 15) claim: 
discussions of British administration are also collectively 
confused about, for example, administrators' values, the 
extent of administrative influence in the policy process, and 
the different links administrators have with each other, the 
centre and outside interest groups ... Yet the relative 
absence of evaluative criteria makes it difficult to judge 
whether we are now offered clear alternative models of 
bureaucracy ... or the outpourings of a tower of 
Babel. 
Rose (1986) suggests that there are two ideal type models of the 
relationship. The 'arms-length' one described above and a model of 
symbiosis in which 'ministers and civil servants combine political and 
administrative skills to deal with value conflicts, problems of public 
presentation and persuasion, and technical, organizational and legal 
difficulties' (p. 5). Such a view incorporates the idea of political 
administration in which politicians and bureaucrats are interdependent 
within the Whitehall village (Heclo and Wildavsky, 1981) and builds on 
Rose's earlier work in 1974. In this he suggested that the relationship 
could be described in terms of an equation (p. 429) showing that the more 
that is expected from those performing the roles of minister and of 
civil servant, the more skills they must have and that loss of 
effectiveness by ministers is not a gain by civil servants: 
Politicians' gills xý servants' skills = Executive leadership 
Ministerial roles Administrative roles in government 
[expectations] [expectations] 
He argues that the interdependencies and complementarities of 
politicians and civil servants are multiple and complex. The most 
55 
meaningful way to think about this relationship is in terms of exchange 
theory, that is, 'the services that civil servants provide ministers, 
and that ministers provide civil servants' (1986 p. 28). Many others who 
do not necessarily go this far with Rose would agree that ministers and 
officials complement each other (Brown and Steel, p. 201). Young and 
Sloman (1982) collected reactions to their radio series about Whitehall 
called NQ, Minister. Greatest reaction came from civil servants and the 
most common reservation concerned the depiction the programmes offered 
of ministers and civil servants as adversaries. They reported that Sir 
Patrick Nairne suggested, 'while of course there would be tensions, 
fundamentally what you find is a partnership. The real question is not, 
"Are the civil servants outwitting the politicians, or the politicians 
outwitting the civil servants? " ... but rather, "is this partnership 
adequately fruitful? "' (p. 100). Even some civil servants who tend to 
see things more in terms of a dichotomy nevertheless can argue, 'their 
duties are complementary not competitive and the functions they perform 
and the qualities they need are essentially different' (Allen, 1977, 
p. 136). 
In this quote we see a possible merging of Rose's two models. A 
more fundamental criticism of the political/administrative dichotomy 
comes from radicals who think that far from ministers deciding policies 
and bureaucrats implementing them, it is, in fact, civil servants in 
departments who have their own consensus views and frustrate attempts by 
politicians to change them (see, for example, Tony Benn, 1980). 
Political figures who do not share such a view are aware that it is a 
view often held by party supporters. (Boyle, 1965; Hudson, 1976). 
Simmonds (1988) in a pamphlet written for the Adam Smith Institute (ASI) 
before he became a special adviser advocated proposals designed, 'to 
regain political control of departments for the politicians' (p. 29). 
Taking the argument one step further Benn and others suggest that 
certain ministers are 'captured' by their departments and become active 
spokesmen for departmental policies. A further complication is the 
claim that some officials in all departments owe loyalty to the Treasury 
(Heclo and Wildavsky). 
56 
Brian Smith (1988) shows that concern about the power of 
bureaucrats is widespread but argues that in questioning whether 
bureaucrats are apolitical, and showing that they do influence political 
choices, he is not necessarily trying to prove that the bureaucrats are 
politically dominant everywhere. (p. 49). Flora MacDonald claims that on 
becoming Canadian Foreign Secretary, she, as a new minister in a 
government of a party which had not been in power for 16 years, needed 
protective mechanisms. Without them, 'the Minister is indeed at the 
mercy of bureaucratic domination, not because of some devious 
manipulative plot, but simply because that is the way the system has 
been allowed to develop. ' (1980, p. 29) She goes on to quote 
approvingly not only from Tony Benn and Richard Crossman but also from 
Henry Kissinger who stressed the power of permanent officials within the 
American bureaucracy. This was also a theme of President Reagan when he 
took office (see, for example, Walter Williams). The Coombes Royal 
Commission into the Australian Civil Service was established by Gough 
Whitlam's Labour Government in large part because of dissatisfaction 
with the public service and the need to consider issues such as 
ministerial control, accountability of officials to ministers, and the 
democratic agenda (Wilenski, 1986, p. 184). James Walter argues that in 
Australia, as in the United States, Canada and Britain, growth in the 
quantity and complexity of demands on national leadership, accompanied 
by the elaboration of bureaucracy, lead to, 'the cry for sympathetic 
aides to push the executive's interests in the face of what is 
experienced as organizational inertia'(p. 7). 
Despite these examples, some authors claim that Whitehall, 
'frustrates the partisan will of the political executives more 
frequently and more completely than perhaps any other bureaucracy within 
advanced democratic systems. ' (Campbell and Peters, 1988, p. 86). 
Another North American commentator, Walter Williams, makes similar 
points when suggesting that Britain, at least in its pre-Thatcher days, 
'often came close to civil service rule in part because of a misguided 
belief in a politics/administration dichotomy and in part because 
ministers either fled managerial responsibility or else had no notion of 
how to exert it. ' (p. 171). 
57 
Power f the Bureaucracy. 
Various ways are suggested in which the bureaucracy might be able to 
gain power at the expense of politicians. Clearly only a very limited 
amount of the information available to a department can be put before 
its minister and he has time to consider only a limited range of options 
on each of the small percentage of issues dealt with by the department 
that are important enough to warrant his attention. As information is 
transmitted it is structured, simplified and made more precise as 
ambiguities are removed. This is the vital process known as 
'uncertainty absorption' (March and Simon, 1958) which Brown and Steel 
(p. 185-6) suggested could be applied to British Government. This is such 
a valuable concept that it will be used here to cover most of the 
activities civil servants engage in when preparing simplified policy 
options to put to ministers. Although ministers accept that this must 
inevitably happen if they are to cope with all their business, some fear 
that important information is being withheld and the list of decisions 
and of options unnecessarily curtailed with options 'unacceptable' to 
the department, or even to other departments, filtered out. Richard 
Crossman was one of many ministers who have expressed a desire for an 
extra pair of eyes and ears in the department: 'the Minister needs those 
eyes and ears, those outside helpers, in order to get his way ... Most 
Ministers sacrifice those, "eyes and ears" and soon scarcely notice that 
they are going blind! ' (1972, p. 69). 
The danger of important elements of information being lost in the 
flow of information both up to a minister and from him down to his 
department, are exacerbated by the rigid hierarchy within departments. 
An effective organization requires both formal and informal information 
flows (Beer, 1966). Despite the presence of informal links within the 
civil service (Drewry and Butcher, p. 90) a strong hierarchy is likely to 
restrict the flow of informal information. Although the principal 
private secretary, as somebody who knows the department and is known by 
it, is likely to be a good source of informal information by talking, in 
Crosland's words, with, 'intelligent indiscretion' (Kogan, 1971, p. 158), 
he is unlikely to put his future career within the department at 
jeopardy by being disloyal to it. 
58 
A stronger version of the argument is that by constantly advocating 
certain options civil servants create considerable pressure on busy 
ministers to follow the considered advice of officials. People who 
question the ability of ministers to impose their will on the 
bureaucracy often suggest that the bureaucracy is not necessarily 
politically biased in favour of the opposite party, but rather, it has, 
'a political position of its own to defend. ' (Benn, 1980 p. 62). One of 
Tony Benn's political allies, Brian Sedgemore, himself a former civil 
servant, believes that, 'the minister soon becomes aware that there is a 
departmental policy on most issues and that some Permanent Secretaries 
see their main role as sustaining the integrity of those departmental 
policies' (1980, p. 89). Reservations about the power of civil servants 
are not limited to radical left wing socialists who suggest senior 
officials have a class identity which makes them hostile to socialism. 
As a member of the House of Commons Expenditure Committee, Sedgemore 
proposed an alternative draft to the first chapter of the Eleventh 
Report (wig QyU Service) in Session 1976-77. He was supported by a 
majority of Labour Members of the Committee who voted, and only failed 
by 11 votes to 15 to receive support for a strong attack on the civil 
service: 
There is, as should be, no role in our society for people with 
little to offer in a practical way but civil servants have got 
round this stumbling block by inventing a role for themselves. 
The role that they have invented for themselves is that of 
governing the country .... They can and do relegate Ministers to the second division (appropriately enough they call their 
own union the First Division) through a variety of devices. 
These include delay; ... 
foreclosing options through official 
committees which parallel both cabinet sub-committees and a 
host of other ministerial committees; interpreting minutes and 
policy decisions in ways not wholly intended; slanting 
statistics ... In doing all these things they act in what they 
conceive to be the public good. Some would say they perceive 
that good in the interests of their own class: others that 
they see it in terms of the tenets and taboos of their caste. 
In doing all these things there is an esprit de corps .... By their very nature bureaucracies become conservative however 
radical their intake. Conservative governments who come 
unstuck in the same manner as Labour governments are those who 
want to change society in a radical direction (1977, Vol. 2, 
pp. lxxix - lxxxi). 
59 
Sedgemore is correct to assert that radical Tories are also apprehensive 
about the power of the bureaucracy. Various commentators including 
Drewry and Butcher (1988) and Wickham-Jones (1990) note that criticism 
comes from both left and right. In his ASI pamphlet Simmonds cites Tony 
Benn's evidence to the 1985-86 Treasury and Civil Service Committee 
enquiry into the civil service, in support of his conclusion that, 
'there is convincing evidence to suggest that departments do take a 
"house" view on important issues which affect them' (p. 20). 
Public choice theories, especially Niskanen's view of bureaucrats 
as self interested budget maximizers (1971), are one influence on the 
radical right. Borins (1988) spoke to Tony Jay, co-author of 1 
Minister and recalls that, 'The first thing Jay said when I interviewed 
him was, "Yes, indeed, you're right - public choice has been a major 
influence on my thinking"' (p. 18). 
People, therefore, holding a range of views have come to the 
conclusion that officials tend to have too much power. This is 
important because if ministers, for whatever reason, perceive civil 
servants to be obstructive then they might want to appoint some partisan 
advisers. 
In 1976 an analysis of the influences on policy making was 
published by two politicians who were later to become ministers - Jock 
(later Lord) Bruce-Gardyne and Nigel (now Lord) Lawson. They too 
believed that, 'it is the civil servants who (in general) acquire power 
by sinking their individuality in a corporate ethos: in this way they 
both build up a departmental esprit-de-corps and limit the range of 
policy options from which ministers are invited to choose ... In 
general ... departments tend to develop a symbiotic relationship with 
their clients' (p. 167). 
The final point leads to another explanation of how officials might 
gain influence. Civil servants are involved in a great deal of 
discussion with relevant interest groups or clients. So much so that 
they are sometimes thought collectively to form, in each major sphere, 
'the policy community' (Richardson and Jordon, 1979) and interest groups 
become part of the decision-making and implementation system. Policies 
60 
are made and administered, 'between a myriad of interconnecting, 
interpenetrating organizations. It is the relationships involved in 
committees, the pgligy community of departments and groups ... that 
perhaps better account for policy outcomes than do examinations of party 
stances, of manifestos or of parliamentary influence' (Richardson and 
Jordan, 1979, p. 74). The policies that departments are alleged to 
develop and defend as a result of their close relationship with relevant 
groups are often 'consensus' views which they wish to change only at 
the margin, if at all. Martin Smith (1989, and 1990), for example, 
examines the difficulties of securing policy changes in agriculture, a 
field where it is often claimed a strong or 'closed' policy community 
exists. 
Such thinking would help explain why radical governments and 
politicians - of left and right - tend to be the ones which have 
greatest conflict with civil servants. A reduction in consensus between 
the political parties might create conditions in which ministers will 
wish to seek assistance from special advisers (Klein and Lewis) and, as 
we have seen, it was claimed in the 1970s that just such a reduction in 
consensus was occurring. 
A party in Opposition might particularly expect difficulties with 
the civil service next time it forms the government. Such expectations 
may be based on a variety of factors. First, a civil service that is 
being loyal to the 'Government of the Day', may appear to the Opposition 
as if it is politically committed to that Government's policies. 
Second, Opposition leaders and supporters may think that any failures of 
the party last time it was in power were partly caused by lack of civil 
service zeal in implementing radical policies and/or by the bias in the 
civil service. Ernest Marples expressed this view after 1964 (Schreiber 
interview) and Marcia Williams (1975) suggested that: 
After 1970 nobody in the Labour Government deluded himself 
that all the hopes of 1964 were fulfilled. We did not succeed 
in doing what we set out to achieve ... I believe that what failures we had can be attributed largely to our defeats on 
two separate fronts. One battle was against the Civil 
Service. This was a struggle which we never fought with much 
heart or conviction ... [and] was lost from the start (p. 274). 
61 
Views similar to these were being expressed by Labour ministers even 
before they lost office - see, for example, Crossman's Godkin lectures 
which although not published until 1972 were delivered in 1970 prior to 
the election. As we have noted the Conservative Opposition was aware of 
such thinking. 
Furthermore, there are various reasons for suggesting that conflict 
between politicians and civil servants might be most likely when a newly 
elected government takes over after the previous party had been in power 
for a long time. First, the previous government would probably have 
played some part in shaping whatever consensus views had by then 
developed within each 'policy community'. Second, Downs's, 'law of 
compulsive innovation', states that, 'Newly-installed administrations 
have a strong desire to reject what their predecessors have started and 
to emphasize programs they create themselves. ' (Quoted in Jordon and 
Richardson, 1987, p. 78). Third, there is a view that inexperienced 
ministers might be most vulnerable to civil service pressure: 'If there 
had not been the thirteen-year gap I imagine that some people who 
succumbed to Civil Service domination might not have done this quite so 
easily. ' (Marcia Williams, 1975, p. 31). The Canadian and Australian 
examples cited earlier occurred in circumstances containing several of 
these factors. At the change of government in Australia there were, 
'prevalent feelings' that the public service, both in structure and in 
outlook, had been deeply conditioned by the previous 23 years of 
Liberal-Country party rule (R. Smith, p. 136). In Canada the incoming 
government with fears about the bureaucracy was Conservative. 
It is sometimes thought that a critical mass of partisans may be 
necessary to have a real party government (Rose, 1974) and to push the 
machine in the direction the politicians wish (Hoskyns, 1982). Such 
thinking is linked to the view that ministers tend to be isolated. 
It must be stressed, however, that most British ministers have a 
high regard for the civil service and, according to Young and Sloman, 
'tend to marvel at the civil servants' industry, integrity and sheer 
availability' (1982, p. 94). Furthermore, many civil servants and 
politicians disagree with the above thesis and claim that far from 
wishing to impose their will on ministers, officials are only too 
62 
pleased if a new minister has a clear view for them to follow (for 
example, Boyle, 1965; Jenkins, 1971). From his interviews with Boyle 
and Crosland, Kogan (1971) concludes 'no feeling emerges that civil 
servants are obstructive' (p. 44). According to Hennessy, 'there is at 
first sight a degree of unanimity between keepers and kept, permanent 
official and transient politician. The cliche is shared - both stress 
the joy and pleasure of having/being a strong minister. ' (1988, p. 490). 
Many people agree, however, that if a minister, in the words of Jenkins, 
'flutters aimlessly, the most dominant civil servant will give him a 
policy' (1971). This is because they 'abhor a vacuum. ' (Lipsey, 1980). 
Some commentators, including Heclo and Wildavsky, conclude that the 
problem is not that civil servants are too strong and creative in 
devising public policies but that politicians are too weak. They 
suggest that not only is there little danger of civil service conspiracy 
but that, 'officials will initially go along with an astonishing range 
of nonsense' from newly elected ministers. (p. 379). Boyle (1965) and 
Pliatzky (1981, and 1989) also allege that if anything, civil servants 
are too unwilling to criticize ministers' policies and to give unwelcome 
advice. 
Boyle told Kogan that, 'there's nothing like returning as a 
Minister to a Department for realizing how fallacious it is to assume 
that presuppositions, on the whole, remain the same ... if only because 
new officials are coming into positions of authority and their value - 
judgements ... are a 
factor in the situation. ' (1971, p. 84). 
Furthermore, a new government may have greater political will than an 
exhausted government and thus be able to impose its policies. It is 
argued that if used properly the private office and permanent secretary 
provide an essential gear-box for getting a department working in the 
direction the minister wishes (see, for example, Nairne to the 
Treasury and Civil Service Committee, 1986, Vol. 2, p. 48). It is 
sometimes claimed that a cabinet works like this (Dutheillet de Lamothe) 
but Neville-Jones (p. 236) suggests that at times a cabin et can become a 
screen shielding the minister from officials' advice he ought to 
receive. 
63 
In A Government Qf Strangers (1977) Heclo questions whether the 
appointment of a large number of 'political executives' in the United 
States is a satisfactory way of controlling a permanent bureaucracy; 
and, to the extent that such a system creates tensions between the 
political executive and the bureaucracy, it may have a demoralizing 
effect in the bureaucracy. (Schmidt, Tanner and Turek-Brezina, 1987; 
Lane, 1987). Recently some Americans have been even more critical of 
their system. Huddleston (1988, p. 415-6) argues that the challenges 
facing the federal government are too great to tolerate a system of 
executive leadership, 'that is driven by groundless fears of 
bureaucratic hegemony, a delusionary reverence for private sector 
management gimmicks and a misplaced faith in the will and capacity of 
political appointees to channel popular aspirations into public action. ' 
Similarly Walter Williams believes that the number of political 
executives should be reduced and that senior career officials are too 
isolated from the top decision making. He shows, however, that 
criticisms of the American system should not necessarily be used to 
justify maintenance of the status quo in the UK: 'The American case is 
instructive because bringing in outsiders has gone too far while Britain 
now errs clearly in the opposite direction' (p. 170). 
Nevertheless, Margaret Thatcher's government, in particular, it is 
claimed, managed to implement many of its radical policies and thus 
illustrate that the politicians can get their way: 'The, Minis 
version of how Governments are deflected by the civil service does not 
apply to the Thatcher Government, as a whole, although there are a 
number of exceptions. ' (Holmes, 1987, p. 6). This raises another debate 
to be examined later, about how far, if at all, Thatcher politicized 
the civil service. 
A somewhat different defence of the civil service role is made by 
people who argue that it is good that there are permanent officials to 
test thoroughly the ideas of politicians (see, for example, Lipsey, 
1982). Others take this point so far that, in the eyes of a radical, it 
would justify their own criticisms: 'It is bound to be an impediment to 
any Government that wishes to make great changes in our affairs that 
they are served by a permanent civil service that is by its nature a 
force for consensus. While it may be an impediment to such a 
64 
Government, it may equally be a great comfort to the citizen. ' (Dell, 
1979). 
Organizational Culture. 
Cultural explanations of organizational success and failure (for 
example, Handy, 1979) are now favoured by business schools and it may be 
useful in several ways to apply these to the relationship between civil 
servants and ministers. It would hardly be surprising if a strong 
organizational culture developed within a permanent bureaucracy and if 
it differed in various ways from that of politicians. Whilst such 
thinking can lead to the view that the civil service deliberately 
obstructs the politicians, it is also useful in helping to explain why 
there can be difficulties and misunderstandings in the relationship even 
where there is no deliberate intention of obstruction. Handy, in Gods 
Qf Management, also shows that if different people and parts of an 
organization have different management styles then exceptional people 
may be required to play the role of liaison officers or 'integrators'. 
The successful liaison man, 'is knowledgeable about each of the areas he 
has to bridge and is respected by both ... [but] It is hard to sustain 
this dual nationality. Most liaison men become identified in time with 
one side or the other, thus reducing their efficiency as a bridge and 
turning liaison into negotiation' (p. 114-15). 
Within a government department the private secretary could be seen 
as such a liaison officer. However, as a generalist administrator he 
clearly faces several problems. He is not necessarily very 
knowledgeable about the party political world in which the minister 
operates, and anyway faces constitutional obstacles to full involvement 
in this area. There is also a danger that the minister will regard him 
as being too identified with the department and part of the insulating 
group referred to earlier. The private secretary might, therefore, 
welcome assistance in carrying out some of the tasks and the minister 
might wish to reduce any isolation he may feel. 
65 
The second benefit of looking at organizational cultures is that 
such cultures filter information and, 'establish values, standards and 
levels of aspiration which motivate action and define more or less 
explicit criteria for evaluation' (Metcalfe and Richards, 1984, p. 444- 
5). Having internalized the norms of the department it may become 
difficult for officials to accept that they are acting in anything other 
than, 'an entirely value-free objective way. ' Therefore, Metcalfe and 
Richards continue, 'some of the debate about political neutrality and 
the existence or non-existence of "departmental views" stems from just 
such blindness to cultural assumptions' (p. 445). This may partly 
explain the attitude adopted by officials towards the overtly political 
stance of partisans - especially non elected ones brought in by 
ministers. This, in turn, helps explain why some ministers may feel 
isolated. 
Having established that civil servants have values that will to 
some extent be determined by the organizational culture of their 
department, there is still room for debate about what impact such values 
will have on the relationship between ministers and their officials. 
This partially covers ground explored earlier but, according to James 
Walter, the writings of Weber and Michels imply that the 
unresponsiveness of the bureaucracy, 'is as much to do with the 
sociology of the organization as with the ideological leanings of the 
bureaucrats' (p. 14). 
It is possible to argue that civil servants have their own 
knowledge and values which they use in arranging for policy to be 
changed, but that, 'their views on what should be done complement, 
rather than compete with those of politicians' (Brown and Steel, p. 201). 
Similarly, Kogan (1974) points out that there are differences and 
commonalities in the values of officials and ministers and that, 'it 
seems inevitable and beneficial that two sets of values should run 
through organization' (p. 110). Such thinking fits with the opinion that 
not only do officials accept the values of political neutrality and 
loyalty to ministers, but also, departmental policies exist and will 
come into play, even to the extent of completely filling any vacuum that 
might appear if a minister fails to impose his values alongside those of 
his department. 
66 
However, at this stage it is useful to develop Walter's argument 
because this is a central feature in his model of the place of personal 
advisers to ministers. It is based on three main themes. First, all 
modern societies require institutionalized civil services to meet 
leaders' needs. But: 
at a certain point in the evolution of modern societies it 
seems, inevitably, that political leaders begin to doubt the 
tractability of their bureaucracies: this is the second theme. 
This arises because none of the participants in the policy 
process can be 'value neutral', since policy deliberations are 
full of imponderables which can only be given definition when 
facts are interpreted in the light of assumptions, and these 
assumptions will incorporate values (p. 111). 
This will not be a problem, he suggests, if politicians believe 
bureaucrats share, or take on board, their values. In such 
circumstances the myth of the bureaucracy being value neutral will be 
preserved. Using the work of Jaques on the dynamics of the development 
of bureaucratic units, he argues that this will only occur when 
organizations are relatively small, and decisions relatively simple. 
When the bureaucratic element becomes complex and demands abstract 
relationships and sophisticated organizational structures: 
the sociology of organization has taught us that it is likely 
to develop its own politics and its own values which may not 
be in concert with those of the political leaders. At this 
stage the political leadership will perceive a tendency on the 
part of the bureaucracy to impede its policies, if not by 
design then by inertia. There will be a call on the one hand 
for the reform of the bureaucracy to make it more responsive 
to the political will of elected representatives ... 
On the 
other hand there will be much greater resort to 'irregulars', 
and eventually the institutionalization of systems of partisan 
advice around political leaders: this has been the third theme 
(pp. 111-12). 
Walter claims these themes are relevant for all western democracies. He 
notes that the appointment of personal advisers is partly a return to 
the court politics existing at the start of the first theme prior to the 
institutionalization of bureaucracies: 'This assertion by political 
executives of the need for subordinates who are directly responsible, 
politically responsive, and loyal appointees, also suggests the 
persistence of small-group enterprise at the heart of political 
leadership, with features perhaps analogous to court politics, even in 
67 
the modem state. ' (p. 15). Walter's work is valuable in several ways 
and further elements from it will be incorporated later, but, at least 
for the UK, other factors need to be analysed before a model is fully 
developed showing possible places for advisers to occupy. 
The concept of political neutrality is particularly strong in the 
British civil service but, according to Hoskyns (1982, p. 14), it puts 
senior civil servants in an impossible situation where they have to 
cultivate 'passionless detachment' rather than the commitment and energy 
necessary to produce substantial changes. He raises the question, 'how 
can you have a radical government, without radically-minded officials? ' 
He suggests, 'the commitment, the urgency and energy must be provided by 
just ninety odd ministers and a handful of special advisers' (pp. 14-15). 
Despite the existence of a general civil service culture it is also 
argued that different departments develop their own sub-cultures (Rose, 
1987) and even that units within a department develop sub-cultures. 
S=trums &lid Images. 
There are various ways of viewing much of the discussion in this 
section. Probably the most helpful perspectives are those that see the 
relationships between ministers and officials either as a spectrum, or 
as a series of Images. Brown and Steel suggest that: 
Professional experts, civil servants, Ministers, MPs, all 
contribute to the consideration of a policy. So may academic 
thinkers and research workers, members of pressure groups, and 
press and television journalists. Their contributions can be 
arranged along a spectrum, with experts and pressure groups 
near the specific-technical-fact end and politicians and 
journalists nearer the general-political-value end (p. 203). 
Elaborating Brown and Steel's concept it might be useful to see that 
there are a range of places that different ministers, and indeed civil 
servants, could occupy on the spectrum. Therefore the roles they carry 
out and the relationship between them vary and are variously 
interpreted. The positions may be different in different departments 
and vary over time. The concept of a spectrum, with generalist 
administrators being closest to ministers, helps to provide an 
understanding of the need that ministers, situated somewhere nearer the 
68 
middle of the spectrum than other politicians, might sometimes feel for 
direct access to either one or more of the following points on the 
spectrum: 
(i) the technical/expert end; 
(ii) policy analysis/strategic planning; 
(iii) the party political end. 
(i) A common theme in discussions about the British civil service is 
that, especially compared with other countries, it has too few experts, 
particularly at the higher levels (for example, the Fulton Report; Klein 
and Lewis; Hennessy, 1988). The complex overlaps between the 
development of special advisers and the increasing demand for, and use 
of, specialists within the British civil service was referred to in 
Chapter 2. Brown and Steel observe that reformers who wish to see the 
position of specialist staff change, 'argue that the practice of 
appointing special advisers, many of whom are experts in their fields, 
is an indication that Ministers no longer feel able to rely upon advice 
given by general administrators' (p. 107). Brown and Steel's spectrum is 
a useful way of looking at the relationship between specialists and 
generalists in the civil service. There are good reasons why 
generalists, who have to be politically sensitive and aware of a range 
of interests, should be the ones closest to ministers. They claim that, 
'as long as importance is attached to the maintenance of a collegiate 
system of government and to political accountability, so there will be a 
need for general administrators in senior posts' (p. 120). In this 
respect Brown and Steel question some of the analysis in the Fulton 
Report. They suggest that specialists are less capable than generalists 
at assisting ministers to carry out the vital function of arbitration 
(i. e. decision taking) by making lower level decisions, narrowing the 
field and sharpening the issues, all of which demand the ability to 
compare and reconcile conflicting priorities. Neville-Jones shows that 
in some continental systems with a more specialist civil service and 
cabinets, the specialist officials tend to take the view that it is not 
their job to exercise judgment (p. 238). Notwithstanding Brown and 
Steel's arguments in favour of generalist administrators usually being 
the ones nearest to ministers, the fact remains that some ministers 
might wish more direct access to the technical/expert end of the 
69 
spectrum. 
(ii) It has also been claimed that the generalist administrator pays so 
much attention to his minister's short-term needs in terms of how to 
defend himself against political attack that insufficient attention is 
given to long-term strategic planning (see, for example, Hoskyns, 
1982, and 1983). This is not a new argument. In what Hennessy (1988, 
p. 191) calls, 'the most impressive submission of all', William (now Sir 
William) Ryrie told the Fulton Committee: 
Far too many issues are referred to the top not because they 
are intrinsically important but because they could be brought 
up in a political encounter in Parliament. A large proportion 
of the time of Ministers is taken up in delving into small 
issues for this reason, or guarding against this danger. 
Consequently far too little time and energy is given to the 
important work of framing basic and long-term policies and 
objectives (Vol. 5 (2), p. 1088). 
Ryrie also predicted the problem could get worse with the ever 
increasing overload of business on government. Concluding his study of 
Whitehall, Hennessy similarly claims that the blemishes of the civil 
service include being both, 'still too preoccupied with advising 
ministers on policy and enhancing their performance in Parliament, ' and 
nothing like as good as it should be, 'at confronting hard long-term 
problems by thinking forward systematically and strategically' (p. 687). 
As Hennessy and others note, however, it is ministers who are, in 
Walter Williams's words, 'intolerant of policy analysis, ' (p. 76) and 
civil servants take their cue from them. Therefore, the officials', 
'main emphasis is not on policy formulation, strategic planning, 
performance assessment - the domain of policy analysis' (p. 63). The 
pressure for greater attention to be given to strategic thinking is, 
mainly, coming from commentators, including some former advisers. 
Williams admits this is a difficulty. Not only is there a problem in 
creating mechanisms to conduct long-term thinking, but there is the 
further question of how to ensure notice is taken of a planning unit 
when a decision maker is under political pressure to find short-term 
solutions. 
70 
(iii) Ironically, many ministers seem more acutely aware of the need 
for greater access to, and help in dealing with, the political end of 
the spectrum. The civil service does not provide help for ministers to 
defend the policies and actions of the department in party meetings, 
Bruce Headey claims. He quotes a former Chancellor of the Exchequer: 
'they expect you to manage party meetings by the light from heaven' 
(p. 137). 
Commenting from what may be regarded as the political end of the 
spectrum, Hudson, a former political secretary, suggested, with regard 
to a minister, 'it seems strange that in the past it was accepted that 
he needed the whole resources of the Civil Service to help him perform 
the non-party political side of his functions, but should have no help 
at all where the party politics are concerned' (1976, p. 305). 
Earlier it was argued that in consideration of policies, values 
come not only from the politicians but from the civil servants too. 
Perhaps, a useful way of combining the concept of a spectrum with the 
acceptance of this point is to use Kogan's concept (1971, p. 42) of civil 
servants contributing low frequency policy waves and ministers 
contributing high frequency activity. 
An ambitious attempt to pull together many of the concepts and 
opinions outlined in this chapter is provided by Aberbach, Putnam and 
Rockman (1981). Their four ideal-types or Images of the relationship 
between politicians (only some of whom are ministers) and civil servants 
not only indicate that there might be a place for special advisers but 
also one of their Images specifically includes special advisers. The 
central point of their argument is illustrated in Figure 3. The Image I 
relationship is the one outlined as the political/administrative 
dichotomy. Image II is called 'Facts/Interests' and assumes that both 
politicians and civil servants participate in policy making but that 
they make distinctive contributions. Civil servants bring facts and 
knowledge; politicians interests and values. Image III is entitled 
'Energy/Equilibrium'. According to this, both bureaucrats and 
politicians engage in policy making, and both are concerned with 
politics. The real distinction between them is that whereas politicians 
articulate broad, diffuse interests of unorganized individuals, 
71 
FIGURE 3, Bureaucrats and Politicians: Evolving Roles. 
Image Image Image 
_? } 
Image 
I U III I, Q 
Implementing 
B B B B policy 
Formulating 
policy P S S S 
Brokering P P S S interests 
Articulating P P P S ideals 
B Bureoucrots responsibility; P= Politicians' responsibility; 
S=Shored responsibility. 
Source: Aberbach, Putnam and Rockman, 1981, p. 239 
bureaucrats mediate narrow, focused interests of organized clienteles. 
Politicians seek publicity, raise innovative issues, and are energizing 
to the political system whereas bureaucrats manage incremental 
adjustments and provide policy equilibrium. 
Image IV is called 'The Pure Hybrid'. This image carries to its 
logical conclusion the process seen in the other three Images of a 
gradual reduction of the distinction between politicians and officials. 
This 'suggests speculatively that the last quarter of this century is 
witnessing the virtual disappearance of the Weberian distinction between 
the roles of politician and bureaucrat' (Aberbach, Putnam and Rockman, 
p. 16). In Britain, they suggest, 'harbingers of the hybrid figure may 
be found in the introduction of politically sympathetic, "outsiders" or 
"irregulars" into positions once reserved for career civil servants' 
(p. 17). 
Even though Aberbach gI gL suggest that those politicians who are 
ministers have always been in a rather special, dualistic, position 
somewhat resembling Image IV (p. 17) these Images are useful when 
analysing the relationship between ministers and permanent civil 
servants as well as in suggesting a place for special advisers. In 1988 
Aberbach and Rockman reviewed the Images in the light of developments in 
various countries. Mrs Thatcher had tried to dent the administrative 
elite culture by simultaneously elevating officials of ambitious 
temperament, 'while generally downgrading the role traditionally given 
to the civil service to fulfil' (p. 18). This could be interpreted as a 
move towards both Image II and Image IV and Bulmer claims, 'the drive 
towards managerialism suggests, paradoxically, both elements of Image U 
and Image of IV' (1988, p. 45). To the extent that civil servants are 
playing Image IV type roles, there might be less need for special 
advisers in these roles. However, Campbell and Peters suggest (1988) 
that permanent officials playing a proactive Image IV type role, 'may 
want to define the perimeters of their roles more clearly and prevent 
the mixing of policy making with explicit identification with partisan 
objectives' (p. 96). In the face of the erosion of barriers between the 
ministers and officials this comment might suggest that other barriers 
are being sought almost as protection. 
72 
Aberbach gjnl, recognize that at any time, in any country there 
will be a variety of relationships between ministers and the 
bureaucracy. This emphasizes how difficult it is to make 
generalizations about who has most influence on any particular policy. 
Hall gl &.,, 1 (1975) were unable to derive a systematic pattern of 
generalizations from case studies of how central government policy is 
made as a result of the various forces at work. Although they found 
there was rarely a single source for policy ideas, it was often useful 
to think in terms of, 'the sponsorship of issues' (p. 501). Not only can 
the range of interest groups, individuals and political groups proposing 
a reform be examined, but also the values and ideological preferences 
behind it can be explored. Thus, for example, in a study of the 
Assisted Places Scheme, Edwards gl aL (1984, p. 136) claim that the 
scheme, 'had been a limited attempt to translate the ideological 
preferences of the new Thatcher government into policy terms but had the 
advantage that groups holding rather different ideological 
preferences could support it for different reasons. ' Of very many 
theoretical perspectives on decision making, Simon's concept of 
'satisficing' seems particularly useful. He claims that, 'Whereas 
economic man maximizes-selects the best alternative from among all those 
available to him, his cousin, administrative man, satisfices-looks for a 
course of action that is satisfactory or "good enough"' (1976, p. xxix). 
Implications Qf t Various Relationships between Ministers 
Officials. 
&nd 
Before relating the various perspectives, including those on policy 
making, to a model of the place of special advisers, it is important to 
examine the range of possible interpretations about what the various 
views of the relationship between ministers and officials might mean in 
terms of a need for extra assistance for the minister. Different actors 
might think that some, or all, of the following limitations exist in the 
services that civil servants can provide for their ministers: 
1. insufficient willingness to devise and implement policies in line 
with the, possibly radical, commitments of the minister and his party 
which sometimes entail breaking with consensus views held by the 
relevant policy community; 
73 
2. insufficient technical or expert advice, especially coming directly 
to the minister; 
3. insufficient opportunities for long-term strategic thinking to take 
place, especially for officials close to the minister; 
4. inadequate attention and sensitivity to the views and demands of the 
party, Parliament, the public, and certain pressure groups, from the 
generalist civil servants who surround the minister; 
5. an unwillingness and/or inability to carry out more overtly party 
political functions which the minister does not always have time to 
carry out himself. 
The final point takes the discussion back to the account in Section 
A of the wide range of ministerial roles, and it might be useful to 
review the argument developed so far in this chapter. In Section A it 
was demonstrated that ministers are overloaded with a large, and 
escalating, list of functions to perform and are at the nodal point of a 
complex network of flows of information and influence. In consequence 
they need considerable and varied assistance. Section B examined the 
range of support available to British ministers and international 
comparisons revealed the relative dearth of opportunities for them to 
appoint their own people to the positions closest to them. Section C 
concentrated on a review of the many analyses of the relationship 
between ministers and their major traditional source of support - the 
permanent civil service. Not only might some ministers perceive 
limitations in this assistance, but its very nature might generate 
further requirements. 
Some commentators, including Bruce-Gardyne (1986), argue that 
ministers are overloaded, isolated and find it difficult to dissent from 
departmental views, but they do not think special advisers are much of a 
solution. For others, however, the overlapping arguments developed in 
Sections A, B, and C illustrate why there might be a place for special 
advisers. A possible model of such a place is outlined in the next 
section. 
74 
SECTION D MOD SHOWING THE PLACE QE SPECIAL ADVISERS. 
It might be possible to identify a place for a special adviser as 
somebody who is appointed by his minister and whose personal loyalty and 
closeness to him will be important. In practice, such a person will 
have greater freedom, both constitutionally, and because of the 
informality of his role, to carry out a range of functions to help 
sustain his busy minister who is at a nodal point in the system of 
government. The minister may require the special adviser to do one or 
more of the following activities identified in Section A: carry out some 
specific tasks; maintain liaison or brokerage with a variety of groups; 
provide personal support. The minister may require the special adviser 
to carry out one or more of the roles that might be necessary as a 
result of the potentially insulating nature of the assistance already 
offered to him and/or the perceived limitations in the services of the 
bureaucracy identified at the end of Section C. Furthermore, how far 
the minister perceives advisers as contributing services that his junior 
ministers and PPS are not willing, able, or suitable to provide will be 
further explored in Chapter 7. 
Figure 4 builds on Figures 1 and 2 and adds possible places that 
could be occupied by special advisers. As with the first two figures it 
is best understood in terms of a minister having a series of bi-lateral 
relationships to maintain if he is satisfactorily to fulfil all his 
roles. Figure 1 showed these relationships with the minister occupying 
a nodal position. Figure 2 added the places occupied by various people 
who assist the minister in maintaining these relationships. Figure 4 
indicates a large potential range of places within which any particular 
special adviser could be situated. Although the adviser has been placed 
at the minister's end of flows of information and/or influence, the 
model implies he is sometimes able to move freely along the channels of 
communication. Furthermore, some advisers spent a considerable time 
working, in effect, inside the department but still possessing the vital 
special link with the minister which is the hallmark of a special 
adviser. It is desirable to expand the model somewhat and examine more 
fully the determinants of the place of a special adviser, some of the 
features of the place of special advisers, and some of the potential 
impacts of special advisers. 
75 
FIG 4 The Place Qi1 Advisers. 
/ 
/ 
i 
i 
PRESSURE 
GROUPS 
ý 
/ 
/ 
/ 
fonstituencv f 
accretarv, ý 
/ 
/ 
i 
ý 
N 
Permanent 
secretary 
DEPARTMENT 
Information 
office 
\ 
1 
mir ministers 
DEPARTMENT 
I 
ý 
ý 
I 
Parliamentary private secret m 
I 
KEY: i) < ----- > Flows of information and/or influence. 
Institutions and people with whom 
the minister maintains a 
relationship. 
iii) Priva Q People who assist the minister. 
iv)   Places potentially occupied by 
special advisers i. e. at the 
minister's end of information flows 
and sometimes in the department. 
/ OTHER N 
MINISTERS 
AND 
DEPARTMENTS 
\ 
\ 
Determinants Q the Place Q dial Advisers. 
A range of factors influence the place of each individual adviser 
including: the wishes of his minister, the resources already available 
to help the minister, and the ability and wishes of the adviser. Klein 
and Lewis correctly state that, 'although personal loyalty to their 
minister is a common thread holding the special advisers together, they 
are otherwise extremely diverse' (p. 3). The role of advisers will vary 
so much because not only will the determining factors differ in each 
case, but so too will the interaction between them. Some of the many 
theories about the relationships between ministers and officials have 
already been explored and it was noted that in several of them there 
might be a place for special advisers. This is because the minister's 
opinions about his need for special advisers will be influenced by his 
perception of what support he finds, or expects to find, already in his 
department. 
A radical minister believing in the conflict model of civil service 
obstruction might well perceive a need to appoint advisers who share his 
political commitments and will help him maintain the thrust of his 
policies. Even for ministers who do not necessarily suspect their 
officials of sabotage, and have every reason to believe they are doing 
everything to help, 'the nagging doubt remains that a more sympathetic 
adviser would have done better by them. It is less a question of 
officials refusing to follow the dictates of a given policy and more of 
excluding from debate the kinds of ideas and follow-through that the 
minister might have favoured if only he had known about it' (Heclo and 
Wildavsky, p. 376-7). Ministers who perceive officials and departments 
as having strongly held values that will be used to fill any vacuum 
might want advisers to help dictate clearly policies for the department 
to follow. 
It is possible to extend Rose's model of interdependence between 
ministers and bureaucrats. In this model both required a range of 
skills if they were to fulfil their roles. Developing this idea special 
advisers could be seen as providing skills which either a) ministers do 
not possess, or do not have time to use; or b) which civil servants do 
not hold or feel constitutionally able to use. Rose (1986, p. 20) 
76 
himself suggests that advisers help ministers and complement the work of 
civil servants. He distinguishes between partisan advisers who assist a 
department, 'by arguing its minister's case in party quarters where 
civil servants cannot go', and policy advisers. The latter can assist, 
'by advising the minister to avoid paths that civil servants believe 
dangerous, and by giving practical content to vaguely expressed ideals 
or aspirations of the minister. ' 
The interaction between the minister's perception of his role and 
his analysis of what existing sources of support are doing, or capable 
of doing, will to some extent prescribe the role of the adviser. 
The importance of examining this is demonstrated by the much 
greater level of support provided in Britain than in Australia by civil 
servant private secretaries and junior ministers. Some of the arguments 
deployed for example by Walter are less relevant in Britain where high 
flying principal private secretaries have often supplied a satisfactory 
level of personal support for ministers. 
Furthermore, once advisers are appointed their role will be 
influenced by the various reactions to them from those already in the 
system. Some might welcome the complementary skills advisers might 
bring, whereas people who perceive access to, and influence on, the 
minister in zero-sum terms might be hostile. Klein and Lewis (p. 10) 
suggest that in some areas there is a 'vacuum' in which special advisers 
operate - the extent to which this is perceived to be the case varies 
widely. The reaction to advisers, and the consequent impact on their 
role, might change over time because, as Heclo and Wildavsky argue, 'in 
time, senior civil servants may realise the protection afforded to them 
by an improved articulation of ministerial leadership' (p. 378). 
Depending upon the reasons for appointment, the minister's needs, 
resources in the department, the department's culture, and their own 
abilities, special advisers will find they have varying degrees of 
discretion to carve out a role by choosing from amongst the menu of 
roles listed in Chapter 2, Section C. 
77 
Meltsner (1986) shows that the role of a policy analyst in American 
government departments is not only influenced by the client, the 
organizational situation and the policy arena, but also by the analyst 
himself. Analysts differ from each other in their expectations and 'in 
part, the policy analyst sets his own expectations' (p. 4). In Britain, 
some special advisers, through their abilities and opportunities, might 
be able to get into such a strong position to exploit their freedom, 
closeness to the minister, and informality that they almost become nodal 
points within the system. Rather than merely acting as conduits of 
information, such people might receive so much information that they 
become gatekeepers and decide what information to pass on to their 
minister. 
It could be claimed that there are so many theories being used to 
illustrate various determinants of the many possible places occupied by 
special advisers, that none of them have much explanatory power. The 
answer to this is two-fold. First, one of the key elements special 
advisers bring to the system of government is a degree of flexibility. 
Therefore, it seems appropriate that they could be used in a variety of 
roles to satisfy disparate perceptions held by ministers of their needs. 
Second, such flexibility forms a central part of an interlocking range 
of features of the place of special advisers. 
Features ýý Elm Qf Sindal Advisers. 
The notions of closeness and loyalty to a busy minister who might have 
varying needs, and the informality of the role, are vital features of 
the place of special advisers. Others are that advisers are 'in the 
know', i. e. within the Official Secrets Act, and 'on the spot'. As 
Klein and Lewis state, 'a crucial element in the relationship, most 
special advisers stress, is sheer availability' (p. 4). 
Combining a variety of ideas from this chapter it might be possible 
to see special advisers hopping freely along the technical-values 
spectrum and up and down the departmental hierarchy. In doing so a 
special adviser might bring expertise, or political opinions, or the 
thinking within the department, or a combination of all these, directly 
to his minister. He might also assist in the process of communicating 
78 
the minister's views to the department and/or to relevant people 
outside. Sometimes it might be necessary to take a view directly to the 
minister to counteract the considerable influence of the 'uncertainty 
absorbers' within the hierarchy. One feature is the inevitable 
potential for conflict. Much of the delicacy surrounding the role of 
special advisers involves the extent to which they, as the minister's 
extra pair of eyes and ears, can counteract the 'uncertainty 
absorption', but do so in an open way so that civil servants are aware 
of what is being sent to the minister and all the benefits of 
'uncertainty absorption' are not lost. 
Relating these points to the wider discussion of systems theory, 
advisers can have a variety of roles. First, they provide extra channel 
capacity and perform a range of gatekeeping and reduction functions in 
relation to, for example, demands from the party. Second, advisers 
might sometimes been seen as helping ministers to cope with the volume 
of demands reaching them for a decision. Third, given the inevitable 
gatekeeping and reduction functions of the permanent bureaucracy, and 
sometimes of the whole political community, advisers can sometimes 
provide ministers with a reassurance that alternatives they would have 
favoured have not been winnowed out. Fourth, advisers provide a means 
of strengthening the communications channels for outputs. 
Dror (1987) describes several dilemmas in the position of advisers, 
especially that between providing objective advice and giving personal 
support. Furthermore, we noted the difficulty of ensuring that 
ministers took notice of strategic analysis at times of pressure for 
short-term action. Brown and Steel highlight comments from Sam Brittan 
(1964) on how to tackle the problem. Brittan called for the 
introduction of more politically committed experts. It is possible that 
the flexibility and closeness to the minister inherent in a special 
adviser's role will provide the best opportunity for this dilemma to be 
overcome, because in some circumstances the person a minister is most 
likely to take uncomfortable, objective, advice from, is a certain type 
of adviser: somebody philosophically and politically committed to the 
minister's policies, personally loyal to him, and with the intellectual 
capacity and specialist knowledge to conduct policy analysis. Clearly, 
advisers who have the ability to contribute from both ends of the 
79 
spectrum are rare. 
Walter describes the type of person who will want to become an 
adviser and, using Gramsci's theory about the role of intellectuals in 
society, shows how they fit into his model of the development of 
personal advisers to ministers in western democracies. He suggests 
there is a psychological and role differentiation, but also an affinity, 
between politicians and, as he calls them, their minders. He attempts 
a, 'more psychologically and sociologically informed analysis of their 
place in the political arena' (p. 125). Linking back to his earlier 
discussion of the timeless element of court politics in political life 
he refers to, 'the ubiquitous pattern of patronage and cronyism' built 
upon, 'a needs relationship based on a typological distinction between 
the leaders and their personal advisers' (p. 177). Mainstream 
politicians specialize in adversary relations. They may be drawn into 
politics by a desire to combine idealism with knowledge, or to stand at 
the hub of events, but, once there, they have not time to think in terms 
of principle or philosophy but only of conflict. Minders are also 
motivated by a desire to be at the centre of events but want to avoid 
public displays of aggression: 
These can never stand first in their own right, but on the 
other hand they are free to stand aside from the daily 
conflict, to think in abstract terms, to consider the long 
term, to reinject ideals. ... Arguably, therefore, the choice 
of a backroom role indicates some difficulty in coping with 
aggression, and a hesitance to live with the consequences of 
actions. Both predilections could be rooted in the 
predicament of the 'adult civilized' child who remains aloof 
from peers but inevitably finds some barriers in relation to 
the adults towards whom he is orientated (p. 178). 
Moving the discussion on and taking Gramsci's argument as an analogy, he 
suggests that politicians, bureaucrats, and advisers all constitute part 
of the intelligentsia but, 'the intellectual function of the power 
elite falls to the advisers' (p. 181). The bureaucrat forgoes the task 
of analysis and articulation, 'to become a supposedly neutral expert in 
"apolitical" information and administration'. Furthermore, the 
politician can pay them little attention because he is too busy 
surviving in political combat: 
80 
At first, the institutional disjunction thus caused creates 
tension and strain at the institutional interface ... But at the next stage the political stratum, in order to maintain its 
dominance, must demand help, and thus demands the services of 
personal advisers, incidentally creating avenues for precisely 
that sector of the intelligentsia obsessed with the importance 
of politics but disillusioned about the available avenues of 
electoral representation or public service (p. 181). 
Whatever merit Walter's ambitious analysis might have in the 
Australian context, its application to the UK is limited by several 
factors. These include the small number of advisers in the UK and the 
desire many of them have, especially under the Tories, not to shy away 
from a front line role but to become parliamentary candidates. Some 
believe their experience of being an adviser will enhance their chances 
of being selected for a winnable seat. The smallness of numbers in the 
UK and yet the diversity of roles played, means that any attempt to 
apply psychological analysis to the features of the advisers' place 
might be of limited value. 
Another feature of the place of special advisers is not only the 
variety of positions they could occupy but also the insecurity of the 
position - only two departments, DHSS and Education, had special 
advisers continuously between 1974 and 1987. If ministers are, in 
Simon's terms, 'satisficers', they might be pleased to take the extra 
information that the right adviser could supply, but not feel the system 
would collapse, or even stall, without them. 
The Potential Im Qf SMial Advisers. 
One area of advisers' potential impact relates to the uncertainty 
surrounding the precise boundaries between minister's responsibilities 
and the legitimate concerns of others (including Parliament, the party, 
the media, pressure groups, and the civil service). The most capable 
special advisers could potentially be useful in a number of almost 
contradictory ways. First, in carrying out overtly political functions. 
This allows neutral civil servants, who are increasingly accused of 
being politicized because of their adoption of a 'can-do' attitude (see, 
for example, RIPA, 1986, p. 44), to emphasize the boundary between 
themselves and party politics. Second, in having the freedom to cross 
uncertain boundaries and act as messengers, or sometimes even brokers, 
81 
for their minister in a way he could not do himself. In many ways 
Figure 4 showing the possible positions of special advisers, together 
with the idea of advisers hopping along the spectrum and the development 
of Image IV officials, encapsulates the notion of boundaries being 
crossed. Several commentators illustrate how advisers are seen as 
having a liaison role across eroding traditional boundaries: 
The increasing politicization of what were once thought of as 
administrative issues, as well as the growing burden on 
Ministers, suggest that the role of the political adviser, 
both in policy and private office functions, will become 
increasingly important (Brown and Steel, p. 335). 
There has also been a marked tendency for the Government to 
have a closer relationship with its own Parliamentary party, 
of which the liaison functions of a proportion of the special 
advisers who have been appointed in larger numbers since 1974 
(though the total is not yet large) is only one manifestation 
(Allen, 1978, p. 7). 
Similarly Walter (p. 167) suggests minders can have a positive role as 
mediators in the groups where major political and bureaucratic 
institutions intersect. 
There is evidence that there is no set pattern as to how central 
government policy is produced as a result of the various forces at work. 
This would not be incompatible with the view that on certain issues 
there is room for special advisers to make a considerable impact on 
policies, possibly as 'sponsors'. To the extent that policy 
communities exist and major changes in policy reflect changes in the 
composition of the policy community, special advisers might sometimes be 
used in a brokerage role to liaise with an interest group which the 
minister, possibly at the adviser's suggestion, wishes to bring more 
fully into policy discussion. Jordan (1990, p. 474) recently admitted 
that 'The existing policy community approach can be seen as a strong 
description of policy-making but as incomplete (by definition) in that 
it has little to say about excluded groups. ' It is feasible that 
occasionally advisers could have a role in helping to facilitate greater 
participation by previously excluded groups. It is also possible to see 
a role for special advisers acting as brokers in situations where 
ministers wish to take less notice of established pressure groups but 
more notice of policy research centres. 
82 
It might be that special advisers who combine technical expertise 
with an ability to make a contribution from the political or 'values' 
end of the spectrum will have the greatest potential to influence 
policy. This would fit in well with the typology of policy analysts 
devised by Meltsner which is shown as Figure 5. Although no analyst 
exactly fitted these categories, Meltsner found that the typology became 
a convenient way of discussing some central characteristics. The role 
and impact of British special advisers will probably vary even more than 
that of American policy analysts who, although they all work in a staff 
capacity, are orientated specifically towards policy analysis and 
information gathering. This point is well illustrated by Campbell's 
development (1987) of Aberbach gl Image IV. Campbell suggests 
there are three categories of officials who can have an Image IV type 
relationship with ministers. The most partisan of these, Image IV 2b 
officials, he calls 'amphibians' and they are politically appointed 
policy professionals. However, he makes a strong distinction between 
these and political appointees who do not contribute substantially to 
policy issues and whom he calls 'political operatives' and who seem to 
have no place in Image IV. Despite the lack of space for 'political 
operatives' within Image IV, it is clear that where they possess valued 
political and personal skills there could be an important place for them 
within a British minister's entourage. 
Campbell's second category of Image IV officials are traditional 
line civil servants who show enthusiasm for the policies they are 
implementing. Their position raises questions about whether some of the 
types of advisory roles are really needed. Having examined changes in 
the UK under Margaret Thatcher, Aberbach and Rockman (p. 23) suggest, 'it 
is plausible to argue that the penetration of the mainstream 
administrative system in pursuit of political responsiveness from the 
traditional bureaucracy renders a more generous return than would be 
gained by building new units of support for the political centre of the 
executive. ' It could be argued that encouraging civil servants to adopt 
a more 'can-do' attitude reduces the need for 'amphibians' but increases 
the requirement for 'political operatives' who will help preserve the 
party political impartiality of the enthusiastic officials. 
83 
FIG L Meltsner's Typo-logy Q Policy Analysts. 
Political Skills 
High 
Analytical 
High 
Entrepreneur 
Low 
Technician 
Skills 
Politician Pretender 
Low 
Source: Meltsner, 1986, p. 16. 
The wide range of possible impacts that special advisers could make 
partly derives, as we have seen, from the variety of potential reasons 
for their appointment. It is possible to identify some types of 
ministers who might want to appoint special advisers. They could 
include: radical ministers; ministers ambitious to carry out many 
functions; ministers who need assistance; ministers who make a realistic 
assessment of their needs. The many specific reasons given for the 
appointment of special advisers is examined in the next chapter. 
84 
CHAPTER FOUR: REASONS FOR IHE APPOINTMENT QF 
SPECIAL ADVISERS. 
Talking once with a miner I asked him when the housing 
shortage first became acute in his district; he answered, 
'when we were told about it' (George Orwell, :g Road 1Q 
Wigan R&, p. 57). 
It is easy for a Minister to be swallowed up in the engrossing 
work of his own department. He can lose touch with 
colleagues, with his Party, with the political strategy of the 
Government ... Seeing this happen, I tried in 1972 and 1973 with Mr Heath's approval to interest several of his senior 
colleagues in choosing political or special advisers of their 
own. (Douglas Hurd, An En IQ Promises, 1979, p. 37) 
The extent to which needs are recognized and become the basis of reasons 
for action varies. Having examined the factors that might, in theory, 
have led ministers to think that they needed to appoint special 
advisers, we should consider the actual reasons given by ministers, 
to see how far the two match. Despite the difficulties this is 
important because if the reasons for appointment are established they 
provide some yardstick by which to judge whether special advisers are 
effective in doing what it was hoped they would do. 
The reasons for appointment need to be included in this study 
because the decision whether to have a special adviser is one that 
ministers still have to make, whereas they have no effective choice 
about having private secretaries, a permanent secretary, information 
officers and junior ministers. That said, it is apparent that some 
ministers appoint special advisers because it has become the thing to 
do. Roy Hattersley is a good example of a minister who had a clear idea 
of what he wanted his special advisers to do and who used them well. 
Nevertheless, when asked to explain why he thought of appointing special 
advisers he said that by the time he joined the Cabinet in 1976, 'I 
suppose I thought of it because we all thought of it. There was no 
specific thing that made me want to do it. I just took it for granted 
that I would ... Standard operating procedures. ' 
Attempting to assess the reasons for appointment is, therefore, 
complex with a range of cross cutting factors to take into account. 
These include: 
85 
(i) variations in the extent to which there were clear reasons; 
(ii) sometimes differing perceptions held by various actors as to why 
ministers appointed special advisers; 
(iii) variations in the degree to which ministers remember and/or 
acknowledge their real reasons; 
(iv) fluctuations in the supply of potential special advisers and the 
influence that this had on the demand for them in general, and in 
specific cases. 
Bill (now Lord) Rodgers initially did not appoint a special adviser 
and his later decision to choose one flowed from his recognition that he 
needed one. Yet, even where there was such a clear acknowledgement of 
needs, Rodgers admits that it is, 'difficult to distinguish between what 
were intended to be, and what became, the functions. ' One official 
suggested special advisers had been introduced as a solution to the 
problem of getting the right people into the right jobs to meet the 
minister's needs. He felt it was the wrong solution to the problem, but 
that a whole host of more or less useful jobs, 'have accrued to special 
advisers, ' because they were there. 
Having accepted these difficulties, and to help cut through them, 
this chapter will analyse in Section A reasons related to ministers' 
perceptions of their needs. Section B focuses on the comments of others 
about what ministers perceived their needs to be. In Section C the 
views and actions of others who thought ministers ought to have special 
advisers will be examined to see how far special advisers were appointed 
as a result of such pressure. This would be either directly or as a 
result of the creation of a climate of opinion. Some of the themes from 
Chapter 3 are relevant for this discussion. 
SECTION Q; MINISTERS' PERCEPTIONS QE NEEDS 
There are a number of aspects to this question: the reasons stated by 
ministers before appointments were made; the reasons stated by ministers 
during the research interviews; and how far ministers have clear reasons 
related to need. 
86 
Reasons Stated Before Appointments Made. 
At some stage prior to their appointing special advisers, certain 
ministers expressed the need for some improvements to be made in the 
services provided to them. Some specifically advocated the appointment 
of special advisers as a way of helping to achieve this. The following 
extracts give a flavour of such thinking. In all cases the comments are 
based on experience of government gained either directly (Tony Benn) or 
indirectly (Peter Shore as PPS to the Prime Minister and David Howell 
who was influenced by Ernest Marples). 
In 1966 Peter Shore, having been Head of Research at the Labour 
Party and PPS to Harold Wilson, wrote in Entitled IQ Know, 
But the most important reform of all is make the power of 
Ministers more effective in their own departments. Deluged by 
work, largely cut off from ministerial colleagues, separated 
from supporting MPs by the Official Secrets Act, accessible on 
a day-to-day basis only to top officials, none of whom they 
have appointed, Ministers have a relationship with their Civil 
Servants which is dangerously unbalanced and dependent .. 
The 
need here is to strengthen the power of the 'temporary 
politicians', the Ministers, against the 'permanent 
politicians', the civil servants. The first step is to end 
the isolation of Ministers by ensuring that top advisers, 
knowing the Minister's policies and able to watch over the 
main fields for which he is responsible, are brought into the 
departments' (p. 155-6). 
In the 1960s the Conservative Opposition undertook major reviews of 
policies. David Howell, an MP who had formerly been Director of the 
CRD, was an important contributor and in 1968 he wrote a pamphlet, 
entitled, Whose Government Works? In it he proposed major reforms 
which are of particular interest given their similarity to Government 
thinking in the 1980s and 1990s; he started by referring to the: 
growing scepticism about the ability of elected politicians to 
control the administration and to get their undertakings 
carried out ... Under a more modern structure of government 
with proper management accounting, senior officials will have 
to be given responsibility as well as authority and will have 
to carry that responsibility in public. At the same time, 
more senior administrative posts (that is, directorships of 
major governments projects, boards or commissions and other 
agencies) will be headed by publicly-named and fully-qualified 
men and women who, again, will have to be able to justify 
87 
their views publicly. 
This kind of development will at once have the valuable effect 
of relieving the Minister - that is, the man at the top - of the great burden of administrative detail of his department 
and giving him time to run the organisation properly with the 
aid of a proper personal staff or cabinet. (pp. 5 and 16). 
On 11 July 1973 Tony Benn wrote in The Times: 
Ministers themselves are at present severely handicapped by 
the traditions of secrecy that operate within Whitehall which 
prevent them from maintaining the close connexions they need, 
both with their colleagues and the public, if they are to do 
their job properly. 
The workings of the Civil Service and the growing pressure in 
the Labour Party for political advisers for ministers is 
closely connected with this issue. The Civil Service half 
consciously uses the Official Secrets Acts to maintain itself 
as a two-way filter between ministers and the outside 
world ... Ministers have no staff specifically charged with the 
development and maintenance of the political links they need 
to have with those who work outside Whitehall; or even their 
own ministerial colleagues... 
There is no ministerial or political network comparable to the 
Civil Service network - through which ministers can brief each 
other, politically, in advance of the committees at which 
papers are to be discussed. 
These are some of the defects in our machinery of government 
which must be remedied if ministers are to be able to maintain 
real contact with each other, real contact with backbench MPs 
and are to have adequate consultation with the world outside - including those advisers who may have helped in Opposition to 
develop the various policies, upon which the party was 
elected. The problem is essentially one of isolation rather 
than of sabotage or obstruction by the Civil Service ... What is required is the open acceptance - with proper 
safeguards - of a new category of political advisers who would be appointed to serve an incoming government, and each of the 
departmental ministers, and would go out of office with them. 
Such advisers would have no executive power within the 
department and no civil servant would be expected to take 
orders from them ... Each minister within his own department - especially in the 
economic or industrial fields - would need both a political 
adviser, and a trade union adviser, as well as an economic 
adviser, all properly serviced. Parliamentary Private 
Secretaries could play a much more active role within such an 
advisory group. 
These changes, minor as they may appear to anyone not familiar 
with Whitehall, would strengthen the political impulse within 
Government without disturbing the sound and practical 
administration of the Civil Service. 
88 
These extracts have been quoted at length because they reveal the 
mixture of motives in the thinking of politicians, all of whom 
subsequently appointed special advisers. In similar vein Barbara 
Castle, in her Mandarin Power article, argued the case for the minister 
to have the support of a political cabinet within the department to 
reduce 'the loneliness of the short-distance runner' (1973). She 
thought it important that the specialist and political advisers should 
be integrated into the structure of the department because it was the 
ministers who needed moral, philosophical, and physical support from 
people who went into the department sharing their approach. Ministers 
required, 'political reminders all the time', and 'a political 
conscience at the heart of the departmental battle. ' 
Several major themes emerge - especially from the Labour 
ministers. Support is needed to: strengthen the position of ministers 
in the department - especially by enhancing the political impulse; 
help ministers cope with overload; and reduce their isolation - especially 
by conducting political liaison. 
Wider but less specific evidence about ministers' thoughts on the 
limitations of services provided for them, and their needs in terms of 
extra assistance, comes from Headey's study of the role of Cabinet 
ministers (1974, pp. 112-13). Of the 50 ministers he interviewed who had 
served up to the early 1970s, 18 thought the range of options presented 
to ministers by civil servants was inadequate. Furthermore, 18 also 
thought outside experts should be brought into the civil service on 
either a temporary or permanent basis, although not all who took this 
view suggested that there was a lack of expertise amongst the civil 
servants. Nine thought that there were, 'problems in communicating the 
ministers' objectives; Private Office needs strengthening; more 
political aides needed. ' As has been noted earlier only five ministers 
thought that they should be spending more time preparing for Cabinet. 
Headey concludes: 
The case for ministerial cabinets is hard to evaluate. It is 
only fair to say that few Ministers want them; for every 
respondent who was critical of the Private Office there were 
several who stated that they were well satisfied and doubted 
if comparably good arrangements existed in business and other 
organisations. On the other hand, the general point that 
89 
departments are not at present so constituted as to facilitate 
or at any rate maximise ministerial and party impact on policy 
also seems a strong one (p. 131). 
This evidence from Headey is important in showing that those ministers 
who were advocating the appointment of special advisers were by no means 
reflecting an unanimous view. 
The Research Findings. 
As we have seen, it is often difficult to distinguish between reasons 
that existed at the time of appointment and the reasons as they are now 
remembered, because inevitably a minister's thinking is influenced by 
the functions his special advisers performed. Interviews with current 
junior ministers and shadow ministers do, however, usefully illustrate 
the needs as perceived by potential secretaries of state. 
From the interviews it is possible to identify a number of specific 
needs felt by some ministers and examine the extent to which these were 
generally thought by ministers to be a reason for appointing a special 
adviser. 
These needs are listed below, and then analysed, in a more specific 
way than appeared at the end of Chapter 3: 
(i) the relief of overload; 
(ü) political support in terms of an extra person, independent 
of the department, to look at departmental submissions; 
(iii) an extra pair of eyes and ears; 
(iv) help with maintaining the thrust of party policies; 
(v) the provision of additional expertise; 
(vi) the provision of alternative and/or new policy thinking; 
(vii) somebody to play an aide/confidant role to reduce the 
isolation; 
(viii) help with party liaison; 
(ix) help with liaison with groups outside the department and the 
party; 
(x) help with presentation; 
(xi) help with preparation for Cabinet. 
90 
Obviously several of these merge into one another, especially from 
(ii) to (vi) which are to do with development of policy in the 
department. Nevertheless, certain of these categories could be further 
sub-divided because respondents diversley interpreted them and 
associated a variety of activities with each one. In most cases a 
minister had a number of reasons for appointing a special adviser. 
(i) A major theme of Chapter 3 was the concept of overload on 
ministers. Many ministers agreed that they were overloaded but 
comparatively few saw the appointment of a special adviser as a way of 
relieving overload. Very few spontaneously mentioned it as a reason and 
most denied that it was when the question was specifically put to them. 
Nevertheless, some clearly did see special advisers as a way of 
relieving overload. Bill Rodgers (1980, p. 24) referred to the need for 
'another pair of hands. ' Another minister suggested that, 'all the time 
you are groping for things which enable you to go to bed at midnight 
instead of 1 o'clock. ' Barbara Castle suggests that special advisers do 
relieve overload and that was one of the reasons for appointing them. 
In her poly entry for 4 November 1974 she observes: 'I thanked God for 
the allies I have got in the ministerial team and for the special 
advisers. Without them a Minister is almost certainly swamped by the 
sheer pressure of the top officials surrounding him - or her' (1980). 
Reservations about the idea of special advisers helping to relieve 
overload take several forms. First, if special advisers read through 
submissions and comment to the secretary of state it is claimed that 
this might help to make the secretary of state more effective by drawing 
his attention to important political points, but it adds to his 
workload. This is because he will have extra words to read; he still 
has to read everything put in his boxes by the private secretary. 
Furthermore, of course, special advisers cannot make decisions on behalf 
of their ministers. Second, it is felt that by performing tasks such as 
writing political speeches and liaising with the party, a special 
adviser might help his minister to do things he would not otherwise have 
been able to do at all, or as satisfactorily. It is not thought to be 
relieving overload, however, if the minister is helped to engage in more 
activities. 
91 
(ii) Ministers have a number of sometimes overlapping needs in relation 
to their departmental role, especially policy making. Recognition of 
these needs encouraged them to appoint special advisers. About half the 
ministers interviewed expressed a desire for somebody who was 
independent of the civil service to be making an input into the process 
of policy consideration within the department. Jim Prior referred to 
the need for somebody independent to give 'candid advice' and John Smith 
claimed that the adviser assisted his work by giving him, 'a source of 
advice independent from that of the department. ' The need to appoint a 
special adviser to provide such independent advice is felt by both 
Labour and Tory ministers; and in both these cases, and others, it was 
important that the advice came from somebody politically committed to, 
and/or knowledgeable about, party policies. Leon Brittan thought it 
important that, 'everything was looked at from the political angle. ' 
If, as a number of ministers believe, politics is thought of as a 
minefield then, according to Peter Shore, especially when he was 
Secretary of State for the Environment, 'one of the things you would 
hope to get from an astute political adviser would be a mine detector: 
"don't put your foot there because it will blow up. "' Advisers can 
carry out this role by taking part in policy discussions within the 
department and by commenting on submissions going to the secretary of 
state. 
(iii) Several ministers suggested that there was a need to appoint 
special advisers to act, as Harold Wilson said in his 1975 statement, as 
an additional pair of 'eyes and ears' for the minister within the 
department (1976, p. 204). The 'eyes role' can be played by reading 
submissions and commenting on them in the manner discussed above. The 
'ears role' goes further and some ministers wanted advisers to gather 
information. Norman Lamont thought that, 'special advisers can often 
develop close working relations with civil servants and can discover 
what is really going on in the department and what officials really 
think. ' 
Similarly, Denis Healey wanted his younger advisers, Adrian Ham 
and Derek Scott, to play an intelligence role and find out what was 
being discussed at a lower level in the Treasury and give him advance 
warning about what would be pushed up. Occasionally, a minister's need 
for an extra pair of eyes and ears related not only to policy making but 
92 
also to his management role within the department. 
(iv) Whereas quite a large number of ministers wanted independent 
advice within the department, somewhat fewer took it a step further and 
saw a need for advisers to help maintain the thrust of their policies. 
This can take several forms. At one end of the spectrum it is merely a 
belief that special advisers could help civil servants by providing a 
steer on details of the minister's thinking or the philosophy behind 
them. Other ministers, however, believed special advisers were 
necessary to provide, 'the policy enthusiasm to help ensure that 
progress is made in implementing the minister's policies and the 
position of the minister in the department is strengthened. ' When 
asked whether advisers helped maintain the thrust of policies within the 
department and helped to ensure they were introduced Lamont agreed and 
stressed that faced with time constraints and officials correctly 
pointing out the difficulties it was often 'very useful' to appoint 
special advisers as people with extra time and, in many cases, expertise 
to consider the issues. 
Whatever position is taken along this spectrum some ministers feel 
a need to take into Government with them a researcher or expert who 
helped develop policies in Opposition. 
Considerable work had been undertaken by the Conservatives in 
Opposition in the late 1960s. Stephen Abbott from the CRD had been 
secretary to a succession of study groups on industrial relations. The 
shadow spokesman on Employment, Robert (now Lord) Carr was 
'instinctively opposed' to special advisers. He stated: 
in so far as an incoming minister might have difficulty in 
getting his way with the civil servants, I used to take the 
view that it would not be helped by introducing irritants into 
the system. I had a feeling as a minister it was my job to 
know what I wanted to do, get it done and to have sufficient 
confidence in my civil servants to detect if they weren't 
doing what they should do. On the whole I believed I was more 
likely to get the help I needed to pursue my, and the 
Government's, policies if I was seen to trust them. 
93 
He knew, however, and as Parliamentary Secretary from 1955-8 had shared, 
the long tradition of Ministry of Labour opposition to the use of the 
law in industrial relations. He assumed that the departmental view 
would still be the same and he might have a battle on his hands. 
Therefore, given that he wanted to act quickly and it was a complicated 
subject, he felt to have someone he had been working with, 'would be a 
great comfort and help. ' He had already suggested to Edward (now Sir 
Edward) Heath that whoever became Secretary of State for Employment in 
the next Conservative Government should take Abbott with him because his 
detailed knowledge would be very useful when legislation was being 
planned. 
Also in 1970 David Howell advocated that Mark Schreiber should be 
appointed to help maintain the thrust (a phrase, he suggests, they were 
keen on in those days) of implementing various ideas on reforms to the 
machinery-of-government they had been working on in the Public Sector 
Research Unit. Arthur Cockfield had been centrally involved in the 
policy group considering taxation. Patrick Jenkin, who was Financial 
Secretary to the Treasury in 1970, recalled that Cockfield, therefore, 
'as an acknowledged expert in the field for whom the Inland Revenue had 
a very great respect' was invited to join the Treasury as Adviser on 
Taxation Policy to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. 
There was similar reasoning in 1974. Barbara Castle appointed 
Brian Abel-Smith who had worked in Labour Party research groups on the 
evolution of policy. In the early 1970s Stuart Holland was an 
influential member of the Public Sector Group of the Industrial Policy 
Committee of Labour's NEC (Hatfield, 1978). The group was formed by 
Judith Hart, and Holland was soon invited to join her on the full 
Industrial Committee. When she became Minister for Overseas Development 
she appointed Holland to be her specialist special adviser, but he 
initially spent about half his time working for Tony Benn in the 
Department of Industry on the departmental working party drafting the 
White Paper, ]3M Regent Qf British Indu=y (Cmnd. 5710,1974), on 
which the Industry Bill was to be based. This Bill was intended to 
implement proposals from the Industrial Policy Committee which had been 
adopted in Labour's Program g fQI DhIgin. 1973" 
94 
Developments in 1979 show most clearly how the idea of wanting to 
appoint advisers who have a detailed knowledge of party policy can cover 
a variety of situations. David Howell was appointed to be Secretary of 
State for Energy even though he had not been the shadow spokesman. He 
thought it would be useful to appoint as a special adviser Michael 
Portillo who had been the relevant desk officer at CRD. Taking over the 
education portfolio for the Opposition shortly before the election, and 
with little previous knowledge of the field, Mark (now Lord) Carlisle 
found that Stuart Sexton, who had been research assistant to his 
predecessor, gave him much advice. Sexton had been involved in 
developing Conservative education policies and Carlisle saw his 
appointment as a way of carrying into Government the work he had been 
involved in in Opposition, particularly on the Assisted Places Scheme, 
which, 'was going to require a good deal of push to get it through. ' 
By contrast, when the Treasury team of ministers were appointed in 
1979 they had already had a considerable spell in Opposition developing 
their policies. In this case the situation was similar to the examples 
cited earlier from 1970 when some ministers took with them people who 
had been working for them for a number of years. However, the newly 
appointed Chief Secretary to the Treasury, John Biffen, neither 
appointed, nor made much use of, any of the Treasury special advisers: 
'I never behaved as though I had a special adviser. ' Nevertheless, 
although he thought the Treasury, 'acted with great propriety and 
loyalty to the policy of the their new Government, ' he could see that 
given the radical programme that had been developed in Opposition and 
'given that you were determined to stick to it, and not to have a 
repetition of the 1970-74 situation, then there was merit in having 
alongside you some of those who had toiled in the preparation of those 
policies. ' Three special advisers were appointed from the CRD to the 
Treasury in 1979: Adam Ridley, Peter Cropper and George Cardona. 
As part of helping ministers maintain the thrust of their policies, 
special advisers are sometimes seen as 'Keepers of the Ark of the 
manifesto'. This is interpreted in several ways. Sometimes it is seen 
as appointing advisers to help make sure that the minister keeps to the 
policies of the manifesto. Many ministers react negatively to such a 
concept although several thought there was something in it and reference 
95 
was made earlier to Castle's comment in the Mandarin Power speech about 
the need for, 'a political conscience at the heart of the departmental 
battle. ' Taking over as Secretary of State for Social Services after 
the sacking of Barbara Castle, David (now Lord) Ennals reappointed Brian 
Abel-Smith and Tony Lynes and thought the phrase was a 'very fair one' 
and that the advisers were a constant reminder of manifesto commitments 
as well as being people who could develop arguments to be used in 
Cabinet, Parliament and the country. Carlisle opined that there was a 
role for Sexton to play in reminding him of manifesto commitments, 
and he sometimes introduced Sexton to people as his, 'right wing conscience. ' 
The other interpretation of the phrase was to suggest that special advisers 
were appointed to help their minister ensure that policies were pushed 
through the department. Few ministers saw things in precisely these terms. 
(v) The provision of expertise is another of the overlapping reasons 
related to the development of policy within a department for appointing 
special advisers. Often it is felt there is a need for expertise that 
is either missing in the department and/or is committed to party 
policies. There is an obvious overlap with the previous points because 
one aspect of expertise might be a knowledge of the policies of the 
party. However the concept of committed expertise takes things one 
stage further. Not only was Abel-Smith somebody independent of the 
department who could evaluate policy developments and bring knowledge of 
policies developed in Opposition, he could also do these things from 
Barbara Castle's particular approach. In appointing Anthony Lester to be 
one of his special advisers in 1974, Roy Jenkins selected a person not 
only committed to fighting race and sex discrimination, but who also had 
skills in aspects of civil law probably lacking in the Home Office at 
that time. Lord Gowrie, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and 
Minister for the Arts, was also government spokesman in the Lords on 
economic affairs. As such he could perhaps have relied solely on 
Treasury backing but wanted the considerable experience that could be 
provided by appointing his long standing friend Adam Ridley who had just 
completed over five years in a role - special adviser to the Chancellor 
of the Exchequer - involving, Ridley felt, a substantial degree of 
committed expertise. Roy Hattersley's belief that Maurice Peston could 
provide, 'committed expertise' was referred to earlier. 
96 
Despite the small numbers involved, there is, in keeping with the 
heterogeneity of advisers, a surprisingly large range of permutations 
between on the one hand, the provision of expertise and/or commitment; 
and on the other hand, filling gaps in civil servants' knowledge or 
adding to their existing expertise. By 1974 the ODM was well staffed 
with economists but Judith Hart felt sometimes there were aspects of 
their, 'assessment of issues that raised economic theology that wasn't 
altogether to my liking. ' It was beneficial, therefore, to have an 
economist, Stuart Holland, who shared her beliefs, 'to use the 
appropriate economic jargon' to tackle the issue as she wished it to be 
approached. Initially Denis Healey appointed Nicky Kaldor because he, 
'wanted somebody who was known to be sympathetic with the thrust of 
Labour policy and who was also capable of arguing on his own level with 
civil servants. I would have liked him as my economic adviser but Ken 
Berrill already had that post. ' This again raises interesting questions 
about how far an appropriate person in the post of Chief Economic 
Adviser might obviate the need for Chancellors to appoint a leading 
economist as a special adviser. 
A mixture of expertise and commitment can be supplied by the 
businessmen recruited. Sir Keith (now Lord) Joseph illustrated the 
importance of commitment: 'By 1979 I was far more alive to the dangers 
of devitalisation than I had been at the end of '70-'74 ... so when I 
came back in '79, I wanted allies who would see things as I saw them. 
David Young and I worked harmoniously together. ' David (now Lord) Young 
and his successor Jeffrey (now Lord) Sterling also brought expertise not 
present in the department. Norman Lamont was Minister of State at the 
Industry Department for four years and thought the 'different 
perspective' provided by businessmen such as Young and Sterling was 
'very valuable'. He illustrated the argument well: 'no matter how good 
civil servants are at developing knowledge about the City, this is 
something that they have essentially learnt. They have never done it 
themselves, and the perspective of somebody who has actually floated a 
company is obviously different to that of somebody who has read about 
it. I 
97 
Michael Heseltine makes similar comments on his use of experts, 
which was described earlier: 
It was what I profoundly believe in which is the fusion of the 
talents of the public sector and private sector, the breaking 
down of barriers ... [They were introduced] to advise on specific areas ... I am a great admirer of the civil service but you cannot expect someone trained in the disciplines of 
the public sector to be an entrepreneurial capitalist and if 
you are trying to deal with the problems of achieving results 
and making things happen, you are well advised to use the 
skills that are experienced in that sort of activity. 
Some of these points can be related to themes discussed in Chapter 3. 
In line with some British ministers, Walter suggests that a, 
'generalized need for most ministers is for expert knowledge, and for 
that expertise to be informed by philosophies and assumptions congenial 
to the minister's politics' (p. 154). However, whereas Heseltine and 
some other British ministers stress the value of advisers in breaking 
down barriers and fusing complementary skills, Walter emphasizes the 
conflict in values between ministers and bureaucrats. He continues by 
stressing the theme, 'that knowledge and the deployment of technical 
capacity are not value-neutral, and that the political executive will 
frequently experience the values of their department as inimical to 
their own' (p. 154). 
Several British ministers, including Ted Short, made a clear 
distinction between expertise and commitment. As minister with 
responsibility for devolution legislation Short appointed Norman Hunt 
(later Lord Crowther-Hunt) to be his special adviser on devolution 
issues, not because of his undoubted commitment to it but rather because 
he was, 'an acknowledged expert'. With encouragement from the Prime 
Minister, Short felt Hunt, 'would be extremely useful' because they were 
starting from scratch on the issue and initially there was a lack of 
detailed knowledge about it amongst the civil servants. Harold (now 
Lord) Lever, as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, had few 
departmental responsibilities or civil servants but he produced many 
initiatives. He appointed Ray Richardson, an economist from the London 
School of Economics (LSE). Lever, an expert in international finance, 
produced papers on economics and wanted Richardson to be, 'a checker and 
challenger of propositions ... [because] it's very important for a non- 
98 
economist to have an economist say, "you can only hold x view if you 
make the following assumptions" - that clarifies your thinking. ' He was 
clear, however, about the limitations on what he wanted Richardson to do 
and, 'didn't appoint him to provide alternative ideas ... I took enough 
initiatives anyway and didn't need anybody to suggest any. ' 
(vi) There are some ministers however, who also appoint advisers to 
provide alternative and new policy thinking. This implies they feel a 
need for somebody, independent of the department, to play a proactive 
role in developing policies. In this sense it is distinct from both the 
person independent of the department who plays a reactive role in 
examining departmental submissions, and the role of advisers who come in 
with knowledge of policies developed in Opposition. However, the needs 
may be linked in the minds of some ministers who might appoint the same 
person to fulfil all these roles. Furthermore, an adviser with 
expertise lacking in the department and/or with committed expertise is 
in an ideal position to develop alternative and new thinking, although 
it is possible for other people to do so. The importance of having an 
adviser to provide long-term thinking is stressed by certain ministers, 
including Richard (now Sir Richard) Luce and John Patten. On becoming 
Minister of State for Housing in 1985 Patten was one of the two 
ministers to appoint David Coleman and thought that the provision of 
alternative/new thinking was a major reason for their decision: 'We were 
going into a policy formulation period, we wanted a cerebal kind of 
person ... someone who was thoughtful, mature and 
far thinking. ' He 
believed it important not only to have, 'someone there to give you the 
party political component but to understand that you might be making 
major sea-changes in policy of a very long lasting nature. ' 
Some of the advisers appointed to provide committed expertise 
and/or alternative and new thinking, including Abel-Smith, Peston and 
Ridley, were expected by the minister to cover a wide waterfront. The 
appointment of other such advisers signalled the minister's intention to 
give greater attention to specific policy areas. This was especially 
true of Heseltine's appointments. Patrick Jenkin appointed Roger Dyson 
to provide, 'an entirely new dimension of expertise', which was related 
to industrial relations and management issues within the NHS. When he 
became Secretary of State for Trade in 1974 Shore appointed Roland 
99 
Brown, who had been engaged on trade and aid missions on behalf of the 
Tanzanian Government, because, 'he had insights particularly into the 
trading and aid and other problems of the developing countries, which I 
thought was an admirable addition to the kind of thinking which I would 
get in the Department of Trade. ' 
(vii) About a third of ministers interviewed suggested that their 
appointment of a special adviser was partly associated with their need 
for an aide/confidant. Again there is a range of interpretations. A 
few ministers thought it desirable to appoint somebody with whom issues 
could be discussed when making policy decisions in the department. 
Respondents also claimed that aide/confidants are required to combat the 
isolation ministers feel from their political colleagues. Benn, Castle 
and Shore all stood by the comments, referred to earlier in this 
chapter, that were written before they appointed special advisers in 
1974. In other cases, however, the special adviser became an 
aide/confidant but, as one minister stated, the role was, 'not in my 
mind originally. ' 
When a new government is formed and ministers are appointed after a 
spell in Opposition, they may want to take with them any research 
assistant or party research officer they had in Opposition and with whom 
this relationship had already developed. Ted Short, for example, soon 
came to think in the early 1970s that if he went back into Government 
his Rowntree Trust research assistant, Vicky Kidd, was somebody he would 
quite like to take with him and he thought the aidelconfidant role was, 
'extremely useful'. 
In their choice of adviser, ministers sometimes indicated the 
importance they were going to attach to the aide/confidant role. Judith 
Hart thought reducing the isolation was, 'terribly important' in a role 
played for her by Margaret Jackson (now Beckett), Tony Banks, and Maggie 
Sidgreaves. She not only looked for people whom she, 'thought were 
capable and intellectually high grade but also one wanted people one 
knew one could get on with. ' Interesting examples of how the 
aide/confidant relationship can develop whilst a minister is in post and 
then become a reason for appointment occurred with both Judith Hart and 
Leon Brittan. Sidgreaves served Hart as private office diary secretary 
100 
in the 1960s and, in common with several other such people, moved 
departments with her minister. Sidgreaves remained in the private 
office at the ODM in 1970 when the Labour Government fell and was still 
there when Hart returned as Minister in 1974. On Hart's departure from 
the Government in 1975 Sidgreaves left the civil service to continue to 
work for her and came back as a special adviser on Hart's reappointment 
to the Ministry. 
When Brittan became Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Robin Harris 
was already a special adviser in the Treasury and he gradually 
gravitated towards Brittan. On becoming Home Secretary in 1983 Brittan 
took Harris with him and thought the aide/confidant role was important. 
A further example occurred with a minister moving in the opposite 
direction. On becoming Home Secretary in 1965 Roy Jenkins appointed 
John Harris whose work he knew of but whom he did not know personally 
very well. However the relationship rapidly developed and when Jenkins 
became Chancellor of the Exchequer it was, as he explains in his 
autobiography, six weeks before he was able to move David Dowler, his 
long standing principal private secretary and confidant, into the 
Treasury as one of his joint principal private secretaries. During the 
interval, he writes, 'I was dependent for an intimate "no secrets 
barred" confidant, of which I have always had great need, upon John 
Harris, who had come immediately from the Home Office to the Treasury 
with me and whose political judgment was admirable, but who would not at 
that stage have claimed to have much economic expertise' (1991, p. 221). 
(viii) For several ministers there was a link between the need to 
appoint a special adviser to help overcome the political isolation and 
the need to carry out liaison with party colleagues. They viewed 
advisers as being 'political antennae'. When Richard Luce was 
appointed Minister for the Arts he thought, especially as the political 
head of a department but not a member of the Cabinet, there was a danger 
of becoming, 'rather politically isolated'. Interviewed whilst in post 
he stated that therefore, 'you should have a political adviser here who 
keeps his or her tabs on what is happening elsewhere and keeps close to 
other political advisers. ' 
101 
Over a third of ministers interviewed appointed advisers to 
maintain liaison with the party - especially the party organization. 
Many Tories, including Leon Brittan, regarded liaison with Conservative 
Central Office as an important element in keeping contact with the party 
and their choice of a former member of the CRD facilitated this. For a 
number of Labour ministers who were active in internal party matters 
including Benn, Castle, Hart, Short and Jenkins it was important to have 
advisers who could liaise with the party. Most of these ministers were 
playing a major role within the party's NEC structure. Matthew 
Oakeshott had been a very useful political assistant in Opposition and 
Jenkins wanted him to continue working on general political matters. 
This was particularly important for Jenkins who, though not on the NEC, 
was seen as leader of the pro-European group of MPs within the Labour 
Party. Ministers who saw this as a major reason for appointment include 
Roy Hattersley who said that David Hill, 'had the very special job of 
maintaining my link with the party. ' 
This party liaison role provides a good illustration of the central 
theme developed in Chapter 3 that advisers act as a channel of 
information. One of the reasons behind Bill Rodgers's decision to 
appoint a special adviser after all, was the feeling that because of the 
overload he needed somebody, 'to provide communications rather than 
advice, ' in relation to the political world. Some Labour ministers also 
wanted advisers who could liaise with the trade unions -a role 
fulfilled by Ken Griffin for Tony Benn, and by Tony Banks for Judith 
Hart. For some ministers, including Peter Shore at Environment, the 
need to have somebody to liaise with party contacts links in with the 
requirement for a person with expert knowledge of local government and 
local councillors. 
(ix) Rather fewer ministers appointed an adviser to liaise with groups 
outside the party. Again, however, for some ministers this was 
something valuable that their advisers, once in post, carried out and in 
that way it became one of the functions that ministers saw advisers in 
general appointed to do. David Ennals was clear from the start that an 
adviser was required to perform such liaison. He appointed a social 
worker, David Townsend, because he, 'needed someone who had day-to-day, 
continuing and professional background knowledge of the social 
102 
services'. He desired 'eyes and ears' in the social work world -a 
phrase also used by other ministers in relation to their department's 
client groups. Luce wanted his advisers to be, 'out and about a lot in 
the arts world: trying to understand the political dimension of it and 
the sensitivities of feelings; giving me a feedback on what people are 
saying and doing; making sure my view has got across at seminars and 
conferences, two way flows, eyes and ears. ' Jim Prior wanted Robbie 
Gilbert, who had line management experience in Shell, where he continued 
to work part time, to act as secretary to a group of industrialists whom 
Prior met regularly and privately. William Waldegrave described several 
facets of this reason for appointing advisers. He claimed, 'Ministers 
need someone to act as a conduit for ideas. ' He too used his special 
advisers, including David Coleman, as secretaries to informal advisory 
groups of senior figures and also felt that advisers could, 'go out into 
the pressure groups and reach the parts that a minister can't usually 
reach and talk to people and make contacts and feed things back'. These 
examples demonstrate the relevance of the model developed in Chapter 3- 
the adviser emerges as a channel of information across sometimes 
uncertain boundaries. 
For some ministers the adviser can begin to play a brokerage role 
and there is a link with the attempt to relieve overload. Hurd (1986) 
stressed the extent to which increased numbers and activities of 
pressure groups exacerbated the burden on ministers. Asked, when Home 
Secretary, whether he stood by his 1979 comment, quoted at the start of 
this chapter, about the need for advisers because of the danger that 
ministers might lose touch with colleagues, the party and the 
Government's political strategy, Hurd replied: 
Yes, I see it a bit more widely now ... the party 
is one thing 
and that is still true. But I think that in any big 
department there is a great advantage in keeping informally in 
touch with a whole range of people, interest groups, and 
lobbies in a way which the civil service doesn't always find 
easy ... The idea has broadened out a bit. You have got a 
skirmisher who will operate quite widely and personally so his 
reports, his information, his ideas come direct to the 
minister instead of coming up through the machine... although 
usually he would copy to, and work closely with, officials. 
103 
Some advisers appointed for this reason, as with some appointed for 
their expertise, indicate that the minister felt he required help in 
giving greater attention to certain aspects of his department's work. 
These were topics that the minister thought were particularly important, 
or merited greater attention. 
(x) Over half the ministers identified help with presentation as a 
reason for having advisers. In many cases it was the major reason. 
Hurd referred to the work of his adviser as being, 'overwhelmingly 
presentational'; others linked this to the minister feeling 
dissatisfied with the services of his press or information office. Thus 
Lord Young (1990, p. 143) claims that when he was Minister Without 
Portfolio with special responsibility for wealth creation and 
enterprise, his 'Press Officer had not worked out. ' Young was upset 
because he had a number of White Papers to launch but then, he writes, 
'I had a minor brainwave. I could appoint a Special Adviser. After 
all, I had once been a Special Adviser and as a Cabinet colleague I was 
entitled to one myself. I did not need one to help me with political 
advice but with dealings with the press. ' Patrick Jenkin told the 
Treasury and Civil Service Committee that, although he had a high regard 
for civil service loyalty, 'far too much of the work of press and 
information officers is reactive' (1986, Vol. 2, p. 124), and he felt 
their role should be re-thought. Furthermore, in interview Jenkin said 
that whilst he was Secretary of State for Industry in 1982, 'more and 
more of my colleagues were getting political advisers and I felt I 
really had to have a political adviser. I needed somebody to help me 
with my speeches. ' Speech writing was identified as the most important 
area where help was needed by many ministers, including Hurd's 
predecessor at the Home Office - Leon Brittan. This applied in 
particular to political speeches, with the party conference speech being 
specifically mentioned by several Tories. 
Assistance could also be provided in a range of other tasks 
connected with presentation. These included: preparation of journal 
articles; production of White and Green papers; preparation for 
Parliamentary Question Time. Some ministers wanted an adviser with whom 
they could discuss the best strategy for presenting the departments' 
work and their own views. Quite a few advisers were given a brief to 
104 
talk to journalists on behalf of their minister. When promoted to Home 
Secretary Roy Jenkins originally took on John Harris very much as a 
press adviser, although he subsequently played a wider role. Several 
ministers were disappointed that their special advisers turned out not 
to be as good as they had hoped at speech writing. 
(xi) Finally about a third of ministers identified assistance with 
preparation for Cabinet, and Cabinet Committees, as being a reason for 
the appointing a special adviser. A few ministers, Jim Prior for 
example, acknowledged that although it had not been an original reason 
for appointment, help with briefing for non-departmental issues coming 
up in Cabinet, especially economic ones, was an important service that 
the adviser could provide. Rob Shepherd performed this function for 
Prior. Several ministers, for example, Michael Heseltine and Sir Keith 
Joseph, did not use their advisers in this role. 
Some ministers, especially Labour ones, thought that this was one 
of, if not the, most important reasons for appointing a special adviser. 
As Lord President of the Council, Ted Short played a major role in 
Cabinet and Cabinet Committees and he wanted Vicky Kidd to comment on 
Cabinet papers from a party political view. Several features of the 
place of special advisers are illustrated in his view that it is 
valuable to have this performed by somebody who, in addition to having a 
political slant, is located in the office (and therefore, 'on tap') and 
has been positively vetted (and thus 'in the know'). Bill Rodgers 
wanted to go to Cabinet meetings well briefed and found that the 
Department of Transport were unable to provide a fully adequate service 
in this field. This was a major factor in his decision that he would, 
after all, appoint a special adviser. A particularly important aspect 
of briefing for Cabinet meetings was the briefing that economists could 
provide. Advisers who were appointed primarily with this in mind 
include: David Metcalf by Stan Orme; and Michael Stewart, initially by 
Peter Shore and later Tony Crosland and David Owen. Perhaps reflecting 
the importance of the post within the Cabinet, two Tory Home 
Secretaries, Leon Brittan and Douglas Hurd, were amongst the 
comparatively few Conservative ministers who referred to the Cabinet 
briefing role as a reason for appointing a special adviser. 
105 
How far dQ Ministers by Clear Reasons Related I4 Needs? 
In addition to discussing ministers' comments about individual 
appointments it is possible to identify general circumstances in which 
ministers are likely to feel the need to appoint an adviser to perform 
specific functions. One is when a special adviser leaves his post and 
the minister looks for another special adviser to continue performing 
the same functions (sometimes the retiring special adviser is given the 
responsibility of finding a replacement in his own image). A good 
example occurred when David Young was appointed to be Chairman of the 
Manpower Services Commission and so could no longer continue as special 
adviser in the Department of Industry. Patrick Jenkin recalled that he 
said to Sir Peter Carey, the permanent secretary, that they needed to 
'find another David Young' because the department was about to embark on a 
major privatization programme and required an understanding of the world 
of finance and the City, 'therefore I have got to have a special adviser 
who can be our conduit in to this area. ' Similarly, Young claims Jenkin 
was quite upset when he announced his departure: '"Find me your 
successor", he said, "otherwise you just can't leave. "' (1990, p. 67). 
Jeffrey Sterling was the man found by Young and Jenkin. Sterling 
provides a good example of the other main circumstances in which the 
need to have a special adviser to carry out specific functions can 
sometimes be identified as the reason for appointment. This occurs when 
a new minister is appointed to a department and concludes that the work 
that the 'existing' special adviser had been doing was very important 
and decides to reappoint him. Sterling served seven successive 
Secretaries of State at the DTI - his sixth being Lord Young, the man he 
was recruited to succeed. Sterling agreed to continue working for Young 
despite the idiosyncratic nature of the invitation the new minister 
issued to one of his oldest friends: '"Jeffrey, " I said, "I have never 
listened to you in over thirty years. I cannot think of a better person 
to be my Special Adviser. " Despite that comment he accepted on the 
spot. This cheered me up' (p. 236). Other specialist special advisers 
who have been asked to serve a number of secretaries of state include 
Robin Cooke, Tony Lynes, and Brian Abel-Smith (to whom Barbara Castle 
said, 'do for me what you did for Dick', i. e. Richard Crossman). 
106 
There have, however, been occasions where it has been difficult for 
the incoming minister not to reappoint the special adviser. In some of 
these instances the incoming minister was an advocate of the use of 
special advisers and/or welcomed the individual 'in post'. When Joseph 
was replaced by Jenkin at the Department of Industry, Young was summoned 
to Number Ten and told by David Wolfson (now Lord Wolfson of 
Sunningdale) that the Prime Minister requested him to continue his work 
in the department. The circumstances of his reappointment were very 
different from earlier: 'I had worked for Keith for years and presumably 
he only selected me once he was satisfied that he could work with me. 
Patrick, who had been at Social Security, had me thrust upon him by the 
Prime Minister at the very moment he was offered the job. No one 
refuses in those circumstances! ' (p. 58-9). When Robert Carr became 
Lord President of the Council he looked upon Michael Wolff, whom he knew 
well, 'as part of the machinery that I had inherited in the Lord 
President's Office, rather than appointing my own special adviser. ' He 
was, 'delighted' to find Wolff there because, as the member of the 
Cabinet responsible for the coordination of Government policy but having 
no civil service specialist staff to assist the Lord President in that 
capacity, he relied on his adviser to liaise with departmental chief 
information officers. 
Shortly after Keith Joseph took over the Education and Science 
Portfolio from Mark Carlisle he 'temporarily dismissed' Sexton (Knight, 
1989, p. 164) and Young worked in a part time capacity for Joseph whilst 
concentrating on Industry. Sexton continued to work, now unpaid, in the 
Department of Education and Science (DES) but largely for Rhodes Boyson, 
one of the junior ministers. According to Knight it was Boyson who 
persuaded Joseph to reappoint Sexton a few months later. 
Margaret Thatcher, especially in the early years of her 
premiership, was restrictive in allowing ministers to have special 
advisers. It is thought that at least one minister who wished to have 
one was not permitted to do so. To the extent that ministers had to 
argue their case for having a special adviser, they were forced to 
produce reasons, or at least justifications. Another circumstance which 
allowed ministers to assess whether they needed a special adviser was 
that an increasing number of newly appointed Cabinet ministers had been 
107 
junior ministers in departments in which there were special advisers. 
As a result, they either came to the conclusion that special advisers 
were desirable, or had this opinion confirmed. Similarly, when John 
Patten became Minister of State at the DoE his decision to appoint an 
adviser was 'very much' influenced by the 'extremely good' work he had 
seen Rob Shepherd and Nick True perform for their respective Secretaries 
of State in departments where he had been a Parliamentary Secretary. 
Some people, however, challenge the extent to which it is 
meaningful to produce lists of reasons for appointing special advisers 
that are related to ministers' needs. Several ministers took the 
initiative in appointing special advisers, or at least, were willing to 
accept them, without having a clear perception of functional needs. 
Some such ministers felt a need to take in their 'own person' without 
specifically linking it to the argument others use about the need for an 
aide/confidant to overcome the minister's isolation. Once special 
advisers began to be appointed then inevitably for some ministers, as 
one admitted, an important reason for making an appointment was the 
attitude, 'I certainly wasn't going to miss out on them. If they were 
going I was going to have them. ' 
In America, Meltsner noted that clients differed on why they wanted 
policy analysis but, 'a few want it because it is fashionable. ' (1986, 
p. 5). Similarly in 1986 a British adviser, Chris Butler, wrote: 'as 
their numbers rose after that [1983] election, it became almost a status 
symbol for secretaries of state to possess a special adviser' (p. 14). 
Norman (now Sir Norman) Fowler, a pre 1983 Tory exponent of 
special advisers, stated: 'When you first come into Government you quite 
wonder what the role of the special adviser is going to be and I think, 
as my career has shown, I have firmly come to the conclusion that the 
special adviser should be a political figure. ' This quote provides 
evidence that the place of special advisers is becoming more clearly 
identified. Once ministers have had the experience of using advisers, 
they should have clearer reasons for making their subsequent appointments, 
and some activities that evolved as part of the first adviser's role, 
will become reasons for later appointments. 
108 
A few ministers just wanted to appoint somebody who was suitable, 
whereas others knew the specific individual they wanted to appoint even 
though the initial decision to appoint was not related to functional 
requirements. By 1974 there were a number of research assistants to 
shadow ministers. Some were the Political Fellows funded by the 
Rowntree Social Services Trust from 1972, and others were in a separate 
research unit set up in late 1973 and financed by Sigmund (now Sir 
Sigmund) Sternberg, a London metal merchant (Darlington, 1976). Some of 
the research assistants were appointed as special advisers in 1974 
without great thought from ministers about their precise needs. One of 
the ministers, Denis Healey, commented that his research assistant was, 
'largely appointed because he was already working with me -I hadn't 
really thought it through very carefully. ' 
Michael Heseltine, as we have seen, appointed specialist advisers 
on short term contracts. When he was asked how far he saw his special 
advisers, at the time of appointment, as people who would talk to, and 
attempt to influence, their colleagues in the private sector, he 
replied, 'I think you are inviting me to rationalize where there was no 
rationalization. I saw someone who knew a lot about this subject, with 
a lot of ideas, a lot of energy and a lot of experience; we need these 
sort of guys and that is where you start. ' Having made his appointments, 
Heseltine, with his managerial background, used his advisers in more 
specific ways than did the majority of ministers. 
Adam Ridley coined the phrase, 'residual legatee' to describe the 
role that special advisers have of filling gaps that might appear in any 
one of a number of areas where services are provided for ministers. 
This could help explain why some ministers appoint advisers without 
being sure which needs will arise. In a few instances ministers 
appointed advisers because people were either proposed to them by a 
third party or the adviser volunteered his services. In the examples 
referred to here there is no question of pressure being applied to 
ministers. The full complexity of the reasons/needs discussion is seen 
here because in some such cases particular ministers could see good 
reasons for appointing special advisers, and other ministers were happy 
to accept them, even though the initial reason for making an appointment 
was little more than an approach from outside. Examples of advisers 
109 
offering their services include John Harris to Roy Jenkins; Miles Hudson 
to Sir Alec Douglas Home (now Lord Home of the Hirsel); and David Young 
initially to Sir Keith Joseph. In 1983 the Secretary of State for 
Wales, Nicholas Edwards, was offered the services of Christopher Butler: 
'I didn't set out feeling I must have a research assistant, let's look 
for one. It happened that a well-qualified individual was available and 
I was approached and enquired whether I would like to appoint him; so it 
worked that way round. ' In all these examples the minister was attracted 
by the qualities of the individual offering his services. Thus Lord 
Home stressed the personal nature of Hudson's appointment. He knew 
Hudson had, 'a very distinguished mind and knew a lot about 
international affairs and policies' but 'if the whips had said would I 
have taken somebody out of the blue, I would have hesitated a long 
time. 9 
It was suggested at the end of Chapter 3 that a minister who 
appointed special advisers might possess certain characteristics. It is 
difficult to generalize. For example, some of the new Conservative 
ministers in 1979 appointed the relevant desk officer at CRD because 
they themselves had had little or no experience of the subject for which 
they were responsible. Yet other ministers with considerable Opposition 
experience of the subject also appointed special advisers. 
Nevertheless, some analysis of the suggestions in Chapter 3 is possible. 
Ministers who had radical proposals for policy changes seemed quite 
likely to appoint advisers - especially specialist ones. Writing prior 
to the 1974 development of the system of special advisers, Headey noted 
that, 'policy initiators, in altering departmental priorities, must 
expect some conflict and unpopularity with their civil servants. 
Conflict is especially likely if, to press through his initiative, the 
Minister reorganises his department or recruits "irregulars"' (p. 215). 
Ministers who were ambitious to carry out many functions and play a 
large role in Cabinet and/or the party were also more likely to appoint 
advisers. There is little evidence to support the view that it was 
ministers with the most limited capacities who felt the greatest need 
for assistance, and consequently appointed special advisers. Bernard 
Donoughue told the Treasury and Civil Service Committee: 
110 
What I noticed very much in the Labour Government was it was 
the best ministers, the ministers who by outside judgment 
would be the most able, who had the special advisers and used 
them well. Ministers thought to be fairly marginal did not 
have special advisers, it was the reverse of what you might 
think. It was those who most needed them who did not have 
them (1986, Vol. 2, p. 197). 
In interview Donoughue claimed that one or two ministers who really 
needed advisers declined to appoint them because it might look as if 
they could not do their job. In reality, especially in the pre-1974 
days, the appointment of a special adviser was sometimes taken to be an 
indication of strength: 'but just as it is the weaker minister who most 
needs a cabinet. so he is the least likely to insist on getting one - 
and he may need to be very strong to insist successfully. ' (Opie, 1968, 
pp. 77-8). Similarly, Headey (p. 212) suggests that the way Jenkins took 
Harris, and David Dowler his principal private secretary, from 
department to department was an indication of strength. 
However, it would be incorrect to conclude that the only ministers 
who declined to appoint special advisers were weak ministers, with 
greatest need for assistance. William (now Viscount) Whitelaw and Peter 
Walker are but two examples of powerful Tory ministers in the post-79 
governments who extracted the most out of their departments and who did 
not appoint special advisers. Several officials at the Ministry of 
Agriculture, Food and Fisheries (MAFF) at the time of the change over 
from John Silkin to Peter Walker, including Terry Dawes, the press 
officer, felt that the valuable role Ann Carlton had played as special 
adviser to John Silkin disappeared as Walker was his own political 
adviser and rewrote draft press notices himself. 
The quality of Whitelaw and Walker demonstrates that it would be 
misleading to develop generalized theories about the type of minister 
who did not appoint advisers. Furthermore, both illustrate the earlier 
point that when ministers 'inherit' an adviser they sometimes keep him. 
When Whitelaw became Secretary of State for Employment in 1973, and 
Walker Secretary of State at the DTI in 1972, they both retained the 
services of the existing adviser - Robert Jackson and John Cope 
respectively. Cope had only worked for John Davies for a few weeks 
before Davies was moved and Cope found himself, 'in the rather odd 
position of being political adviser to Peter Walker, which was at first 
111 
sight probably the least necessary job in Whitehall. ' In fact, Cope 
commented, 'I found myself worked hard in a department which at that 
time had ten ministers. ' Despite the fact that Jackson and Cope were 
well regarded in the departments, and have demonstrated their political 
skills by their subsequent rise to ministerial positions, it is possibly 
unlikely that Whitelaw or Walker would have initiated such appointments. 
SECTION B MINISTERS' REASONS SEEN $I OTHERS. 
It is difficult for other people to know conclusively the reasoning 
behind a minister's appointment of special advisers. However, Table 1 
shows the questionnaire answers given by special advisers to question 
14) about why they thought their minister appointed them. Most advisers 
were prepared to attempt this even though frequently the minister had 
not precisely defined what the adviser's functions would be. 
Although the findings of Table 1 are broadly in line with evidence 
from interviews with ministers, they need to be interpreted with care. 
The following analysis is based on evidence from the interviews with 
advisers and civil servants, in addition to the raw statistics. One 
adviser refused to answer on the grounds that ministers did not think 
along such systematic lines when appointing special advisers. This 
view, discussed in the previous section, was one with which other 
advisers had a degree of sympathy. Furthermore, it was rare in practice 
for advisers to make a clear distinction between reasons for appointment 
and functions performed. Inevitably, too, some advisers stressed the 
reasons why they thought ministers should appoint advisers. As far as 
possible this section concentrates on what were thought to be the 
ministers' reasons. 
Relief cf overload. Question 14a) on the relief of overload was 
interpreted in various ways. Many advisers believed they were 
performing tasks (especially in the party political field) which 
otherwise might have been left for the minister. Some advisers thought 
that this did not always result in the ministers being any less 
overloaded - they simply became involved in extra activities. Other 
advisers felt, however, they were appointed to relieve overload. Roger 
Liddle, for instance, thought that Bill Rodgers was sceptical about the 
112 
TABLE 1: Questionnaire Findings on Reasons for Appointment - Percentage 
Response. 
14) Various reasons have been suggested for the appointment of special 
advisers. In the case of your appointment, what importance do you 
think was attached by the minister to each of the following: 
Substan Consid Moder Slight Neglig 
tial arable ate ible 
a) Relieve the overload of 
business on ministers 7 18 26 21 28 
b) Provide political support 
within the departments 
staffed by "neutral" civil 24 41 12 11 12 
servants, to ministers 
wishing to introduce 
changes. 
c) Fill any gaps in the 
knowledge or experience 
of the civil service with 19 32 15 18 16 
experts committed to the 
policies of the party. 
d) Help ministers carry out 
a more effective 21 16 22 22 19 
collective role in cabinet. 
e) Prevent ministers drifting 
away from the party by 4 31 21 12 32 
liaising with the various 
sections of the party. 
f) Help the ministers with 
the presentation of their 37 27 21 3 12 
views on departmental and 
general issues. 
p) Provide new/alternative 
policy ideas. 19 32 31 99 
h) Reduce the isolation of 
ministers by playing an 18 31 15 16 20 
aide/confidant role. 
need for advice but rather wanted more capacity to get things done: 
'Bill wanted me to help him with any task he asked me to do. ' Liddle, 
in common with several other advisers including Edward Bickham used the 
phrase, 'an extra pair of hands' to describe a major reason for their 
appointment. Another adviser suggested that, even though his minister 
might not have been prepared to admit it, he feared being 'swamped' by 
the workload and the appointment of an adviser was an attempt to relieve 
the burden. 
Political suprt. The answers given to questions 14b) c) and g) were 
handled differently in the previous section's analysis of interviews 
with ministers because it became clear that the data were not only 
overlapping but were also, especially 14b), subject to a range of 
interpretations. Many special advisers believed their minister had made 
the appointment to ensure that policy issues within the department were 
examined by somebody independent of the civil service and wholly 
committed to the minister, and usually to the party. Part of the 
required political support was often thought to be looking through 
policy submissions for 'time bombs' (Rob Shepherd), or 'landmines as far 
as the domestic House of Commons situation was concerned' (John Harris). 
Leon Brittan's stress on the importance of issues being examined from 
the political perspective was echoed by one of his advisers, John 
Whittingdale: 'Ministers do like to have a different source of advice, 
someone who is seeing the same issues as officials but looking at them 
from a different angle ... how we should structure things so that the 
backbenchers would approve of it and generally advising him on the 
political side of every issue coming up. ' Peter Shore's comments, 
reported earlier, about the need for a mine detector, especially at 
Environment, are mirrored in his reasons for appointment as seen by one 
of his advisers, David Cowling: 
Part of what I was about was watching out for politically 
sensitive areas and slapping in a paper with some ideas and 
comments on the civil service conclusions ... acting as a 
bit 
of a warning system about how the party might receive certain 
things coming from the department. Not just the party at head 
office but the party at local government level. 
113 
Some advisers felt their minister appointed them to play an eyes and 
ears role. David Stephen was selected by the new Foreign Secretary 
David Owen several months before he could fill the position and, 'had a 
number of chats with him over the summer about what he wanted and it was 
clear that it was basically agreed with the Office that I would have an 
extra pair of eyes and ears role. ' 
There was less agreement about how far this political support was 
necessary to help progress the policies of the minister and/or the 
party, in the department. Some thought this was a reason, but that it 
only extended as far as familiarizing civil servants with the policies 
and/or the philosophy and arguments behind them and/or the priorities 
amongst them. 
Linked to this, but most contentious of all, was how far advisers 
were appointed to help maintain the thrust of the minister's policies 
possibly against civil service obstruction. Many did not see it in 
these terms. Mark Schreiber, however, interestingly suggested that the 
Tory politicians in Opposition in the 1960s were aware of the views of 
the Labour critics such as Crossman and Castle who believed that the 
civil service had its own long-term policies to which it successfully 
adhered. Thought was given to ways of overcoming obstruction of the 
radical changes the Conservatives wished to introduce and the 
recruitment of outsiders was seen by some shadow ministers as a way of 
achieving this. Having played a major part in devising the tax reform 
plan launched by the Conservatives in 1970, Arthur Cockfield claims, 'I 
was brought in to ensure that this programme was driven through - which 
it was. ' 
The approach adopted by the Tories at the Treasury in 1979 is 
subject to slightly differing interpretations. Adam Ridley felt there 
was, 'emphatically' a desire when they came in to sustain the thrust of 
implementing the policies on which they had been elected and that, 
'special advisers sustain the thrust because they know why the policy 
was devised. ' Furthermore, if ministers were considering moving away 
from a manifesto commitment or from a policy they had already 
established, then, compared with the civil servants, the adviser, as a 
political operative, 'has far more licence to say, "are you sure you 
114 
want to change that policy? "' Whilst pointing out that he did not 
become a Treasury adviser until 1982, Douglas French agreed that a 
reason for the appointment of advisers was to help maintain the thrust 
of a newly elected government and sustain it when aU turn was 
expected in the country. George Cardona suggested that the incoming 
Tory advisers in 1979 expected the Government to face civil service 
obstruction: 
I arrived at the Treasury as a special adviser in May, 1979, 
clutching an armful of files which contained the policies we 
had worked on in the years of Conservative Opposition. 
I had read, and heard, about the obstructions the Civil 
Service would place in the way of a new Government. Books and 
articles by Labour ministers and special advisers 
(particularly in the Bennite wing of the party) warned me of 
what to expect. I was ready to defend our policies against 
the most dirty tricks. (The Times. 11 November 1981). 
Cardona believed that in reality they encountered little obstruction, 
and that although he had anticipated some he felt that the incoming 
ministers, apart from on a few specific issues, were not expecting 
resistance from the civil service. He argued that from the ministers' 
perspective the appointment of advisers, 'was to maintain continuity 
with the policy formation which I had been doing for so many years - to 
see that through. ' 
Several other Treasury advisers drew a distinction between 1979, 
when the ministers might have been feeling a need for help to maintain 
the thrust of their policies, and later years. However, according to 
some, including Howard Davies, even that presented, 'an exaggerated 
case. ' Davies was a Treasury civil servant in 1979 who later left the 
service to join McKinsey but in 1985 was seconded for 15 months to 
become a special adviser in the Treasury. He suggested that other 
advisers would say, 
the Treasury was trying very hard, was as political as it 
really could be but nonetheless the constitution prevented it 
from being as political as the ministers would really have 
liked and therefore in presentational terms, and just as an 
extra pair of hands ... there was a job to be done - but not a kind of crusade against the bureaucrats. 
115 
He went on to suggest that there might be a greater need to help 
maintain the thrust in departments such as the DHSS or DES where 
the departments have a close relationship with their clients. 
In fact, several of the comparatively few advisers who 
accepted the term 'Keeper of the Ark' served in the DES. The 
comments of Mark Carlisle reported earlier are echoed in the words 
of his special adviser, Stuart Sexton: 
I saw my role as continuing to develop education policy, to 
see that what we had planned and proposed in the '70s was 
actually put into effect ... I'd accept the phrase 'Keeper of the Ark of the Manifesto'; particularly as I would claim to 
have written a lot of it ... Mark Carlisle 
kindly said to me, 
'now that you've written all this for the election manifesto, 
you'd better join me in Government and see that we put it into 
effect. ' 
When Oliver Letwin was appointed by Keith Joseph he understood his task 
to be to help introduce the voucher scheme - 'everything else was 
ancillary to that. ' In performing this role he was not 'Keeper of the 
Ark' but helping to push new and alternative policy thinking within the 
department. The emphasis that Maurice Peston gave to the political 
nature of his role has already been shown. He had a generally, 'very 
high view of the civil service and didn't see the role of political 
advisers, or the possible future role of cabinets, as to do with lack of 
expertise. ' He saw the provision of political support as vital: 
Any organization works via conflict and I actually think the 
role of the civil service is at least 50 per cent to test out 
the politicians' ideas ... It was believed by the Labour Party, as in the Tory Party, that the civil service was too 
good at sidetracking people; therefore there was a need for 
more political commitment on the part of the adviser. 
When asked whether the concept of 'Keeper of the Ark of Manifesto' was 
appropriate, Peston replied, 'Yes, very much so; I regard that as the 
central role of advisers - saying, "this is party policy. It cannot be 
changed without good cause, and civil servants not liking it, is not 
really good cause. " I was a firm believer that that was what I was most 
there for. ' Peston stressed however, that his ministers were keen that 
the civil servants should not feel that they were undermined by 
advisers. Perhaps the clearest example of an adviser stating his role 
116 
in these terms comes from Butler (1986): 'A prime function of special 
advisers, and to a great extent their justification for existence, is 
acting as "Keepers of the Ark of the Manifesto"' (pp. 14-15). 
We noted earlier Barbara Castle's belief in the need for 'political 
reminders' and 'a political conscience at the heart of the departmental 
battle. ' Brian Abel-Smith was clearly attuned to this need: 'The object 
of a special adviser is to make sure the minister is giving sufficient 
time to the main policy commitments of the party and that they are 
properly considered. ' Another of Castle's advisers, Jack Straw, felt 
there was more need to help ministers maintain the thrust of their 
policies at DHSS than Environment because, 'there was a high degree of 
scepticism at a departmental level about the policy of removing pay beds 
from the NHS'. 
The concept of ministers in different departments having differing 
needs or reasons for appointing advisers, was clearly demonstrated by 
Stuart Holland. As explained earlier he was appointed by Judith Hart at 
ODM but spent some time working for Tony Benn at the Department of 
Industry on the Industry White Paper. The latter case he felt presented 
an 'encounter situation' between some of the civil servants and the 
ministers who, with their advisers, successfully battled to ensure that 
the committee drafting the White Paper reflected the policy contained in 
the manifesto. Holland claimed it was, 'a classic example of the case 
for special advisers. ' The situation was different at ODM where, 'the 
department was basically behind Judith and very glad she was there, so 
it was dealing with some individual issues as they came up and pushing 
some individual issues to which the department was more resistant. ' 
Similarly Tony Banks felt ministers in other departments would use 
advisers to help maintain the thrust of their policies but this was not 
really necessary for Judith Hart who was a respected world expert on her 
subject and was on top of the department. At Industry, Holland, an 
expert on the location costs of industry, showed how expertise and 
commitment can be combined. He also argued that even when a minister 
has specialist knowledge and his department with him, there is still a 
role for an adviser. Interviewed whilst a Labour frontbencher he 
declared: 'I would want them. At the moment, my Shadow responsibility 
is Treasury Affairs. I am a professional economist but however wide 
117 
one's experience as a professional economist, there are certain areas 
where you need specialist advice, or you should get second opinions. ' 
Provision Q expgrIlse. Holland illustrates points that became clear in 
the earlier discussion: the provision of committed expertise can be 
linked to filling gaps in the knowledge and experience of the civil 
service and/or to commitment to party policies. Many advisers, 
including Abel-Smith, Mitchell and Peston, thought the phrase, 
'committed expertise' appropriate. Three further examples demonstrate 
facets of this concept. Tony Lynes, author of fl Penguin Guide IQ 
Supplementary Benefits (1972), was appointed by Labour ministers in the 
1960s and '70s. He stated: 'the reason I was appointed, basically, was 
that I had worked with the people concerned outside government ... one 
was known to both understand, which is quite important at DHSS, and 
sympathize with, the policies. ' Anthony Lester claimed that Roy Jenkins 
needed somebody, 
to be in creative tension with the department... The immediate 
issues involved sex discrimination and race relations 
legislation and the policy formation on that. And that was 
the area where I was an expert. So it was the fact that the 
Home Office lacked experience in that area of law, coupled 
with the fact that Mr Jenkins and I shared common values which 
made it a sensible thing to do ... 
it was the expertise of 
someone committed to producing the best possible sex and race 
discrimination legislation one could. 
The experience of Arthur Cockfield provides a particularly 
interesting example. Cockfield, a former postgraduate student of 
Hayek, rose rapidly in the Inland Revenue to become a Commissioner of 
the Board. He then joined Boots eventually becoming Managing Director. 
His role in helping to devise Tory taxation policy in the 1960s has been 
described. The policies he helped to develop were based, he claimed, on 
certain principles including a move from direct to indirect taxation. 
When he became Tax Adviser, therefore, to his role of providing 
political support to help drive through the policies, he brought an 
unrivalled combination of philosophical commitment, detailed knowledge 
of the policies and an expert administrative specialism in the subject 
matter. More than anybody else his role may be thought of as being Btl 
generis and beyond that of an ordinary special adviser. 
118 
A number of advisers, including Lynes and Peston, opined that 
whilst they were bringing in expertise this was not necessarily required 
because of gaps in the services provided by the department. Similarly 
some advisers, especially from the CRD, saw themselves as experts in the 
policies of the party even though they lacked the academic or business 
background of other experts. In Table 2 the answers to question 14 are 
analysed by party in government. For a few key questions the 1979-87 
results were further divided into 1979-81 and 1982-87 but this is not 
shown on Table 2. Virtually all the advisers appointed in the 1979-81 
period thought of themselves as being in some way chosen for their 
expertise - even if it was related to the work in Opposition on 
developing party policies. This finding fits nicely with the view of 
Patrick Jenkin that Mrs Thatcher made it known in Opposition that she 
was 'opposed to the idea of political advisers to departments. She was 
initially very prepared to consider expert advisers. ' 
Whilst Jenkin's adviser at the DHSS, Roger Dyson, was an academic 
(at Keele University) his specialism was in the practical issues of 
management/industrial relations within the health service. Through 
activities such as seminars he had developed a large network of contacts 
and claimed that, 'Patrick wanted my expertise ... and wanted a direct 
line that hadn't come through the official channels, to some of the 
senior managers in the service which would have given more of a direct 
feel for what was happening. ' Dyson is, therefore, only a partial 
exception to the general argument developed by Tim Boswell that the Tory 
expert special advisers tend to be, like him, practitioners not 
academics. This constitutes one of the major distinctions between the 
parties in terms of advisers used. 
Hew/alternati ve pj ies. One of the Tory practitioners was Tom Baron, 
Managing Director of Christian Salvesen (Properties) Ltd. Appointed by 
the new Secretary of State for the Environment, Baron felt that 
Heseltine thought he had original ideas: '"you're the burr under the 
saddle", he said. ' Baron was put to work within the objectives set by 
Heseltine, including getting value for money, improving and easing the 
planning system, and improving the production of housing for the bottom 
end of the market. Baron's role is one of the clearest examples of how 
the provision of expertise can overlap with the introduction of new and 
119 
TABLE L. Questionnaire Findings on Reasons for Acpointment-Percentage 
Response Broken Down b§y Party in Government. L= Labour 74-79 (N=40) 
T= Tories 79-87 (N=29) 
14) Various reasons have been suggested for the appointment of special 
advisers. In the case of your appointment, what importance do you 
think was attached by the minister to each of the following: 
Substen Consid Moder Slight NegLig 
tial erable ate ible 
a) Relieve the overload of L6 17 20 28 29 
business on ministers. 
T 10 16 39 13 22 
b) Provide political support, 
within the departments L 28 36 8 17 11 
staffed by "neutral" civil ------------------------------------------- 
servants, to ministers T 19 47 12 6 16 
wishing to introduce 
changes. 
c) Fill any gaps in the 
knowledge or experience L 17 30 17 22 14 
of the civil service with .......................................... 
experts committed to the T 26 32 13 13 16 
policies of the party. 
d) Help ministers carry out 
a more effective L 26 21 15 23 15 
collective role in ------------------------------------------ 
cabinet. T 16 10 32 19 23 
e) Prevent ministers drifting 
away from the party by L5 29 18 11 37 
liaising with the various ......................................... 
sections of the party. T3 39 26 13 19 
f) Help the ministers with 
the presentation of their L 24 33 24 5 14 
views an departmental and 
general issues. T 56 19 16 09 
p) Provide new/alternative L 11 31 35 8 15 
policy ideas. ......................................... 
T 26 33 30 74 
h) Reduce the isolation of L 18 32 18 25 7 
ministers by playing an ......................................... 
aide/confidant rote. T 19 31 88 34 
alternative thinking. Provision of such thinking can equally be linked 
to the theme of supplying political support and doing so within the 
context of the features of the place of special advisers developed in 
Chapter 3. Thus Frances Morrell, one of Tony Benn's advisers, thought 
that, 'providing political support within the department was very 
important - we formed a political community round the minister ... the 
essential point is to give the Secretary of State the opportunity of 
alternative sources of advice within his working life and within the 
framework of the Official Secrets Act. ' 
Cabinet briefing. Item (g) of question 14, provision of new/alternative 
policy ideas, was analysed out of order here because of its overlap with 
the linked items (b) and (c) but it is now useful to return to the 
questions as listed in Tables 1 and 2. The answers to question 14d) on 
helping ministers prepare for Cabinet, include some by advisers whose 
role almost entirely involved working on papers from their own 
department to be discussed in Cabinet. For most advisers, however, the 
briefing was mainly to help prepare their minister for non-departmental 
issues. Some advisers, including the economist David Metcalf, felt this 
was the main reason for their original appointment. In his case he 
thought the minister, Stan Orme, was particularly interested in briefing 
for economic issues, with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) 
discussions being very important. Vicky Kidd, echoing comments from Ted 
Short, thought that one of her two principal duties entailed providing, 
'input into consideration of other departments' papers for Cabinet and 
its committees. ' The greater emphasis placed on this role by Labour 
rather than Tory ministers is reflected in the Table - it was noticeably 
less important for Tories after 1981. However, there were still some 
Tory advisers in this period who thought it was a most important reason, 
including Michael Dobbs - appointed by Norman (now Lord) Tebbit. For 
quite a number of advisers this was not a reason for their appointment. 
Party liaison. Many advisers thought that the second part of 14e) - 
liaising with the party - was more appropriate than the first part which 
suggested that this was necessary to prevent ministers drifting away 
from the party. This probably helps to explain why so few advisers 
thought it was substantially a reason for their appointment. A few 
Labour special advisers thought it would be more appropriate to suggest 
120 
that a reason for appointment was to prevent the party from drifting 
away from the minister. Roger Liddle argued that, 'liaison with the 
party was very much part of my activities but the purpose of liaison was 
to do it from Bill's point of view ... rather than keeping him in line 
with the Labour Party. ' Advisers who knew from the start that party 
liaison had been a reason for their appointment include David Hill and 
David Lipsey. Hill mirrored Roy Hattersley's comment quoted earlier by 
saying: 'Corresponding with the party was one of the things I knew I was 
going to have to do. ' According to Lipsey, 'squaring Transport House 
was a major part of the job - brokering the endless party committees. ' 
Labour advisers who thought party liaison was an important reason for 
their appointment include: Tony Banks, Margaret Beckett, John Lyttle, 
Tom McNally, Frances Morrell, and Jack Straw. Generally they worked for 
the ministers, referred to earlier, who played an important role within 
the party's NEC structure. However, about 40 per cent of advisers to 
Labour ministers did not think that this was at all a reason for their 
appointment. 
Question 14e) was so phrased partly to reflect the opinion 
expressed by Douglas Hurd in the quotation at the start of this chapter, 
about encouraging ministers to have advisers because he could see them 
losing touch with colleagues, the party, and the political strategy of 
the Government. John Cope agreed that liaison with the party was part 
of the main reason for his original appointment which was to assist his 
minister, John Davies, with the political side of his role. The post- 
1979 Tory advisers who felt this was an important reason for their 
appointment were more likely to have a CRD background. John Houston, 
for example, was appointed by the new Foreign Secretary, Sir Geoffrey 
(now Lord) Howe, who was generally anxious to retain his contacts with 
the domestic political scene and specifically wanted somebody to work 
with the party in the preparation of the manifesto for the European 
elections. Again, however, some of the Tories thought that the second 
part of question 14e) was more appropriate than the first. The notion 
of the adviser operating along lines of communication on behalf of his 
minister was captured in the evocative phrase of David Coleman who 
thought some ministers regarded the main function of advisers as being 
a, 'pot of political grease and lubricant, relieving them of tiresome 
and time consuming chores. ' 
121 
Once again, Environment supplies a clear example of the need felt 
by certain ministers to appoint somebody capable of liaising with 
councillors and knowledgeable about local government. Peter Davis 
recalled that when he was appointed in 1984 the incoming Minister for 
Local Government, Kenneth Baker, said he wanted him, 'to liaise with 
Conservative local government groups in the trouble spots that he was 
taking on - the abolition areas, the rate-capping areas - because he 
knew that I knew a lot of the people. ' 
Presentation Helping ministers with presentation, question 14f), comes 
out strongly as a major reason for appointment. This compares well with 
the evidence from interviews. Once again the figures for Tory advisers 
appointed in 1979-81 are closer to those of the Labour advisers than 
they are to those of the Tories after 1981. Richard Ehrman was clear 
that speech writing was one of the main reasons for his appointment in 
1984 because Tom King, Secretary of State for Employment, set him a 
selection test. Ehrman had to write a speech, and a job description 
outlining what he thought he could offer. Others have been clear that 
speech writing was a major reason for their appointment: 
the basic concept of the political adviser at that stage was 
to help with speech writing (Robert Jackson appointed in 1973 
by Maurice Macmillan). 
It was a political battle which was being fought through press 
releases and speeches. It was a matter of winning the battle 
in the country for policies which were pretty unpopular at the 
time ... I was specifically brought in to do that. (Robin Harris, appointed in 1981 by Geoffrey Howe). 
Basically he said, 'I need someone who can help me to write 
speeches. ' That was what I was taken on for. (Christopher 
Mockler, appointed in 1983 by Patrick Jenkin). 
Departments will concede most easily that an adviser has a 
role in helping with presentation and Parliamentary affairs. 
(Edward Bickham). 
I was brought in initially mainly to write speeches for 
Lawson. (Rodney Lord, appointed 1983). 
Speech writing is something which will always come top of the 
list of priorities when ministers are telling special advisers 
what they want done. (David Coleman, appointed by Leon 
Brittan, 1985). 
122 
Several of these comments correlate very well with the needs expressed 
by ministers including Hurd, Jenkin, and Brittan. For some of the 
advisers quoted above, and others, help with presentation as a reason 
for appointment meant more than speech writing. Michael Dobbs, who 
continued to work part time as a director of Saatchi and Saatchi, was 
appointed partly to assist Norman Tebbit plan how to present the case so 
as to change the way people perceived the Government's role in dealing 
with unemployment. That help with presentation is now seen as being 
perhaps the major reason for a minister wishing to appoint a special 
adviser, was highlighted by a spoof 'job description' for a special 
adviser appearing in the f Times Diary 26 August 1988: 'Do you have a 
keen interest in legal affairs? Are you creative? Are you tactful? 
Most important, do you want to relieve civil servants of the onerous job 
of writing speeches for an increasingly publicity-conscious Lord 
Chancellor, Lord Mackay of Clashfern? If you fit the frame, apply to 
become the latest of Whitehall's "special advisers. "' 
Aide/confidant. About a third of Tory advisers answering question 14h) 
thought that acting as an aide/confidant to reduce the isolation of 
ministers was not in the slightest a reason for their appointment. 
Furthermore, there are particular difficulties with the aide/confidant 
role in distinguishing how far it became a function of special advisers 
as opposed to being an original reason. Nevertheless, it was clearly in 
the mind of Anthony (now Lord) Barber who, Brendon Sewill recalled, 
telephoned him whilst he was on holiday in France and asked him to 
become his 'alter ego'. Barber had not been Shadow Chancellor. 
Therefore, being asked to take over the Treasury on the death of lain 
Macleod only a few weeks after the return of the 1970 Conservative 
Government, he felt, according to Sewill, he wanted somebody at his 
right hand who knew how and why the policies were developed. Sewill was 
Director of the CRD and this appointment illustrates how the 
aide/confidant role can overlap with other reasons for appointment. 
There are a range of other circumstances in which a relationship 
between the minister and adviser can already have developed and the 
aide/confidant role clearly be seen as a reason for appointment. Some 
advisers, including Vicky Kidd, David Lipsey, and Tom McNally, who 
worked for their ministers in Opposition, thought this important, with 
123 
Lipsey referring to, 'the age old need for somebody to be on the 
minister's side - the totally loyal aide role. ' Kidd mirrored the 
comments noted earlier from Ted Short, and McNally described it as, 
'just this rather intangible ... somebody to talk to outside the 
machine. ' 
Certain ministers appoint people known to them in ways other than 
through their work in the research department or on party policy 
committees. Sometimes such advisers, including Elizabeth Thomas who was 
assistant literary editor of the Nrm Statesman before being appointed by 
Michael Foot in 1976, believe that the aide/confidant role was in the 
minister's mind initially. Echoing the views of Judith Hart, her 
minister, Maggie Sidgreaves thought she was appointed to continue 
playing a 'confidante' role that had developed over the years. 
The views of three Labour ministers, Benn, Castle, and Shore, that 
ministerial isolation is a reason for appointing advisers have been 
followed through from writings prior to the appointments to agreement 
retrospectively that these opinions influenced their actions. Several 
of their advisers also thought this was a major reason - the most 
important one according to David Cowling. Michael Artis, an economist 
appointed for one day a week by Peter Shore at Trade, believed Shore 
wanted somebody with economics training who was a non-civil servant and 
politically sympathetic, 'to discuss, in the role of a confidant, the 
economic papers and his interpretation of what civil servants were 
doing. ' This statement reflects a similar convergence of themes to that 
contained in Shore's 1966 quotation given earlier. Brian Abel-Smith 
argued that giving ministers the feeling that they have a friend to 
discuss things with was, 'an inevitable function and of course to give 
them support and to tell them, "you were right and you had to do it. "' 
Both Abel-Smith and Straw worked for Castle and Shore. Straw's evidence 
is particularly interesting because it combines experience as an adviser 
with that of a shadow minister: 
having somebody who is a confidant is important because 
politics at a senior level is a very isolated business and it 
is egocentric. It ought not to be, but it is there, anyway 
people are very competitive ... even in the Shadow Cabinet you 
can be isolated in terms of policy decisions, but in 
Government you are physically isolated from people. 
124 
One of Tony Benn's advisers, Ken Griffin, also remarked on the 
importance for ministers of talking with somebody who was not a 
permanent civil servant. Frances Morrell, however, observed that she 
was an adviser: 'that was specifically the role -I never saw myself as 
an aide. ' Nevertheless, her stress on building a political community 
around the minister was noted earlier. 
In some instances what a minister claimed were his reasons 
correlated very poorly with the perceptions of his advisers. Overall, 
however, the findings from the questionnaire reinforce the picture of 
ministers possessing a wide variety of reasons and generally varying 
from each other both in specific requirements and in levels of awareness 
of their needs. 
Ministers' Reasons as = by Civil 3ervants. 
In general, and in many specific cases, civil servants' assessment of 
why ministers thought they needed advisers matched those of ministers 
and advisers. A small number of the many examples that could be given 
illustrate this. David Edmonds, as principal private secretary, was 
present at the meeting when Michael Heseltine decided to appoint Tom 
Baron. Edmonds argued that the new Conservative Government was 
determined to have a fresh look at issues such as the planning system, 
the way housing was administered and giving a bigger role to the private 
sector. Baron was appointed because the contributions he was making at 
the meeting with the Volume Builders Study Group, 'impressed Michael 
Heseltine ... For a Secretary of State faced with that set of 
objectives, the additional knowledge and background that someone from 
the private sector could bring we hoped would be invaluable, and that, 
in fact, proved to be the case. ' 
Douglas Hurd's view on the need for advisers to help maintain 
contact not only with the party but also informally with interest 
groups, illustrates the model developed in Chapter 3. Furthermore, Home 
Office ministers (including Jenkins, Brittan and Hurd) and their 
advisers (including Robin Harris, Coleman and Bickham) referred to 
assistance with presentation as being a reason for their appointment. 
125 
Sir Brian Cubbon, former permanent secretary at the Home Office 1979-88, 
linked these points and he agreed that John Harris could be seen as a 
precursor of the special advisers. He suggested that, 
the whole accountability of ministers to the public was 
transformed in the sixties; the media interest became 
intense ... you had to have a line on everything and the old 
civil service approach rather crumbled when you said, 'nothing 
to do with us, it is a matter for the chief constable'. ... Ministers then, rightly, wanted a different range of, not 
necessarily views on policy but, views on how to deal with 
interest groups as well as the media. In my experience of it 
in the Home Office that was the trigger for the special 
adviser, and in parallel, almost at the same time, the growing 
importance of junior ministers. 
Working as a Treasury civil servant in 1979 David Willetts (later a 
member of the Prime Minister's Policy Unit, Director of the Centre for 
Policy Studies, and Conservative MP) thought advisers were brought in 
because they had helped develop policy in Opposition. Ministers wanted 
top grade understanders rather than second grade believers in the 
permanent bureaucracy. The fear was not whether or not officials were 
believers but whether all the civil servants would understand, after 
working for Labour ministers, what it was the new Government wanted to 
achieve. Therefore, in 1979, there was a role for advisers to help 
transmit the message and further develop policies. 
In general, several themes emerge quite strongly from the analysis 
of officials' perceptions of ministers' reasons. First, quite a few 
ministers were thought to want to appoint somebody who had a personal 
and/or political loyalty to them and had perhaps worked with them in 
Opposition. Thus Lord Brimelow, former permanent secretary at the 
Foreign Office, thought that the civil service attitude was that they 
must not be disloyal to minister A, but if they were actively loyal to A 
how could they be actively loyal to his successor B who might hold 
diametrically opposed views. However, 'A and B want loyalty to them, 
not abstention from disloyalty to them. That is the basis for wanting 
political advisers. ' Second, some officials thought it went one stage 
further and that ministers, especially initially, were, to varying 
degrees, worried about the bureaucracy. Some officials believed it was 
outright suspicion, whilst for others, including the late Sir Hamilton 
Whyte of the Foreign Office, 'ministers tend naturally to be a bit wary 
126 
of their officials certainly when they first arrive in the department 
because they are so heavily dependent on them, and they don't want to be 
taken over by them totally. ' Third, several officials admitted that 
ministers wanted somebody to bring an expertise that they felt was 
lacking in the department. 
Fourth, many civil servants suggested that ministers appointed 
advisers to inject party political thinking into policy discussions 
and/or to liaise with the party. Sir Douglas Wass, former permanent 
secretary at the Treasury, claimed that, 
Ministers may feel that civil service advisers, though 
perfectly competent at evaluating and implementing policy free 
from party political considerations, need to be reinforced by 
somebody, who has got a closer knowledge of what party 
susceptibities might be ... It is helpful to a minister, I think, to have someone who is looking at the activities of the 
department through political spectacles ... 
Of course, he's 
doing it himself but he's often so busy that he doesn't have 
time to maintain all the contacts with the backbenches, the 
party research offices, or with the party bureaucracy, and the 
special adviser can do that for him. 
This theme partly overlaps with the first and also with the fifth reason 
mentioned by a number of officials - help with presentation. Speeches 
to political audiences and the political content of other speeches were 
the aspects of presentation that advisers were seen as most likely to 
have been appointed to provide. 
Several of these overlapping themes emerged in Andrew Semple's 
assessment of why Tony Crosland, the Secretary of State for the 
Environment to whom he was principal private secretary, appointed David 
Lipsey. He felt that Crosland assumed as a matter of course that he 
would want Lipsey to help him with the political end of his duties. 
This was to deal not only with party matters but, 
particularly with the sensitivities of the Labour Party in 
relation to both personalities and the way policy is 
developed. He was afraid he would not find within the DoE, 
from the civil service, a proper understanding of that ... There would be speeches with a political content to be 
drafted ... And someone to talk to about the way his thinking 
was going in political and philosophical terms as well as 
in practical and implementation terms. 
127 
Some officials, however, felt it was difficult to know why 
ministers had appointed advisers. A few felt advisers had almost become 
a status symbol. Yet others suggested that the main reason for 
appointment was the encouragement or pressure applied to the minister 
rather than his own assessment of needs. 
SECTION Q;. APPOINTMENT QE SPECIAL ADVISERS FDR REASONS 
OTHER THAN NEEDS PERCEIVED BY MINISTERS. 
In Section A we saw that it is not sufficient merely to examine the 
reasons in terms of ministers' perceptions of their needs. In some 
cases a specific analysis of needs was the prime factor. In others, 
consideration of needs played some part, but a range of organizations 
and individuals who believed ministers needed special advisers also 
influenced the decision. This section explores the nature of this 
influence and who exerted it. 
The influence ranges from specific pressure on individual 
ministers, to the generation of a climate of opinion that ministers 
should appoint special advisers and the creation of opportunities for 
them to do so. It was primarily associated with Number Ten and with the 
party, but outside commentators and the civil service occasionally 
played a role. These points are examined in mainly chronological order 
and the emphasis will be on the assistance that other organizations and 
people thought the ministers needed. However, it is sometimes difficult 
to disentangle this from the reforms that an organization, such as the 
party bureaucracy, was advocating because it perceived them to be in its 
own best interests. 
In 1964 a Fabian Working Group produced a pamphlet, Ilig 
Administrators. claiming that if an incoming government was to be able 
to, 'succeed in devising, presenting, and executing new policies' 
(p. 41), there was a need for, 'explicit provision for two types of 
political appointment - experts who are called in to help to implement 
the particular policies of the government of the day, and personal aides 
to provide general help to Ministers in their private office. ' (p. 42) 
The experts would be wanted for their expertise rather than general 
political advice and might not even be associated with the party in 
128 
power. It was thought that there was already adequate formal provision 
for temporary appointments, although the Labour Government would need to 
make fuller use of them than some preceding governments. The reasoning 
behind the second type of political appointment was that ministers, 
may feel the need to have near them persons whose personal and 
political judgment, as well as expertise, they trust ... a Minister would be able to make a number of outside 
appointments - up to say, three or four - as assistants in his 
private office ... they would not make administrative decisions; they would be there to assist the Minister in 
making use of the machine to formulate policy (p. 40). 
The Working Group did not propose that such appointments should be made 
automatically in all departments. They also advocated greater 
recruitment of specialists into the civil service and wanted them to be 
more widely used at a policy-making level. 
In practice, Labour ministers appointed many experts and encouraged 
greater recruitment and better deployment of specialists. In both 
cases, these were predominantly economists. Only the appointment of 
John Harris clearly fitted the second category of political 
appointments. Paradoxically, the three ministers who appointed him - 
Patrick Gordon Walker, Michael Stewart and Roy Jenkins - were probably 
on more harmonious terms with their civil servants than were many other 
ministers. This paradox, which was noted by Jenkins, shows that the 
appointment of advisers should not be seen solely as a response to 
presumed civil service obstruction. There was no encouragement from the 
Prime Minister for ministers to make outside appointments to their 
private offices. Shortly before he became Prime Minister in 1964, 
Harold Wilson was asked by Norman Hunt whether there was a case for a 
minister having, 'his own private little cabinet'. He replied, 
My own experience, having tried as a minister to bring in one 
or two outside experts with the right political approach, was 
that I did far better when I relied on loyal civil servants 
who knew what I wanted, in my private office, and who saw to it that the rest of the department knew what I wanted (Hunt, 1964, p. 18). 
Nevertheless, some consideration was given by various ministers to the 
introduction of a political cabinet. Barbara Castle recorded in her 
Diaries (1984) that on 13 April 1970 she discussed the idea with a group 
of civil servants. However, none of the ministers introduced one. The 
129 
reasons for this were explained, and justified, in Wilsonian terms by 
the arch critic of the civil service, Richard Crossman: 
The danger is, if you bring in two or three people to a 
British Department, they may merely isolate you from the 
Department. You sit there with them and the Department makes 
sure nothing happens. A total frigidity sets in because 
Departments are very hostile to foreign elements, and they 
feel very strongly that the link between a Minister and his 
Department is not something that he must introduce from 
outside ... I am reluctantly convinced after six years' 
experience that if you want to get your way in a Department 
the worse thing you can possibly do is to say, 'I trust you so 
little that I am bringing with me four of my own people from 
outside who will be my Private Office. ' (1972, pp. 68-9). 
The Labour Party, as distinct from the Labour Government, continued 
to advocate both types of political appointment. It did so in its 
evidence to Fulton quoted earlier. The party recommended that ministers 
should have the right to appoint personal assistants because the load on 
the political head of a department had grown greater and the result was 
that, 'a Minister can be a lonely man' (1968, Vol. 5 (2), p. 665). The 
evidence suggested personal assistants might have three functions: to 
help with departmental policy formulation by keeping the minister in 
touch with what was going on in the department; to brief the minister on 
cabinet agenda items and to liaise with members of other ministers' 
cabinets and thus form a network to parallel the informal link between 
officials; and to transmit the policy impulse from the minister to 
officials working in the department who never saw him. The Fulton 
Report welcomed the practice of ministers bringing in a small number of 
experts but did not lend its support to the introduction of ministerial 
cabinets (1978, Vol. 1, paras. 129 and 285). 
Tory thinking in Opposition in the 1960s about the need to reform 
the machinery-of-government partly reflected the discontent with the 
civil service expressed by some Labour ministers. However, the main 
impulse for appointing outsiders came in the form of the push for the 
Businessmen's Team to be brought into government and for the 
establishment of the CPRS. In 1970 there was little, if any, concerted 
pressure on ministers to introduce political secretaries and it is 
130 
difficult fully to support Rose's contention that, 'the Conservative 
government of 1970 moved to strengthen the influence of party by 
appointing a group of men to act as political secretaries or special 
advisers to senior ministers. ' (1974, p. 451). He also suggests that 
they were, 'not intended to become involved in the administration of 
policies, but rather, to strengthen the party element in the 
presentation of policies and the partisan definition of the minister's 
mind within his department. ' (p. 421). It is correct that there had 
been, as noted earlier, an unprecedented effort by the Tories in 
Opposition to develop policies. This work, reassessed recently by many 
of the participants in a Contemporary Record symposium (1990), produced 
particularly detailed policies on taxation, trade union reform, and the 
organization of central government. Furthermore, advisers were 
appointed by ministers dealing with each of these key areas. 
When these and other appointments are examined individually, 
however, it is difficult to see them as part of a systematic attempt to 
strengthen the influence of the party. Robert Carr's opposition to 
advisers in general was noted, as was his explanation of the peculiar 
circumstances that led to his appointing Stephen Abbot. Carr felt that 
in the Conservative Party, there was, 'a gradual, evolutionary growth of 
bringing people in, rather than a conscious policy to do so. ' 
Commenting on his appointment of Miles Hudson in 1971, Lord Home said 
he, 'never viewed it as part of the development of a system. ' And 
Hudson, despite having been head of overseas affairs at CRD, said that 
once he became political secretary to the Foreign Secretary, his links 
with the party machine, 'were rather tenuous. ' A similar point has 
already been noted in the cases of Mark Schreiber and Brendon Sewill, 
and the latter was not brought in at the start of the Government. The 
adviser appointed by Chancellor lain Macleod immediately following the 
1970 election, was Arthur Cockfield, but, because of his experience and 
career, he felt his role bore 'little resemblence' to that of the other 
advisers. Finally, Douglas Hurd believed his appointment as Political 
Secretary to the Prime Minister was much more in the tradition of 
personal appointments by the Prime Minister, than it was part of the 
development of a system. 
David Howell illustrates the paradox of advisers being introduced 
partly to help implement policies developed by the party leaders in 
131 
Opposition, but not really being seen as a strengthening of the role of 
the party. Commenting generally on appointments made by the incoming 
Conservative Government he said: 
The party, in those days didn't come into Conservative politics 
the way it came into politics of the left ... it was basically an organizational idea and what we felt we were doing was 
adding an organizational thrust... There were certain policies 
which the Conservatives had dreamed up, of tax reform, of 
trade union reform, of organizational reform ... We were anxious to get those through, and in so far as it was felt 
that the civil service machine wasn't going to help too much 
with that, then we thought that ministers should have extra 
eyes and ears in the form of research appointees. But there 
was never a mention anywhere of a sense of a party line, and 
we have got to get it through. 
Nevertheless, in 1970, according to Hurd in An End IQ Promises, 
there was a determination that there should not be a repeat of what had 
happened at the end of the Macmillan Government in 1963. Then, there 
had been, 'a general feeling in the Conservative Party that Ministers 
had drifted out of touch with their own supporters in the country, 
partly because there was not enough regular contact between Ministers 
and Central Office' (1979, p. 93). Machinery was established in 1970 to 
try to ensure there was not a repeat but Hurd does not mention the 
political secretaries in this context. However, he does point out that 
the reason why senior party advisers always feel that their advice 
begins to carry less weight when the party enters Government is that, 
'The Official Secrets Act and (far more important) the entrenched habits 
of Whitehall turn the familiar friend into an occasional acquaintance' 
(p. 94). For William Waldegrave, who became Hurd's assistant as 
Political Secretary to Prime Minister Heath and was intended eventually 
to succeed, 'the key to the rise of the political adviser is the 
Official Secrets Act. ' He referred to, 'the well-known phenomenon of 
the party advisers being excluded from any up to date knowledge and 
therefore, the rapid outdating of any advice they gave. ' Having been 
close to party spokesman in Opposition, the people remaining in CRD 
resented the way they were, 'steadily edged out by the civil service 
using the secrecy barrier ... therefore the jobs were getting boring and 
so they thought couldn't they get inside the departments somehow. ' 
132 
Perhaps it was this pressure, combined with both the concern to 
maintain thrust and the degree of effort devoted to developing detailed 
policies in Opposition, that led to the creation of a climate of opinion 
in which a number of individual decisions were taken to appoint advisers 
in 1970-71. 
One of the projects suggested by the Businessmen's Team following 
the election was a review of the organization of ministers' private 
offices. Behind this proposal lay a desire to examine the advantages of 
the French cabinet system and see whether private offices could include 
experienced political aides as well as permanent officials. The civil 
service, 'resisted this proposal and its supporters were unable to 
persuade the Prime Minister of its desirability. ' (Pollitt, 1980, 
pp. 88-9). Mark Schreiber and Tony Hart had been sent to Paris to report 
on the adaptability of the cabin system to British purposes. Their 
finding, according to Hennessy, 'was surprisingly wishy-washy - "If 
British Ministers feel the need for some personal reinforcement ... 
there are features of the cabinet system which could be adapted to fill 
the need" - and nothing happened. ' (1989, p. 238). 
As noted by Hurd, there was concern in 1970 that the party and the 
Government should not drift apart. Inevitably this began to happen and 
he became so concerned about it that he sent a paper to the Prime 
Minister entitled, Tg Patty as A I4 Government. In it he 
developed the theme that, 'There seems to be greater difficulty in 
getting Ministers to think politically about their daily problems. As a 
result there is a tendency in the Party to criticize the Private Office 
and Press Departments of Ministers who sometimes appear to keep them in 
a sort of cocoon, over-protected from the outside world. ' (1979, pp. 94- 
5). Hurd's anxiety about the lack of coordination between ministers and 
between the Government and the party, especially over the presentation 
of policy, echoed earlier fears expressed by John Wyndham from 
Conservative Central Office in 1951. (Egremont, 1968). In 1972-3 
Hurd's concern led him, as explained in the quotation at the start of 
this chapter, to encourage more ministers to appoint political 
secretaries. He played a part in the subsequent appointment of John 
Cope and Robert Jackson by John Davies and Maurice Macmillan 
respectively. 
133 
When the Labour Party produced Labour's Programme fQt Britain in 
1972, its thinking was similar to before but went one stage further than 
the evidence to Fulton and advocated the full French system of cabinets. 
According to a party official then working at Transport House, the 
introduction of special advisers, 'was part of the policy discussions 
leading up to the '74 election. ' There would be a group of people, 'to 
maintain links with the party and provide a form of alternative advice 
to the minister. We were already aware that Cabinet papers were often 
circulated late, and that ministers could be isolated, because we found 
this in the '64-'70 period. ' 
Barbara Castle records (1980) that at the very start of the 1974 
Labour Government Harold Wilson told the NEC of the Labour Party: 
"My job is to be the custodian of the Manifesto. I have already recruited a 
political team at No. 10 which will have access to all the documents. I 
am asking all my colleagues to appoint political advisers to their 
private office"'. (Diary entry, 6 March 1974). It is important to assess 
how, and why, the thinking in the party was translated into the adoption 
of special advisers in 1974 in a way that had not fully occurred in 
1964. 
One factor, again demonstrating the appropriateness of the 1970 
starting date for this study, was that Labour noticed the developments 
made by the Tories. The party official recalled, 'we were quite 
impressed by the use they made of them. ' Similarly, Harold Wilson (1976, 
p. 98) suggests special advisers represented a formalization of a step 
started under the Tories: 'Reference has been made to Edward Heath's 
political appointments, some of whom were integrated in to the official 
machine as full-time, though temporary, civil servants. The incoming 
Labour Government in 1974 regularized the position by treating them as a 
special category of "political advisers. "' 
Perhaps more importantly, a climate of opinion had been created in 
which it was felt that the civil service had been partly to blame for 
the failures of the Labour Government between 1964-70. This view was 
134 
cogently expressed by Marcia Williams in the passages quoted earlier 
from Inside Number IQ. She went on to claim: 
During the Opposition years from 1970 to 1974 Labour carefully 
introduced into each Shadow Minister's office a political 
administrative assistant. Many came from the Rowntree Trust. 
Others were personally recruited. All trained for the day 
when Labour would return to power. They trained to become the 
political ears and eyes of their Minister. Since 1974 they 
have become a formidable team of able men and women keeping 
ministers informed of political developments, and maintaining 
political contacts throughout Whitehall and the country, and 
watching the work of their departments for political content 
(p. 284). 
It is here that the greatest difficulty arises in distinguishing 
between the generation of a climate of opinion, the creation of 
opportunities and the exertion of pressure. One of the Rowntree 
Political Fellows, Roger Darlington, wrote of Marcia Williams's claim: 
It was not like that at all. There were almost no assistants 
until 1972, and those who arrived then never took it for 
granted that they would be moving into Whitehall. Indeed the 
concept of Political Advisers was barely discussed ... The surprising point is that this most important constitutional 
innovation dust happened. It was not exactly an accident, but 
it was certainly not planned (p. 12). 
Darlington stressed that the impetus for the introduction of political 
advisers came from the action of the Joseph Rowntree Social Services 
Trust in offering the Political Fellowships. Influenced by the 
Secretary of the Trust, Pratap (now Lord) Chitnis, the Directors took 
the view that party political spokesmen in Parliament did not have the 
day-to-day political back-up which they required and that, in terms of 
research, Opposition parties were at a substantial disadvantage compared 
to the Government which had the full resources of the civil service. 
The Political Fellowships allocated to the Parliamentary Labour Party 
were awarded to Roger Darlington, Adrian Ham, Vicky Kidd, David Lipsey 
and Matthew Oakeshott. They worked for Merlyn Rees, Denis Healey, Ted 
Short, Tony Crosland and Roy Jenkins respectively, each of whom joined 
the Cabinet in 1974, in the post which they had been shadowing. 
135 
Therefore, Darlington concludes, 'it was a totally natural process for 
these five Rowntree people to be taken into Whitehall as Political 
Advisers' (p. 10). This implies that it was the creation of 
opportunities to appoint people, rather than any central planning, which 
was the major outside influence in these ministers' decision to appoint 
advisers. 
The extent to which the Rowntree Fellows expected to be taken into 
Government with their ministers varied. Whereas Vicky Kidd did not 
remember the issue featuring at all before the election campaign, 
Matthew Oakeshott said, 'we never discussed it particularly but it was 
assumed that obviously that was the logic of it. ' Adrian Ham felt that, 
'it wasn't assumed to be absolutely automatic ... amongst the Rowntree 
Fellows it was regarded as quite a likely situation. ' In early 1974 
Labour politicians had not been expecting to fight an election - let 
alone, as David Lipsey said, form a Government - and so detailed 
planning had not begun. Asked whether he had assumed he would take 
Darlington in with him when Labour were next in Government, Rees 
replied, 'I don't think I did ... 
I didn't think we were going to win 
the next election so I hadn't really thought ahead. ' 
The contrast between the preparations made by the two Labour 
politicians who both wrote in June 1973 of the need for political 
advisers, Benn and Castle, illustrates the difficulties in interpreting 
the factors behind the expansion of special advisers in 1974. Two 
entries in Benn's Diaries (1989) indicate the extent of his 
preparations. On 17 March 1973, he wrote, Bish, Jackson and Holland, 
'came in to tidy up the industrial policy paper. I had prepared a great 
chart showing what our objectives were and adding equality and 
redistribution of power under the general heading of "A fundamental and 
irreversible transfer of power and wealth", as the main objective of the 
next Labour Government. We have also included an advisory structure 
whereby Ministers would have personal cabinets attached to them. ' Six 
months later, the entry for 21 September states: 'I offered Frances 
Morrell a job as political adviser in my department if we won the next 
Election. ' 
Strong evidence of the limitations on whatever planning there might 
136 
have been comes from Barbara Castle. Despite her firm advocacy of 
political advisers she was not a shadow minister in the run-up to the 
election and had nobody pencilled in for the slot. She was surprised 
when Harold Wilson said that ministers should make such appointments. 
Jack Straw, whose name was suggested to Mrs Castle by her husband, was 
equally taken aback when first asked to fill the position. 
After Harold Wilson told ministers they should appoint special 
advisers, Transport House (Labour Party headquarters) offered to second 
staff (Rose, 1974). Eventually four special advisers were recruited 
from there - Ann Carlton, Margaret Jackson, Tom McNally and Terry Pitt. 
However, there was no suggestion that Transport House were exerting 
pressure on ministers to adopt special advisers. Indeed its position 
seems to have been rather ambivalent; Darlington (p. 40) quoted a 
newspaper report in Autumn 1974 claiming that staff in the Labour Party 
Research Department in Transport House felt, 'peeved' about political 
advisers and were worried that they, 'might act as a buffer between 
Ministers and the general party. ' 
Harold Wilson, in his statement to Commonwealth Heads of 
Government, explained that there were two main reasons behind the 
political advisers experiment. The first was the pressure of work on 
ministers which made it almost impossible for a minister to, 'carry out 
his departmental and political responsibilities and at the same time 
sustain a detailed analysis of all the various nuances of policy ... 
he 
finds it increasingly difficult to play a constructive part in the 
collective business of the Government as a whole' (1976, p. 202). The 
second reason was the nature of the civil service which, because of its 
permanence, 'can become isolated from changes of mood and structure in 
our society. ' He summed up the case thus: 
The Political Adviser is an extra pair of hands, ears and eyes 
and a mind more politically committed and more politically 
aware than would be available to a Minister from the political 
neutrals in the established Civil Service. This is 
particularly true for a radical reforming party in government, 
since, 'neutralism' may easily slip in to conservatism with a 
small 'c' (Wilson, 1976, p. 204). 
In addition to Marcia Williams, other key figures around Wilson who 
137 
advocated the use of special advisers included his press secretary from 
1969-76, Joe Haines. In 1977 he wrote, 'it is essential to the future 
of democratic government, I believe, that Ministers should have access 
to more than one source of expert advice, particularly from those who 
are not civil servants' (p. 39). 
The pressure from Number Ten went further than merely generating a 
climate of opinion that was favourable to special advisers. Bernard 
Donoughue is thought to have persuaded several ministers in both the 
Wilson and Callaghan Governments to make appointments. In some cases 
ministers, including Stan Orme in 1976, readily agreed when the 
suggestion was made, but there were others where Donoughue had to exert 
whatever pressure he could before the minister agreed. He was keen that 
there should be advisers in as many departments as possible. Some of 
the Labour ministers, however, refused to recruit. The combination of 
the attitude towards the civil service expressed by Marcia Williams and 
the encouragement given to Ministers to appoint advisers was commented 
on at the time: 'That suspicion of the Civil Service goes a long way to 
explain why 38 political appointments have already been made by Mr 
Wilson and his ministers, and why all Cabinet ministers are under 
pressure to follow the trend. ' (Wood, 331c Times. 10 June 1974). 
The Labour Party had envisaged special advisers being located in 
private offices, but very few advisers formally did so. One who did was 
Tom McNally who took over the place of Miles Hudson, his Tory 
predecessor. McNally soon moved out because it was easier for him to 
work from a separate room close to the private office. In no department 
did the special advisers become the cabin envisaged in Labour's 
Programme & Bzitain. (1972) although several ministers took steps 
towards building an unofficial cabinet. 
The climate of opinion generated by Margaret Thatcher in 1979 was 
rather hostile to political - as opposed to expert - advisers. One of 
the Treasury's ministers in 1979, John Biffen claimed that Thatcher was, 
'not a great enthusiast', and one of the department's advisers, George 
Cardona, suggested she was, 'very, very sceptical at first. ' The 
attitude in 1979 partly reflected the strident opposition to Labour 
special advisers seen on the Tory backbenches and: 'there was a general 
feeling that it was time to "clear the board" of patronage, and in 
138 
almost deliberate contrast to the previous Labour Government, the number 
of special advisers was severely restricted. ' (Butler, 1986 p. 13). 
Furthermore, according to Adam Ridley, 'she saw quite rightly there was 
a problem about the Government bringing in large numbers of special 
advisers and then saying to officials, "You are grossly overstaffed. 
Cut. Cut. "' Thatcher was thought to be more concerned with installing 
ministers with political will than with changes in the machinery-of- 
government. (Simmonds, 1988). Nevertheless, the Tories had developed 
radical policies in Opposition and, as we have seen, some ministers were 
keen to bring in people who had worked with them. Many people felt 
that the new Prime Minister came to office suspicious of bureaucrats, 
believing they would present obstacles to the implementation of her 
programme (Hennessy, 1989, p. 627; Fred Ridley, 1983, p. 36; Hugo Young, 
1990, p. 157). Others shared Thatcher's fears: 'Joseph, Howe and John 
Hoskyns were particularly exercised about the problem' (Hugo Young, 
p. 157). 
There were, therefore, a variety of factors at work in 1979 but 
only a few advisers were appointed and generally it was as a result of 
pressure from ministers rather than prime ministerial encouragement. 
Since then there has been, in the words of one minister, 'incremental' 
growth of the system. The 1980s saw a growing climate of opinion that 
political advisers were a 'good thing'. Several of the earlier 
quotations from ministers implied that this was one of the reasons 
behind their decision to make an appointment. However, it was probably 
ministers themselves who took the lead in generating the climate of 
opinion. Furthermore, in most individual cases it was up to the 
minister to persuade Thatcher to agree to the appointment of an extra 
special adviser. There were only a few instances where the 
opportunities created and/or prime ministerial encouragement could be 
seen as a reason for appointment. These include the initial decision 
that several of the CRD officials who had originally been destined for 
the Number Ten Policy Unit could instead go to the relevant departments 
they had been covering. Whilst reference has been made to 
encouragement given by the Prime Minister to Patrick Jenkin to reappoint 
David Young, Jenkin had already demonstrated his belief in advisers by 
appointing Roger Dyson at DHSS. Jenkin thought that, 'she has always 
been a supporter of getting more interaction between the private sector 
139 
and the public sector. ' 
It is clear that during the 1980s the number of special advisers 
increased and the bulk of the pressure for this came from the ministers. 
It is less clear whether Thatcher merely grudgingly tolerated the 
expansion or actively welcomed it; and if there was a change of mind, 
when it occurred. According to Jenkin, Thatcher came to realize, 'that 
the ministers who had them were sometimes more effective than ministers 
who didn't ... and particularly sometimes ministers who lack some of 
that political flair ... the ability to coin the phrase. ' Some 
felt the 
tide had turned in favour of special advisers before the 1983 election 
but there was almost universal agreement that Thatcher was impressed 
with the performance of some of the advisers drafted in to help with 
that campaign. She was so pleased with the work of Stephen Sherbourne 
that she recruited him to be her political secretary. Some think that 
he was then in a position to encourage her to take a liberal attitude 
towards requests by ministers for permission to recruit special 
advisers. One minister also felt that Bernard Ingham supported the 
spread of special advisers in some departments. 
Many of these points were brought together by Tom King who provided 
important illustrations of some of the general points. As Shadow 
Secretary of State for Energy in the late 1970s he had, as had his 
predecessor Patrick Jenkin, picked up from the department vibrations of 
unease about the role of advisers. Amongst the Tories in 1979, 
therefore, 
initially there had been some aversion to too many political 
advisers but a number were taken on ... Then gradually people began to find they were very useful and they played a pretty 
valuable role in the 1983 election ... The Prime Minister 
recognized that they did have a useful role to play in 
government and I think also that the civil service found that 
whereas they had had some unhappy experiences with some in the 
past, the calibre of many of the people who came in was 
good An important element was the development of the 
Policy Unit at Number Ten. For the special advisers it was an 
important linkage and it provided a major strata in the 
political steering of the Government and certainly for Richard 
[Ehrman] that relationship was an important part of his work. 
140 
Various advisers believed that the advisers' role in the 1983 
election campaign finally convinced Thatcher of their usefulness. 
Several advisers described the process, including Rob Shepherd (1983) 
and Chris Butler who in 1986 wrote: 
The 1983 General Election was a watershed. Much of the 
responsibility of briefing the Prime Minister before the daily 
press conferences fell on special advisers. They performed 
well, and easily outshone their less experienced counterparts 
in the Conservative Research Department (CRD). In the Prime 
Minister's eyes, special advisers were now a 'good thing', no 
longer an unknown species so cunningly conceived under 
Socialism (p. 13). 
Many similarities exist between the factors behind the development 
of special advisers in the UK and those responsible for the 
transformation of the private offices of Australian ministers into teams 
of personal advisers. Perhaps the most striking comparisons are those 
between the reaction of incoming right wing governments, under Fraser in 
1975 and Thatcher in 1979, to the development of advisory systems under 
their Labour predecessors. Fraser had come to office, according to 
Walter, 'with a commitment to cutting back government spending and the 
ministerial staff system - particularly given its criticism fostered by 
the conservative parties when in opposition - seemed one of the obvious 
targets. ' Initially, numbers in the private offices were cut back but 
grew again eventually to reach the previous level as, 'faced with levels 
of complexity and demands for actions ... Fraser's ministers came to 
realize the value of, and need for, private staff (pp. 78-9). 
In the UK a noticeable reduction in the number of departments in 
which there were special advisers occurred in 1979. However useful some 
civil servants had undoubtedly found special advisers to be, there was 
little encouragement from the civil service for the incoming 
Conservative Government to make such appointments. At some stages 
though, certain civil servants have encouraged ministers to recruit 
special advisers. Ian Bancroft told the Treasury and Civil Service 
Committee: 'I count it a minor triumph to have been one of the few 
141 
former Permanent Secretaries (perhaps the only one for all I know) who 
persuaded a reluctant Minister to appoint a special adviser' (1986, 
Vol. 2, p. 251). In the story quoted earlier from the h Times D 
about a special adviser being sought to work for the Lord Chancellor, 
David Walker alleged that: 'It is not clear that Lord Mackay has 
himself approved the idea. But his officials, who complained at a 
recent internal meeting of the high level of demands now made on them, 
think it an excellent scheme; the minister will, as necessary, be 
prevailed upon'. (wig Times. 26 August 1988). 
In a very few cases an existing special adviser was able to 
persuade his minister that an additional adviser was required. Anthony 
Lester for example, was faced with a major responsibility for assisting 
in drafting the proposals for sex discrimination legislation, in 
addition to acting as a more general adviser to Roy Jenkins on Home 
Office and other matters. He therefore, sought Roy Jenkins's approval 
for the appointment of an extra special adviser to work with him on 
plans for the Sex Discrimination Bill. Paul Chapman, one of the junior 
special advisers recruited to assist Brian Abel-Smith, suggested that 
his post, 'was created by Brian Abel-Smith who said to Barbara Castle 
that he needed some help and was it OK if he recruited someone to 
provide it. ' 
These three sections have shown that ministers decide to appoint 
special advisers for various reasons. In some cases the decision was 
not solely or specifically linked to the assistance the special adviser 
could provide in meeting the needs perceived by ministers. 
142 
CHAPTER FIVE. SELECTION SPECIA ADVISERS. AND 
SUPPLY AND DEMAND. 
SECTION & SELECTION. 
Special advisers are a minister's 'own people' and he is responsible for 
selecting them. A wide variety of methods have been used, but their 
selection cannot be entirely divorced from the reasons for their 
appointment. Sometimes the decision to recruit an adviser was 
explicitly made because there was an individual whom the minister wished 
to bring into the department. This usually occurred when a new 
government was formed. The clearest examples of individuals being 
recruited rather than people being selected to fill an existing slot 
occurred with Michael Heseltine's appointments although even here he was 
certain there was a problem to be tackled: 
I met Tom Baron at a meeting organized by him of the Volume 
House Builders to teach, to tell and argue with ministers 
about what ministers should be doing in the housing policy. 
This was obviously a man with a contribution to make and when 
I left lunch I asked my permanent secretary if there was any 
way in which he could come and work for me within the 
Ministry. 
In many other cases where the selection and the reasons for 
appointment were strongly linked, it is not clear to what extent the 
decision to appoint was influenced by the presence of a specific 
individual ready to come in or to continue in post. Once such decisions 
to appoint had been made, however, there was no question of a selection 
process; the obvious person was appointed. Included in this category 
were specialist special advisers such as David Young who were 
'inherited'. This term was used by a number of ministers, including 
Patrick Jenkin, who came into a department in which an adviser had 
already been working. There was some debate about how far it had been 
planned that the Rowntree Political Fellows should become special 
advisers; nevertheless, in practice, they were all appointed. The 
ministers do not appear to have looked elsewhere for political advisers, 
although several of them appointed an additional specialist. Roy 
Jenkins said of Matthew Oakeshott, 'he had been a considerable success 
as a general political adviser and assistant and when I went back to 
143 
the Home Office, I kept him on, as most people did. ' 
In June 1979 not all the people from the CRD were appointed as 
special advisers. However those ministers who did appoint advisers 
mostly selected the relevant CRD official. Jim Prior not only appointed 
Rob Shepherd, the desk officer on Employment Affairs, but also Robbie 
Gilbert who was Shepherd's predecessor at the CRD. We have already seen 
how the Treasury Affairs team at CRD moved Ca blgg to become special 
advisers at the Treasury, and one of the ministers, Peter (now L)rd) 
Rees, said they had, 'been part of the furniture for a long time in 
Opposition. ' 
Generally where a minister did not consider anybody other than the 
person appointed there were two possible scenarios. If it was as a 
specialist adviser then he was the obvious candidate for the department, 
and if it was as a political adviser he was the natural choice to go 
with his minister to whichever department he went. A slight variation 
on this came from Roy Hattersley. In a thoughtful answer to the 
question as to how automatic was his selection of David Hill and Maurice 
Peston to be his two special advisers, he commented that David Hill was 
an automatic choice and, 'he came along with me to the Ministry on the 
first morning', but Maurice Peston, as an economist, would have been, 
'the inevitable nominee for a large number of ministries but not for 
every one of them. ' The selection of Brian Abel-Smith at DHSS was 
almost automatic. Barbara Castle wrote in her Djaly entry for 6 March 
1974: 'I am losing no time in appointing staff. I rang up Brian Abel- 
Smith this morning and said simply, "Will you come to me? " to which he 
replied equally simply, "Of course. " What a relief! He is unmatchable' 
(1980). Sometimes, especially since 1983, a political adviser has 
become the obvious candidate to be retained in a department: the best 
example is John Whittingdale who was appointed by Norman Tebbit and 
'inherited' by Leon Brittan and subsequently Paul Channon. Usually when 
a political adviser is inherited, his previous master has left the 
Government, or in the case of Tebbit ceased to be a departmental 
minister. 
144 
There were many cases where the minister had to find somebody 
because there was no one, obvious, person. Here too there were a range 
of approaches. Sometimes a minister asked a specific individual he knew 
personally, for example, several of the advisers appointed to the 
Treasury were known to Nigel Lawson, including Howard Davies, a former 
assistant secretary in the department, who had been the principal 
dealing with monetary policy when Lawson was Financial Secretary. Over 
a third of the special advisers, however, were not personally acquainted 
with the minister who appointed them. Some of these fall into the 
category of advisers who worked for the minister's predecessor and 
therefore became 'the obvious candidate', but many of them do not. A 
selection process then became necessary. A number of advisers suggested 
that they were chosen after the minister interviewed several candidates. 
This was not always well remembered by the ministers. Names are 
suggested to ministers from a variety of sources. Reference has already 
been made to the important role played by Douglas Hurd and Bernard 
Donoughue. Sometimes a departing minister, for example Mark Carlisle, 
recommends his former adviser. Richard Luce recalled that when Patrick 
Jenkin left the Government, and his replacement as Secretary of State 
for the Environment proposed to bring his own adviser with him, Jenkin 
telephoned saying he had had a very good adviser, Andrew Tyrie. After 
Tyrie moved on to the Treasury and Luce was looking for a replacement 
Nicholas Edwards recommended Chris Butler, who had resigned from his 
position as special adviser to the Secretary of State for Wales to 
contest unsuccessfully the Brecon by-election. 
Within the Conservative Party there is a strong network amongst 
current and former members of the CRD. Indeed, whatever their method of 
selection, the CRD has been by far the most important source of special 
advisers for Conservative ministers. In the lists produced by the 
1986 Treasury and Civil Service Committee, this fact is somewhat 
obscured; several advisers, including Tim Boswell, Michael Dobbs, 
Douglas French and John Houston are not recorded as having come from CRD 
because they had moved to other occupations prior to becoming special 
advisers. When Keith Joseph recruited a family friend and university 
don, Oliver Letwin, to help him in the DES there was no opportunity for 
him to become a paid adviser because Stuart Sexton had by that time been 
reinstated by Joseph. Letwin, therefore, was simultaneously appointed 
145 
to be both a special adviser and the Education desk officer at the CRD 
but only paid in the latter capacity - by the party not the state. 
Initially he also continued as a Cambridge fellow. Furthermore, he was 
one of the few advisers not to be a member of the Government party at 
the time of appointment. He did subscribe to broad Conservative 
principles and joined six months later although like other advisers in a 
similar position the lack of party membership had not been causing him 
any problems. 
As Director of the CRD Robin Harris accepted that there was some 
degree of responsibility on it, when necessary, to help ministers find 
advisers. According to Peter Davis, the normal course of events for 
desk officers is that 'they will move on after doing a stint in the 
research department for two or three years. If they are lucky, they 
will be recruited as a special adviser. ' Davis himself went from being 
special adviser to Kenneth Baker at Environment to become head of Home 
Affairs at CRD. 
Several other advisers have taken posts, but not concurrently, in 
the CRD, most noticeably Peter Cropper who went from the CRD to the 
Treasury as a special adviser, returned in 1982 as Director, and in 1984 
went back to the Treasury as special adviser to the Chancellor. It had 
been originally hoped that there would be some cross-fertilisation 
between the special advisers and the CRD. No one source was so 
predominant for Labour advisers. More came from the universities - 
especially specialists appointed on a part-time basis. 
Ministers were not always clear about the qualities they were 
looking for. Even when they knew what they wanted, their requirements 
varied considerably. This inevitably reflected the various reasons for 
appointment and the diverse nature of ministers, who often wanted 
somebody who would be compatible. A party background and commitment was 
often required. Writing in 1976, Darlington claimed that sometimes 
ministers and advisers disagreed about major issues but, 'on the whole, 
however, Minister and Adviser are close to each other in political 
position and style, with the Adviser usually being that much more radical 
than his boss' (p. 33). 
146 
Several ministers stressed that the demands of the job required 
somebody of high quality. Thus Barbara Castle outlined in the Mandarin 
Power speech how difficult it would be to introduce political advisers 
and thought it required somebody not only with a political background 
but also sufficient self-confidence and intellect to be able to 
withstand the pressure from the civil servants. 
Sometimes the minister wanted somebody who would stand up to him. 
David Metcalf was suggested to Stan Orme by Bernard Donoughue. Metcalf 
claimed 'he wanted someone who had a track record in the local Labour 
Party, which I had, and we got on very well, in large part because I 
stood up to him. ' Similarly, Harold Lever, 'asked Donoughue if he knew 
a good, reliable, intellectually courageous man who wouldn't be 
intimidated by me - who would challenge me. ' 
Advisers sometimes helped recruit other special advisers. Several 
retiring special advisers, including Jack Straw and David Young, were 
asked by their minister, including Peter Shore and Patrick Jenkin respectively, 
to propose a short list or to find a successor before leaving. In the 
few cases where pressure from an existing adviser helped persuade the minister 
to appoint an extra adviser, it was usually the senior adviser who proposed 
the new recruit. Anthony Lester proposed Angela Byre and Brian Abel- 
Smith proposed Paul Chapman and subsequently Geoffrey Alltimes, both of 
whom had been students of his at the LSE. 
A few examples illustrate the variety and lack of standardization 
in the selection process. When David Ennals decided to appoint an 
adviser with experience of the social work world, David Townsend was 
proposed by Ennals's PPS. Townsend, a social worker and former Labour 
parliamentary candidate, had acted as press agent to the PPS. When Bill 
Rodgers was appointed to the Cabinet, Roger Liddle, an industrial 
relations officer who had had political experience as an Oxford City 
councillor, was suggested to him as a possible special adviser by Frank 
Pickstock, a mutual friend and former Chairman of the Gaitskellite 
Campaign for Democratic Socialism. At that time Rodgers did not intend 
to recruit an adviser, but he soon decided to do so and said that he 
finally chose Liddle after hearing the speech he gave as best man at the 
wedding of Matthew Oakeshott. In another case the person who was 
147 
appointed by the minister seems to have been deliberately chosen partly 
because he would cause as little trouble as possible to good relations 
between the minister and his officials. 
Evidence about the diverse methods of selecting special advisers 
can be related to the themes of the place of special advisers and the 
degree of formalization in the system. As a group, special advisers are 
probably more varied in age (from 22 to 65 when first appointed) and in 
background than any other category in Whitehall, including private 
secretaries, permanent secretaries, or ministers. This contributes to 
the fact that special advisers can occupy a range of places as 
suggested in the model developed earlier. However, to the extent that a 
higher proportion of them now have a more political than expert role 
there has been a limited degree of standardization. Nevertheless, in 
terms of actual recruitment there was probably less standardization at 
the end of the 1980s than when the government was newly formed and the 
most obvious candidates were people who had worked with the ministers 
when they were shadow spokesmen. 
CT 
.& 
SUPPLY AM DEMAND. 
We have observed that if it is clear there are people to fill the posts 
then the reasons for making such an appointment might become more 
apparent and/or compelling. With reference to the appointment of 
political secretaries between 1970-4 Rose claims, 'the number of 
appointments was not limited by a low demand, but rather, by the party's 
inability to locate men with the appropriate background, abilities and 
inclination to undertake the work on the terms offered' (1974, p. 452). 
Some more recent Tory ministers, for example, Leon Brittan, have 
referred to some difficulties in finding a suitable person; and in 
several cases part of the reason why no appointment was made was that 
nobody with the appropriate qualifications appeared. One minister said 
that he did not think the need was all that great but, 'if the right 
chap had come along I would have said, "Yes please, let's have him", but 
short of that I didn't bother too much. ' Fred (now Lord) Mulley, 'has 
argued that a pertinent reason why he did not have a special adviser at 
the Ministry of Defence was that no-one sufficiently able or experienced 
in defence matters was known to him' (Fraher, 1981, p. 18). Interviewed 
148 
in early 1987, Chris Butler commented, 'it is very difficult at the 
moment to fill special adviser places. ' The former permanent secretary 
at the DoE, Sir George Moseley, made an interesting comparison in 
stating that he did not think the minister, 'could reach out and say to 
somebody, as we can do in the civil service, we will have three or four 
for me to look at next Monday. ' Some special advisers had several 
offers and there were some attempts at poaching. One permanent 
secretary referred to himself and the minister 'playing in the transfer 
market'. Even when a good person has been identified it is not always 
easy to persuade them to accept. Initially, Tom Baron, 'was quite 
horrified at the prospect, ' of leaving his company and coming to London 
as an adviser for some months. 
By contrast, some ministers found that a number of people offered 
their services and/or individuals were proposed by third parties. 
Norman Fowler believed it had become a popular career episode for some 
people and there was no shortage of volunteers. 
There is a complex overlap between questions of motivation for 
special advisers. How far is the role satisfying? Does it help or 
hinder a subsequent career? Knowledge about the satisfaction and job 
prospects of earlier advisers could motivate prospective advisers. The 
variety of motivations partly reflects the diverse backgrounds, so that 
academics and specialists might be more likely to be interested in 
observing the policy making process in specific fields, and even 
influencing it in certain directions in which they believe. With his 
strong views on educational policy, Stuart Sexton, for example, went to 
considerable lengths to gain an advisory position, initially in 
Opposition and then in Government. (Knight; Edwards ci a,, 1989). Many 
younger political advisers viewed it as an extremely interesting job 
with the advantage, noted earlier by William Waldegrave, of being inside 
the Official Secrets Act, unlike the research posts at party 
headquarters. Various advisers would fit Walter's description, noted 
earlier, of people motivated by a desire, 'to be at the centre of 
events' (p. 178). Butler (1986) similarly wrote that, 'the reasons why 
advisers put up with all the disadvantages must be their interest in 
politics. It is one of the most interesting and fascinating jobs to be 
undertaken in the political world, outside of being a government 
149 
minister' (p. 19). 
One disadvantage reported by many advisers was the comparatively 
low levels of pay and other benefits, especially considering the 
insecurity. Despite critical comments of an 'excessive' level of pay 
noted in Chapter 2, money was not the motivation behind most decisions 
to become an adviser. Indeed many advisers took the role despite, not 
because of, the salary. This was recognized by some civil servants, 
including one time CSD official, George Moseley, who noted: 'A lot of 
them, though they didn't kick up a fuss about it, were, I suspect, 
considerably out of pocket. They had some different motivation from 
money. ' Echoing these remarks, John Whittingdale, who was only 24 when 
appointed and thus on the equivalent of a senior executive officer's 
salary, said: 'I wasn't doing the job for the salary. It is a fantastic 
job and to be quite honest I would have taken a pay cut. It is the 
sheer enjoyment you get from that job. ' 
Overall the level of satisfaction felt by advisers varied. Writing 
about departmental and Policy Unit advisers in late 1976 Darlington 
(p. 17) estimated, 'that at least 27 advisers have passed through the 
system in less than three years; that is, more Advisers have been and 
gone than are currently in post. The "survivability rate" then is not 
high. However, the reasons for leaving have been varied. ' Those he 
listed include: the minister leaving; disillusionment with the policies; 
return to original employment; becoming an MP, or a minister in the 
Lords; found to be unwanted or unsuited. 
Despite the frustrations, which are discussed in detail later, many 
advisers found the job very satisfying. There is some scepticism from 
outsiders about what the role could offer to academics/specialists 
unless they were committed to achieving certain policy aims: 'it is hard 
to see what attractions such a post, lacking both public recognition and 
a career outlet, could offer to candidates of experience and ability 
unless (like Brian Abel-Smith) they had strong commitments in a 
particular policy area' (Brown and Steel, p. 331-2). Several academics 
have, however, made it clear that there is considerable satisfaction 
beyond the ability to push policy preferences: 
150 
Who does not want to see history being made?... What did I 
gain from a spell in government service? First, an awareness 
of the process of government which no book could give me ... If it is the task of academics to teach students about the 
real world, a spell in government is invaluable for obtaining 
a deeper understanding of it (Abel-Smith, THES, 27 June 1980). 
It must be of interest to those who work in the field to 
examine the actual way policy is formulated and put in to 
practice (Peston, THFS, 11 July 1980). 
For an academic who is constantly involved in researching and 
teaching with health service personnel it's extremely useful 
(Dyson). 
All three of these academics held chairs prior to becoming advisers, so 
they were not looking to their spell as advisers to assist further 
promotion. Overall, however, many more thought that having been an 
adviser had helped their career development than considered it a 
hindrance. Several advisers, including David Lipsey, nevertheless felt 
that, whilst the experience could be an advantage, the clear association 
with a particular party was sometimes a handicap - especially when that 
party was in Opposition. Furthermore, there were occasions on which 
advisers complained they had subsequently suffered from having had 
disagreements with civil servants. 
For some advisers the contacts gained, plus the first hand 
experience of the process of government, were extremely valuable. David 
Stephen, for example, thought it was, 'undoubtedly' useful in his career 
development: 'Clearly one gained an experience in foreign policy 
formulation in this country and contacts with people in other countries 
doing the same thing. ' Walter develops this point much further and 
links it with his discussion of the role of the intelligentsia. 
Walter's views, which relate to all those - including civil servants - 
working as personal advisers in ministers' private offices, are not 
generally appropriate for the UK. They do though, illustrate how the 
role's potential, especially if expanded, might be viewed: 
While there is no security for the ministerial staffer, and no 
institutionally prescribed career path, the options facing 
him/her at the end of service are far from limited ... the transition ... to influential bureaucrat, highly placed business consultant, well-paid lobbyist or senior academic is 
common ... This may be seen as part of a broader pattern in 
151 
that the modem intelligentsia is characterized by 
occupational mobility, but there is much to indicate that a 
trajectory through the ministerial staff may be the fast lane 
to success. The knowledge developed within the system and the 
contacts with those in power, and also the networks built up 
through the reciprocal relations between politicians and 
minders contribute to this (p. 187). 
We have seen that a major weakness of Walter's approach, 
particularly if applied to the UK, is the understatment of the degree to 
which advisers are ambitious to play a front line role in the political 
battle. Far from becoming a special adviser because they have, 
'difficulty in coping with aggression', some people are motivated to 
become advisers because they believe it will enhance their chances of 
being selected to be a parliamentary candidate. Indeed, it is widely 
assumed by civil servants, politicians and commentators that this is the 
main motivation of most younger political advisers. Sometimes advisers 
are spoken of in a highly critical, and often dismissive, way because of 
this ambition. This is particularly so if it is suspected that the 
advisers are, in the words of one official, 'anxious to help their 
ministers, and achieve greatness for themselves by the minister's rise - 
on the coat tails. ' John Hoskyns saw a danger that young special 
advisers from the research department who were anxious for a political 
career might lack the independence to upset their ministers by speaking 
bluntly. For some Tory MPs this was yet another point to add to their 
list of criticisms of advisers. Thus the former diplomat turned MP, Ray 
Witney, in arguing the case against Roger Darlington's suggestion of an 
increase in the number of advisers, wrote: 'The tribunes of the people 
would bitterly - and rightly - resent the pretensions of a bunch of 
placemen, many of whom would be (as they are at present) aspirant 
parliamentary candidates who have been rejected by constituent selection 
committees. ' (Tg mss, 3 August 1978). 
For ministers such as Richard Luce the fact that their prospective 
special adviser, in his case Chris Butler, wanted to get into Parliament 
was a factor to consider favourably. Being a special adviser provided 
very good experience and given that it was a risky occupation with no 
clear career structure, somebody aiming for a political career could be 
well suited to it. There was a tradition that some CRD staff 
successfully sought to become parliamentary candidates, and so the role 
152 
now played by advisers can be seen as a logical extension of this. 
About a third of departmental special advisers appointed since 1970 
have at some stage stood for Parliament and others are known to have 
parliamentary ambitions including probably a majority of more recent 
Tory advisers. At least a further seven advisers have been given 
peerages, three of whom have served as ministers (Lords Cockfield, 
Crowther-Hunt, and Young) and two as Opposition spokesmen (Lords Peston, 
and Prys-Davies). Including those who served at Number Ten, four of the 
1970-4 political secretaries (John Cope, Douglas Hurd, Robert Jackson, 
and William Waldegrave) became ministers. Three of Judith Hart's 
advisers were elected to Parliament (Tony Banks, Stuart Holland, and 
Margaret Jackson); and Jack Straw 'inherited' Barbara Castle's Blackburn 
seat in 1979, which also saw the election of Terry Davis (who had 
briefly been part-time adviser to Albert Booth) and of Tom McNally. 
In the 1987 election the former head of the Policy Unit (John 
Redwood) and three former advisers (Tim Boswell, Christopher Butler, and 
Douglas French) entered Parliament. Colin Moynihan, who had briefly 
worked in a personal advisory capacity for Foreign Secretary Pym, was 
elected in 1983, and Michael Portillo won the Enfield Southgate by 
election in 1984. Robin Cooke became an adviser after being an MP and 
Adam Fergusson was appointed by Foreign Secretary Howe after losing his 
seat in the European Parliament. Some of these advisers and several 
others had also been local councillors. 
Opinions differ about how far having been an adviser assists 
selection as a candidate. Echoing comments recorded above by Richard 
Luce, his second minister, Chris Butler claims: 'many special advisers 
have political ambitions, and the knowledge and perspective they gain 
does help them win the confidence of selection committees' (p. 19). 
Butler was first chosen to fight a by-election, as was Michael Portillo 
who believed that the experience of being an adviser, especially dealing 
with the media, was helpful in securing selection for a by-election in 
which much media attention was expected. Other advisers, including 
Douglas French believed 'it would have been of benefit in securing 
interviews. ' He further thought some constituencies would be attracted 
153 
by a person who was, 'special adviser to a man who was well known, well 
respected and liked. ' Although selection committees were thought to 
vary in their attitudes, several advisers shared the views of one who 
believed that most local parties 'are not particularly impressed by some 
very young chap who has spent all his life in Whitehall with his head in 
the clouds ... special advisers are not popular by and large with 
selection committees. ' 
Many proposals exist for increasing the number of special advisers 
appointed by ministers (see Chapter 10). However, any such scheme would 
run serious risks of some unsuitable people being appointed (as seemed 
to happen in the 1980s, according to one interviewee, in Canada under 
the Conservatives) unless there was a large pool of good potential 
advisers from which to choose. Various people, including Stephen 
Sherbourne, doubt the existence of such a reservoir in the UK: 'You 
can't have a structure which assumes a calibre which isn't always 
available. ' Demonstrating that experience as an adviser is often of 
benefit to career prospects, including enhancing the likelihood of 
selection as a parliamentary candidate, might result in an increase in 
the number of would-be special advisers. 
The introduction of the 'Short money' ensures that at any future 
change of government there is likely to be an improved source of 
advisers, although this was not part of Ted Short's original thinking 
behind the scheme. This funding provided to assist Opposition parties 
in Parliament, has led to a considerable increase in the number of 
research assistants working directly to shadow ministers. Stuart Sexton 
was funded in this way when he was working for the shadow Ministers of 
Education. According to a Labour Party official speaking in the late 
1980s, there is an assumption on the part of shadow ministers that they 
are going to have a cabinet or special advisers, 'partly because they 
have all got their own little teams of advisers that are on a friendly 
basis with one another. ' 
Walter Williams is a strong advocate of reform of the bureaucracy 
and the introduction of outsiders to become policy analysts. Even he 
recognizes, however, that, 'on the outside too the supply is thin ... 
The search will be difficult. Political executives are well advised to 
154 
draw on civil servants as much as possible' (p. 65 and 175). He 
believes, however, that the shortages could be overcome and policy 
analysts trained and developed as they were in the United States from 
the mid-1960s onwards. In the second edition of his book Meltsner 
(1986, p. 300) wrote: 'With its association, journal, schools, and an 
increasing membership, we should no longer refer to policy analysis as 
an emerging profession. It has emerged with a defined identity and is 
working towards standards of performance and practice. ' Most British 
advisers would not consider themselves to be policy analysts and this 
underlines the importance of examining what advisers currently do in the 
UK before consideration is given to possible reforms. 
155 
CHAPTER SM FUNCTIONS Of SPECIAL ADVISERS. 
SECTION Qj HOW THEY SPEND THEIR TIME. 
Given the diversity of reasons for appointment it is not surprising the 
functions of different advisers vary enormously. In the words of Ian 
Bancroft some special advisers are bit players, some scene shifters, and 
others 'fairly considerable actors in their own right. ' In the model of 
the potential place of special advisers it was suggested that a key 
feature was the flexibility advisers bring to the system, with their 
ability to occupy a number of possible positions and informally move 
along various channels of communication. The flexibility comes in 
several forms. Michael Dobbs, for example, argued how difficult it was 
for civil servants, who have to provide continuity and the same service 
for all ministers, to have the flexibility to cope with the unique 
demands of individual ministers. In some ways it can be more easily 
done by advisers. Furthermore, several advisers also provided added 
flexibility by each performing a range of functions, with certain 
activities being more important at one time than another. 
These general comments can be illustrated in various ways. Thus 
Butler claims the adviser possesses a, '"roving commission" - acting as 
cement in the brickwork, as an early warning system for departmental 
difficulties or political "banana skins", or as antennae for the 
minister, picking up gossip from the other special advisers and 
elsewhere' (p. 17). The unpredictable nature of the role was stressed 
by David Lipsey: 'It varied quite a bit as to what sort of thing one 
was doing... There were core elements to it like liaison with party 
committees and certain things just varied depending upon what was on. 
It was a question of filling in the gaps. ' Similarly Adam Ridley, with 
the concept of the adviser as a 'residual legatee', saw the functions of 
advisers such as himself fluctuating very widely. This point is 
reinforced by the comments of ministers, including Bill Rodgers, who 
stressed the importance of, 'the freewheeling nature of the individual' 
who was able to help out wherever the minister wished. Two sets of 
answers to the questionnaire are particularly relevant here. The 
findings from questions 15 (how frequently special advisers were in 
contact with various people) and 16 (how they spent their time) are 
156 
given in Tables 3 and 4. These answers give an overall picture and this 
was used to produce the list of functions given, in approximate order of 
importance, in Chapter 2. However, several activities that scored quite 
low were a major feature of some advisers' work. Briefing for Cabinet, 
for example, was not high in the list but, as noted earlier, for certain 
advisers it was important. 
In the following analysis, evidence from the questionnaires is 
interpreted alongside opinions expressed in interviews. When 
considering Table 3 it must be remembered that about one-fifth of the 
respondents, in both parties, were working only part time. This 
accounts for a percentage of the cases in which the adviser did not see 
the Cabinet minister, the private office or other civil servants on a 
daily basis. 
Half the advisers had contact with other ministers' advisers less 
frequently than weekly, and in some cases never. This underlines the 
extent to which, to use the words of Roger Darlington, many advisers 
thought the network of special advisers was, 'loose and inadequate'. 
The figures for contact with backbench MPs and with party officials are 
similar to one another and both reflect wide variations in the extent to 
which party liaison was seen as a function of special advisers. 
Reference has been made to Mark Schreiber's role in helping to carry 
into Government Tory Opposition thinking on the need for a CPRS. Apart 
from him only one other had more than spasmodic, if any, contact with 
the Think Tank. A few advisers reported that when working on specific 
issues they might be in contact with the CPRS. This finding accords 
well with the CPRS perspective of Blackstone and Plowden who conclude 
that although there could, 'be mutual benefits in communicating and 
occasionally cooperating ... Many members of the CPRS 
had little or 
nothing to do with political advisers of either main party' (1988, 
p. 68).. Although for some advisers contact with pressure groups was 
frequent, for the majority it was not significant. 
157 
TABLE L. Questionnaire Findings on Frequency of Contact with Various 
People - Percentage Response. 
15) Now frequent was your contact (either face-to-face or by telephone) 
with: 
Daily Several Weekly Less Never 
times a frequent 
week 
a) The cabinet minister 63 22 77 
b) Junior minister(s) 27 49 10 68 
c) Parliamentary private 
secretary 16 29 23 22 10 
d) The private office 82 12 330 
e) The permanent secretary 6 41 25 20 8 
f) Other civil servants 59 26 4 10 1 
y) Advisers in the PM's 
policy unit 12 9 23 40 16 
h) Advisers to other 
ministers 1 21 27 35 16 
i) Backbench MPs 1 27 27 27 18 
j) Party officials 4 26 26 25 19 
k) Members of the CPRS 202 35 61 
L) Members of relevant 
pressure groups 05 25 43 27 
m) Academics/other 
specialists 0 14 12 58 16 
n) Government whips 13 19 31 35 
o) Journalists 8 25 17 31 19 
TABLE 4: Questionnaire Findings on How Time was Spent - Percentage 
Response. 
16) What amount of time did you spend on the following aspects of your work. 
Substa Consid Moder Slight Insigni 
ntial erable ate ficant 
a) Examining papers on depart- 
mental matters going to the 35 40 19 33 
minister and briefing him 
on them. 
b) Preparing reports on 
policy on departmental 18 24 31 16 11 
matters. 
c) Chasing up the progress 
on implementing the 4 11 25 42 18 
minister's wishes. 
d) Preparing briefs on non- 
departmental agenda items 8 18 23 21 30 
for cabinet or cabinet 
committees. 
e) Attending meetings of 
all the politicians 11 22 40 12 15 
within the department. 
f) Corresponding with party 
MPs, officials etc. / 
attending party meetings/ 13 11 34 15 27 
receiving party deputations 
on behalf of the minister. 
g) Speech writing. 26 21 29 15 10 
h) Discussing issues with the 
minister. 31 35 24 10 0 
i) Attending meetings, visits, 
receiving deputations - 
other then party ones - 22 32 18 16 12 
with the minister on 
departmental business. 
j) Attending departmental 
meetings and receiving 
deputations - other 4 17 25 23 31 
than party ones - on 
behalf of the minister. 
k) Advising the minister on 
(and involvement with) the 
presentation of departmental 32 33 17 11 7 
policy and the minister's 
general views. 
Outside the department, journalists were the people with whom, on 
average, advisers had most frequent contact. This is consistent with 
'helping with presentation' being the reason for appointment cited most 
often as being substantial. It is perhaps surprising that contact with 
journalists was more frequent than that with party officials or advisers 
to other ministers. This degree of contact also indicates that for a 
number of advisers helping with presentation amounted to more than just 
speech writing. 
The pattern of frequency of contact with the listed categories was 
broadly similar for 1974-9 Labour advisers and 1979-87 Tories, but 
there were a few significant differences. Those correlate with findings 
from interviews and other tables. Interviews, for example, revealed 
even less collegial activity by Labour advisers than by Tories and the 
number of Tory advisers having weekly, or more frequent, contact with 
advisers to other ministers was almost twice as high (at 64 per cent) as 
for their Labour counterparts. Half the 1979-87 advisers had contact 
with party officials either daily or several times a week, whereas from 
1974-9 the figure was a fifth. This possibly reflects the importance of 
the CRD background in the recruitment of Tory advisers. Only 15 per 
cent of Labour advisers, as opposed to 54 per cent of Conseravtives, had 
contact with Government Whips weekly or more frequently. This again 
partly reflects the greater importance of the party liaison role for 
Tory advisers and correlates with their spending a greater proportion of 
their time in prayer meetings, i. e. gatherings of all the politicians 
attached to the department, and which, for Tories at least, often 
included the relevant Whip. The same factor may partially explain why 
at 41 per cent the figure for daily contact with junior ministers was 
over twice as high for Conservatives as for Labour. 
Before examining how advisers spent their time it might be useful 
to list Harold Wilson's seven examples of advisers' roles in his 1975 
Statement on Political Advisers (1976, pp. 203-4): 
158 
1) A 'sieve' 
2) A 'deviller' 
3) Medium - and long-term planning 
4) Contributions to policy planning within departments 
5) Liaison with the Party 
6) Outside interest groups 
7) Speech writing and research 
In the questionnaire, and interviews, an attempt was made to examine in 
rather more detail how advisers spent their time. Often there was not 
much difference between the pattern of responses from the two main sets 
of advisers. Examining submissions to the minister and briefing him, 
16a), was the major way in which many advisers spent their time. 
Several advisers thought 'commenting' a more appropriate term than 
briefing. There was no consistent pattern as to how advisers received 
submissions. A few of the senior advisers achieved the position of 
having material routed through them. Roy Hattersley regarded Maurice 
Peston as playing almost a deputy secretary role. Many advisers, 
however, received copies of submissions from civil servants - especially 
after a working pattern had been established. Thomas Brimelow argued 
that not only can political advisers never cover the whole field but, 
also, especially in Foreign Affairs, issues come up unexpectedly. 
Therefore, the department has to know when to alert the political 
adviser to take an interest in development X. The general rule towards 
Tom McNally was, 'be helpful to the man'. McNally saw the situation 
similarly and thought the secret for the political adviser, 'is to make 
sure that there is an understanding that he or she sees all the key 
papers. ' In some departments guidelines were issued indicating the area 
of particular interest to the adviser(s). 
Where a strong relationship developed with the private secretary he 
made sure the adviser saw copies of any submission not copied to him on 
which, as private secretary, he knew the minister would value the 
adviser's comments. Several advisers, again especially those with a 
close relationship with the private office, looked through the 
minister's box and read anything they thought they ought to see. 
Advisers such as John Cope, John Harris (at the Home Office and the 
Treasury), and Miles Hudson, who sat in the private office, saw things 
159 
as they went through. Sometimes ministers asked advisers to read and 
comment on a particular submission. 
The type of comments made were often political. In this way the 
adviser was carrying out the 'mine detector' role that even such an 
experienced politician as Jim Callaghan told Tom McNally he wanted from 
him. Some ministers also expected advisers to comment on what the party 
had said about the subject dealt with in the submission. Bringing the 
two points together, and linking with one of the reasons he gave for 
appointing advisers, David Ennals said that Mike Hartley-Brewer reminded 
him where the party stood or the political implications missed by the 
civil servants and, 'he sniffed out potential trouble and traps. ' 
Hartley-Brewer was one of the advisers who spent more time on examining 
submissions and briefing than on any other activity. A good example of 
how an adviser could make political comments on submissions, and 
consequently have some impact on the policy, came from John Houston. 
Over many months he criticized the lack of awareness, in the Foreign 
Office submissions, of the public's concern about the failure of foreign 
diplomats to pay parking fines. His role was recognized in a newspaper 
profile of Geoffrey Howe which claimed that Houston, 'gives him advice 
the Foreign Office does not always relish. It was Houston, for example, 
who argued that the political advantage of punishing foreign diplomats 
stationed in London who refuse to pay their parking fines outweighed the 
risk of retaliation against British diplomats abroad' (unday Times, 6 
April 1986). 
Advisers also made more substantive comments, largely depending on 
the extent to which they were specialists. This was taken to 
exceptionally detailed lengths by Stuart Sexton at the DES who acted as 
a first filter for all the proposals for Section 12 and 13 
reorganizations, under the 1980 Education Act, of schools within a Local 
Education Authority (LEA). He not only read the large reports but sometimes 
also talked to officials in central and local government before producing 
a two to three page memorandum for the junior minister who commented on 
the reports before they went to the Secretary of State. 
160 
Many advisers commented on only a small proportion of the papers 
they saw. Nevertheless, as Chapter 4 revealed, ministers often thought 
it was of great value to have somebody independent of the department, 
and politically committed and aware, to go through submissions. In this 
way the adviser was acting in the 'sieve' role described by Harold 
Wilson: 'a "sieve" examining papers as they go to Ministers, drawing 
attention to problems and difficulties, especially ones having Party 
political implications or electoral considerations, and looking for 
"landmines" - especially in politically sensitive areas' (1976, p. 203). 
Some advisers, for example John Cope, stressed that the type of 
political comment made covered more than just potential landmines: 
if there was some political initiative that I thought could be 
taken, or insufficient being made of something politically, or 
political danger in some proposed course of action, or a 
political element in a choice between options, then I could 
add my pennyworth to the advice that was going to the 
minister. 
Time spent by advisers on reading submissions was necessary not 
only for them to be able to brief the minister, but also to enable them 
to fulfil other roles, including more generally discussing issues with 
the minister and helping with presentation. If he was to be 'on top of 
things for the following day' Roger Liddle worked most evenings from 
10.00 p. m. to 1.00 a. m. reading both departmental submissions and papers 
for Cabinet and its committees, and writing briefs. Even so he had to 
be selective and decide what was politically important. He claimed 
that, 'as time went on I got a better sense of when you should do a 
written brief and when you should just have a word. ' 
Briefings or comments from advisers could be made in a variety of 
ways: in discussions between the adviser and the minister or ministerial 
team; in meetings with the minister and officials; and on paper. A few 
advisers, including Jeffrey Sterling, rarely put things on paper. Ann 
Carlton consistently discussed points with Tony Crosland and John Silldn 
but met with disapproval early on at the DoE. A permanent secretary 
told her she 'was an unsatisfactory special adviser. ' In explanation he 
said, 'you don't put things in writing and Mr Lipsey is so much better 
and puts everything in writing. ' 
161 
One reason why many advisers, including Liddle, preferred to 
produce written briefs was so that they could copy them round the 
department. According to Liddle, and others, copying minutes was 
important, 'in terms of maintaining good relations with officials. What 
they don't like is the thought of you secretly getting the minister on 
his own and giving him lots of steers away from what's being said 
without them being in a position to challenge what you're saying. ' 
Similar points were made by David Cowling and both of them gave credit 
to Jack Straw at the DoE for suggesting the best way to behave as an 
adviser. Straw and others also saw it as enlightened self interest to 
copy round: 'it was a two way process. What is the point of not copying 
if they had an interest in it and they copied stuff to me? ' When Straw 
started in the DHSS the pattern of keeping officials informed was set by 
the experienced adviser, Brian Abel-Smith. In his opinion, 'it didn't 
matter what you said as long as you said it in writing and they got a 
copy. ' Not only was this good for officials and the adviser but also it 
was 'good for the Secretary of State for the officials to think out what 
the difficulties were in what the adviser was proposing. ' 
Many others stressed the importance of officials being consulted 
and warned in advance so that, in the words of Adam Ridley, 'they had a 
chance to stop us doing something disruptive out of ignorance or 
misjudgment. ' Quite apart from these arguments for not going behind the 
civil servants' backs, Miles Hudson felt, 'it's not the way Alec would 
like to carry on. ' A few ministers took a contrary view. Thus Tony 
Benn stated, 'I would not expect special advisers to give copies of 
briefs supplied to me to the civil servants. They had no responsibility 
to the department, the responsibility was to the minister. ' Often it 
was difficult to make an absolute rule covering all situations. Jim 
Prior said he would generally 'expect them to circularize anything ... 
but they might then write me a very private note saying, for example, "I 
think you ought to be saying such and such a thing but I know that X 
civil servant will not like it. " 
162 
Where there was a group of advisers they would sometimes copy their 
comments to each other, although each of them, such as those in the DHSS 
under Labour, or in the Treasury under the Tories, tended to specialize 
on certain topics or activities. Paul Chapman, however, the first 
assistant recruited by Abel-Smith, worked mostly to him rather than 
sending material to the Secretary of State. 
Whereas in question 16a) the emphasis is on reacting to 
departmental submissions, the focus in 16b), the preparation of policy 
reports, is on the proactive function of advisers. The distinction is 
not always clear cut. Sometimes an adviser produced a policy report in 
response to a departmental submission; at other times when briefing on a 
submission an adviser developed alternatives and went beyond the 
reactive mode. Nevertheless, most advisers spent less time on writing 
policy reports than on reading submissions and briefing the minister. 
Some reports took the form of 'think' pieces; others developed the 
party's election commitments. Oliver Letwin claimed that his main role 
at the DES, working with Stuart Sexton, was to develop workable 
solutions to the obstacles confronting the introduction of educational 
vouchers. He was, 'constantly writing papers to Sir Keith, copied to 
officials, saying, "officials have identified this problem, let us deal 
with it this way. "' The officials would knock his ideas down and he 
would keep trying something else in a process described by Halcrow 
(1989, p. 173) as a 'stately quadrille'. Heseltine gave Tom Baron major 
problems to examine, and he produced reports containing proposed 
solutions. Sometimes advisers produced reports following meetings with 
groups or visits either domestically (for example, David Coleman) or 
abroad (for example, David Stephen who was able to make some trips, such 
as to Namibia, to report on the SWAPO guerilla campaign, which would 
have been more difficult for somebody with a formal position). 
Specialist advisers who had helped develop policy in Opposition were 
well placed to produce substantial reports detailing proposals to 
implement the policy once the party was in power. 
Various other occasions give advisers a greater opportunity to do 
long-term thinking and produce proactive papers. Sometimes when a new 
minister takes over in a department he welcomes fresh thinking. When 
Leon Brittan became Home Secretary in 1983 Robin Harris put in several 
163 
long papers on the review of the criminal justice system. Frances 
Morrell and Francis Cripps produced various policy papers for Tony Benn 
but a particularly important one came some months after they moved to 
the Department of Energy. Sometimes the ministers, senior officials and 
special advisers of a department spent several days - perhaps at 
Sunningdale in September - considering the strategy of the department. 
Certain advisers, including David Metcalf, produced papers for such 
meetings. 
There were two views as to when proactive reports should be copied 
to civil servants. Some advisers and ministers felt it was 
inappropriate for the department to receive, and perhaps work on, policy 
proposals that did not have the minister's approval. Others thought 
that officials should have the opportunity to examine anything that went 
to the minister. 
Although the term 'report' is not quite appropriate to describe 
White and Green Papers and Circulars, a number of special advisers 
played a part in drafting them that went far beyond examining and 
commenting on departmental drafts. A good example, to be examined in 
detail later, is the work of Anthony Lester and Angela Byre on the Sex 
Discrimination White Paper of 1974, EQuality &I Women (Cmnd. 5724). 
Work on White and Green Papers was included by some advisers as part of 
their involvement in helping ministers with presentation. Again, 
however, Jim Prior demonstrates the difficulty in drawing a precise line 
around advisers' roles. Commenting on the work of his advisers on Green 
and White Papers at both Employment and the NIO he said, 'it would be a 
little bit more drafting and presentation than it would be substance but 
I wouldn't say there was no impact on substance, because there was. ' 
Sometimes advisers played an important role in producing Green Papers or 
other policy statements which then got over taken by events, such as 
electoral defeat; advisers could sometimes play a substantial role in 
writing statements which civil servants felt uneasy about handling. 
Stella Greenall wrote much of the Orange Paper, Progins in Education 
(DES, 1979), which reviewed the Labour Government's achievements and 
plans in Education. 
164 
Although Wilson included the role of acting 'as a "deviller" 
chasing up Ministerial wishes', in his list of possible functions, this 
was not something on which many advisers spent much time. The role of 
the private office helps explain why this activity was not important for 
most advisers. Advisers, including Jack Straw, realized that the formal 
relationship between the minister and the department was best left to 
the private office. Straw agreed, however, he had a role: 'I might 
say to Barbara, "Look, I think, you really ought to cause a fuss about 
the fact that this hasn't come out; you haven't had a submission on 
this. " And Barbara would say, "OK, tell Norman [Warner]", or she would 
say to Norman, "I think we ought to do something about that. "' 
Preparing briefs on non-departmental matters arising in Cabinet 
(question 16d) did not occupy any time for a third of the special 
advisers. As noted this was a less important reason for appointment for 
Tories, especially after 1980. From his investigations Alastair Ross 
Goobey reported in interview that he had concluded Labour special 
advisers, 'felt that most of their time was spent on Cabinet warfare of 
one sort or another. ' There was rivalry even amongst those who were 
allies in Cabinet. As Bill Rodgers suggested, ministers wanted to be 
more effective in Cabinet than even those of their colleagues who were 
friends. The proportion of advisers who spent a substantial or 
considerable time on briefing for Cabinet was twice as high, at one 
third, for Labour as for Conservative. 
Opinions differed about the Cabinet agenda items with which it was 
appropriate for advisers to become involved. Question 16d) referred to 
briefing for non-departmental matters, but some advisers were also, or 
primarily, involved in preparing briefs and speaking notes for ministers 
on departmental issues. This became a tradition in the DHSS team under 
Labour, with Brian Abel-Smith describing it as condensing what the 
officials had written into either a speaking form that was most likely 
to convince Cabinet or something that Barbara Castle could modify. 
These advisers were heavily involved in briefing during the Public 
Expenditure Survey Committee (PESC) round of discussions, including 
those in Cabinet. Some advisers also played a role in canvassing 
support for their minister's line by briefing other ministers' advisers. 
Jeffrey Sterling's role was exceptional because according to a BBC 
165 
profile he sat 'on two secret Cabinet committees, one on broadcasting 
and the other on privatisation' (Fryer, 1989). At both Industry and 
Energy Tony Benn was also unusual in using his advisers to write papers 
for Cabinet and its committees. Their role in the disputes over nuclear 
reactors was particularly controversial and is chronicled in detail by 
Sedgemore (1980) and in Benn's Diaries (1989, and 1990). 
More frequently advisers were used to brief ministers on non- 
departmental issues. Again Tony Benn is a prime example with the 
economist Francis Cripps saying that, in practice, his main job was 'to 
do research and write the papers to expose Treasury questions from a 
non-Treasury minister's point of view in Cabinet'. Other economists who 
spent much of their time on this included Joan Mitchell, Michael 
Stewart, David Metcalf, and - once he became adviser to Lord Cowrie - 
Adam Ridley. Some of the other advisers who briefed their ministers 
more generally on non-departmental issues included John Lyttle and Vicky 
Kidd, who spent most of her time doing this. The range of activities 
that could be involved in the Cabinet briefing role are well illustrated 
by Rob Shepherd. Jim Prior explained that not only might Shepherd give 
him an independent brief on some issues, but he might also approach 
people suggested by Prior - especially economists - to discuss the 
issues in general terms without letting on it was coming up in Cabinet. 
Shepherd could in addition make a political input in the briefings and 
on one occasion obtained the election addresses of several ministers, 
thus arming Prior for a Cabinet battle (described in Prior, 1986) in 
which he was able to help defeat a proposed benefit cut by pointing out 
that the ministers had promised to maintain its value. 
The procedure adopted by some ministers was to select the non- 
departmental topics on which they wanted briefing. Other ministers let 
the advisers take the initiative; sometimes a mixture of approaches was 
used. . 
Some advisers provided a comment on virtually anything, others, 
including Anthony Lester, concentrated on non-departmental matters 
within their knowledge and competence. Some ministers expected that the 
adviser would contact other advisers - especially in the lead department 
- when preparing a brief. The extent to which this occurred was less 
than several ministers seemed to assume. 
166 
Question 16e) caused some difficulty. Certain advisers reported 
that they attended all of the prayer meetings, but that they did not 
occupy much time. These meetings tended to be more frequently held by 
Tory ministers and, at 45 per cent, the proportion of Tory advisers who 
spent a substantial or considerable time on them was twice that of 
Labour. As noted, the Conservatives were more inclined to include other 
political figures; often the relevant Whip, the PPS and the CRD desk 
officer attended at least some of these meetings. 
In some cases, most noticeably the Treasury since 1979, these 
meetings have been significant, lasting anything from half an hour to 
over an hour, and advisers played a full part. No civil servant was 
present at Treasury prayer meetings and it was the responsibility of an 
adviser to produce minutes reflecting as much as the Chancellor wished 
to be reported. Practice elsewhere varied widely: some advisers, 
including Peter Davis, told the private secretary what had happened 
rather than producing any minutes; as private secretary, Norman Warner 
attended the DHSS meetings but Jack Straw wrote the minutes; in other 
departments, including the Home Office, the private secretary made the 
record. Sometimes advisers were given work to do arising from the 
meetings. Thus not only did John Cope minute the DTI meetings but he 
was also left with the action column, and particularly if one of the 
numerous ministers in the department was not there, Cope had to inform 
him of relevant matters or discuss them. David Townsend reported that it 
was at the DHSS meetings that it was sometimes decided an adviser would 
do something for a junior minister. In some departments, including the 
Treasury, they were held first thing in the morning, but in others, 
including the DHSS under Mrs Castle, they were at lunchtimes. Some 
ministers preferred ad hi& meetings. 
Party liaison, 16f), did not occupy any time for over a quarter of 
special, advisers. Again there is a party difference, with three times 
as many Tory advisers (42 per cent) spending a substantial or 
considerable time on it as Labour. In both parties the largest response 
was in the moderate category. This is perhaps surprising given the way 
this activity has almost become synonymous with special advisers. There 
are several possible explanations. First, as Edward Bickham argued, it 
was important but did not occupy much time, typically consisting of four 
167 
or five telephone calls a day to Central Office. Second, to be in a 
position to conduct at least some of this work, the adviser must spend 
time on other activities including reading submissions and attending 
departmental meetings. Third, political liaison is often an activity 
which civil servants would not perform and, therefore, it is more 
clearly identified as a 'special adviser's function'. These final two 
points illustrate the model developed of an adviser as somebody, 'in the 
know', who is close to the overloaded minister and able to operate, 
often informally, on his behalf along various channels of communication. 
Therefore, in the words of Adam Ridley, 'the adviser is uniquely well 
placed to act as a channel of communications, if he is reliable and 
trusted. ' 
A variety of activities, some of them unglamorous chores, 
contribute towards party liaison. Some, according to Coleman, 'are 
potentially important, others astonishingly trivial' (1991, p. 422). 
Overall, despite overlaps, these matters can be split into two 
categories. Many of them related to the minister's departmental 
responsibilities; but to varying degrees ministers also wanted help in 
liaison for their wider political role. The many aspects of party 
liaison on departmental issues include letters, telephone calls and 
meetings with a wide range of people and groups. Some advisers helped 
with letters - especially political ones, including those from MPs and 
party supporters. This activity, which a few advisers regarded as the 
bane of their lives, could involve: replying on behalf of the minister; 
drafting replies for ministers; drafting paragraphs to be used in 
standard replies written by officials; and/or checking civil servants' 
drafts. 
Some Labour advisers, including Ann Carlton and Elizabeth Thomas, 
who was working for the Leader of the House, liaised with backbenchers. 
However, Tories did this more frequently. By virtue of their research 
role in Opposition, advisers from both parties such as Carlton, Miles 
Hudson, Adam Ridley, and Stuart Sexton had developed close links with 
MPs particularly interested in their field. Sometimes advisers, for 
example Hudson, approached backbenchers to find out what was behind 
particular Parliamentary Questions. Where advisers were well known to 
them, backbenchers might contact the adviser on a point, knowing it 
168 
would be easier to get through to them than to the minister. Whilst 
some Tory advisers attended the weekly meeting of the relevant backbench 
committee, a CRD official would be present to take the minutes and 
report back. One adviser, therefore, felt that some of his colleagues, 
'used to go to those meetings because they wanted to get personally 
known to as many MPs as possible. ' 
Generally advisers spent more time on liaison with party offices 
than with MPs, but according to a Labour official, 'there was no 
coherence in approach between ministers and us - it depended on the 
personality of ministers and advisers. ' In the two parties the liaison 
worked both ways between advisers and party headquarters. Chris Butler 
was one of several advisers to refer to themselves as 'lightning 
conductors' between the minister and the party structure, often dealing 
with minor matters without these having to go to the minister. For 
post-1979 Tory advisers who had worked in the CRD, it was natural to 
have links with party officials. One role played by Tory advisers, 
which was particularly important in the Treasury, was preparing the 
Central Office briefing for backbenchers before major debates. Several 
Labour advisers, including Brian Abel-Smith, Tony Lynes and Stella 
Greenall, were members of sub-committees of the NEC prior to becoming 
advisers. Many others involved themselves in the work of committees 
relevant to their minister's department in a way that the minister did 
not have time, or in a few cases the inclination, to do. They saw their 
role as being to inform, explain and, where necessary, defend the views 
and policies of each to the other, though most gave priority to the 
policies of their minister and the Government. Tom McNally went from 
being International Secretary of the Labour Party to being adviser at 
the Foreign Office and attended all the meetings of the International 
Committee of the Labour Party until they asked him to stop: 
I attended as an observer but I think it was because I spoke 
too much ... and some of them felt I was being used as an understudy and this was beneath their dignity ... The original intention was that Jim Callaghan would attend all meetings of 
the party's International Committee but it became less and 
less realistic for the Foreign Secretary to be present. 
169 
Some advisers met party groups on behalf of the minister. Obviously 
care was needed not to offend people who thought they should see the 
minister. A good example of how the adviser could operate was given by 
David Owen. He met pressure groups and party groups concerned with 
human rights in particular countries the first time they requested a 
meeting. Thereafter, he suggested if the group wished to contact him 
their usual route should be via David Stephen, his special adviser and 
an expert in human rights issues with particularly good links with Latin 
America. 
Often advisers were used to gather information or as messengers, 
possibly either at the minister's request or because party people would 
contact the advisers - sometimes if they could not get through to the 
minister. Such an 'intelligence gathering service', as Bill Rodgers 
called it, was frequently important for ministers who had to deal with 
local councillors. Consequently, most advisers working in the DoE, 
including David Lipsey and Peter Davis, were amongst those who regarded 
this as being one of their major occupations. Chris Mockler, also at 
Environment, said it is 'not the job of special advisers to tell 
ministers the facts of life on politics ... but there 
is quite a lot of 
information in circulation which they need someone to assess the 
importance of, or judge, and bring to their attention if need be, and 
to liaise with Central Office very closely and with councillors. ' 
Advisers were well placed to gather information that could be useful in 
negotiations and also to talk to leaders of minority groups on 
councils. 
Liaison with the Welsh and Scottish parties played a part in some 
advisers' work - including two at the Welsh Office. Gwilym Prys-Davies 
regularly discussed issues with the Secretary of the Welsh Labour Party, 
and for Chris Butler the Welsh Conservative MPs formed a distinct group, 
with which he thought it important to remain in close contact. Part of 
Vicky Kidd's work for Ted Short, minister with responsibility for 
devolution, involved attending Scottish Labour Party and Trade Union 
meetings and conferences: 'I was sent off as his eyes and ears to come 
back and prepare a report. ' 
170 
Many ministers travelled the country on trips combining 
departmental and party meetings. Such trips were particularly common for 
ministers dealing with local government and the arrangements especially 
complex, because, for example, the adviser might be involved in helping 
the private office arrange which of the party's councillors in the town 
visited should be invited to meet the minister on the official part of 
his trip. Certain advisers, for example David Lipsey, assisted with the 
arrangements for party trips, or the political elements of official 
visits. This is moving into the field of assisting the minister with 
party liaison in his general political activities. 
For ministers on Labour's main NEC there was considerable scope to 
use advisers to make arrangements, liaise, and provide briefing. Thus 
Banks and Margaret Beckett said that the party liaison work they did for 
Judith Hart involved her wider role on the NEC in addition to ODM 
issues. The two elements of party liaison were seen perhaps most 
clearly in the work of Shirley Williams's advisers. Whereas Stella 
Greenall continued her membership of the Education Sub-committee of the 
NEC, and was asked by Hugh Jenkins (now Lord Jenkins of Putney), 
Minister for the Arts, to attend the Arts Sub-committee as well, John 
Lyttle spent much time liaising on general political issues. This went 
far wider than just NEC liaison. There was close contact with Roger 
Liddle who, in turn, spent considerable time, 'being the link man 
between Bill Rodgers and our faction. ' This entailed organizational 
work within the Manifesto Group of Labour MPs and the extra 
parliamentary, Campaign for Labour Party Victory. A similar function 
had earlier been performed by Matthew Oakeshott, according to whom the 
Jenkinsites, 'were quite a close knit group'; in keeping in touch with 
them he was continuing a role he had played in Opposition. The MPs 
concerned were not necessarily particularly interested in Home Affairs, 
but rather were the pro-European group. Oakeshott conducted much 
liaison with Brussels, especially with the cabin of George Thompson 
(now Lord Thompson of Monifieth), and was heavily involved in the 
referendum campaign. On the other side in that campaign Frances 
Morrell, Tony Banks and Jack Straw were called 'our permanent officials' 
by Tony Benn (1989, p. 363). Benn's Diaries not only record the 
considerable role of Morrell in that campaign but also her work for Benn 
in the 1976 leadership contest. Similarly Jim Callaghan relates how 
171 
three of his former PPSs 'rallied at once and with Tom McNally, my 
Political Adviser, formed a small inner team to conduct the contest on 
my behalf (p. 392). The delicate nature of some of this political 
activity was demonstrated in a minute from Harold Wilson which, 
according to Darlington, stated that advisers should not be involved in 
the leadership campaign. 
Speech writing, 16g), was a major occupation for almost half the 
advisers. There was a marked party difference in the proportion of 
advisers spending substantial time on this - Labour 11 per cent, Tory 45 
per cent. However, the most striking distinction was between advisers 
appointed after 1980, and the rest. Of the former, 55 per cent spent a 
substantial time on speech writing as against 22 per cent (two out of 
nine) of those appointed in 1979-80. This correlates both with the 
analysis of the figures on reasons for appointment and the statements 
quoted earlier from Patrick Jenkin about the development of the system. 
Some of his advisers, including Stephen Sherbourne and Christopher 
Mockler, were among those who spent most time on speech writing. Others 
for whom it was a major occupation included Home Office advisers Edward 
Bickham, David Coleman, and Robin Harris. Brendon Sewill estimated that 
three quarters of his typed output consisted of speeches and briefing 
for broadcasts. For some advisers, reading submissions and attending 
meetings was primarily essential background work for this activity, but 
Treasury advisers found that presentational work could give them a 
reason for having good access to, for example, budget discussions and 
for others, including Edward Bickham, it provided a 'justification for 
dabbling in more things than otherwise might have been possible. ' 
Bickham thought it was impossible to divorce the substance of policy 
from its presentation: 
If you are trying to build a strategy and framework within 
which to present policy you have to have regard to the merits 
and the detail of that policy. Although I tended to play 
quite a large part in the writing of speeches and had a 
general public relations role I would also usually attend all 
his [Douglas Hurd's] substantive policy meetings and aim to 
make a contribution. 
172 
Some advisers had to have a row with the department to establish 
that they were not going to spend all their time on speech writing, and 
others were unhappy at the extent to which they spent longer than 
anticipated on, to quote one, 'the wretched speech writing business, 
which is a bug bear of a whole host of special advisers. ' The tension 
is perhaps best illustrated by the department in which officials were 
told that advisers would occasionally prepare major speeches, but speech 
writing was not a major part of their work; nevertheless, they wanted to 
see copies of all draft outlines and full draft speeches, and would 
advise on the proposed content of speeches and on presentational aspects 
of particular occasions. 
This illustrates some of the many ways advisers contributed to 
speeches. Sometimes they produced the first draft, especially for party 
political speeches. On other occasions they commented on, or redrafted, 
speeches prepared by civil servants. This was at the request of the 
minister or as a result of officials copying speeches to the adviser. A 
few advisers, including Mockler, had prime responsibility for the full 
range of the minister's speeches outside the House of Commons once he 
had made it clear what he wished to talk about. For others, such as 
Brian Abel-Smith, it came to be accepted that they would coordinate the 
speeches. For a general speech on the National Health Service (NHS) 
this might include taking various contributions in different styles from 
the civil servants and rewriting them to provide a common style, 
memorable phrases, an introduction and conclusion as well as finding the 
basis of a press handout in it. 
Many other advisers were responsible for inserting political 
paragraphs into departmental speeches. Often there was close liaison, 
with civil servants and adviser usually recognizing that it was 
important that anything relating to the minister's departmental 
responsibilities should be checked by officials. However, for Jim 
Callaghan's first major speech, as Foreign Secretary, to European 
ministers, Tom McNally was asked to prepare a text based on the party's 
manifesto; it was not well received in some quarters. The requirements 
of ministers, and their degree of involvement, varied widely. Some 
preferred to speak from brief notes and the adviser's role was to 
discuss the main themes for the speech. Others, or the same minister on 
173 
other occasions, wanted detailed drafts which they might read and return 
for alteration, until they were satisfied. Advisers also sometimes took 
part in discussions of the themes the minister should develop in 
speeches over the coming months. 
Two thirds of advisers claimed to spend a major part of their time 
discussing issues with the minister (question 16h). The interview 
evidence suggests some have possibly exaggerated the time spent on this 
role. This might reflect the importance they attached to it and also 
indicate an overlap with other functions. Nevertheless, it was clearly 
the most important activity for Ray Richardson about whom Harold Lever 
said, 'his main role was to discuss issues with me but Ray won 
considerable respect at the Treasury and he often discussed matters in 
detail with Treasury officials. He had a cooperative, not combatative, 
relationship with them. ' If the adviser had a set time for seeing the 
minister it was usually first thing in the morning or in the early 
evening. Sometimes discussions between a minister and his adviser were 
related to specific issues, including presentation and policy decisions, 
but for many ministers the adviser was a confidant with whom he could 
hold wide-ranging discussions. This is well illustrated by Tony Benn's 
Diary entry for 18 February 1975: 'I talked to Frances Morrell about all 
sorts of things' (1989). When interviewed Benn agreed with the comment 
of Morrell, that advisers attempted to help form a 'political community' 
around the minister. For other advisers, including Brendon Sewill, the 
wide ranging early evening chats were often an opportunity to review the 
day's events or decisions over whisky. 
How far the private secretary was a party to discussions between 
the minister and his advisers varied. Some ministers had a small group 
of confidants, often including special advisers, private secretaries and 
the chief information officer. Some referred to them as a cabin , or a 
'mafia'. Various advisers, including several who worked for Nigel 
Lawson, saw their role in discussing issues as being one voice amongst 
several in a central core around the minister. Thus during some crisis 
weeks Howard Davies referred to being part of 'a sort of rolling 
meeting', and at Energy, Lynda Rouse said that at 'meetings with Mr 
Lawson at 6.30 or 7.00 in the evening, when the whisky was out, it would 
be the chief press officer, the private secretary and me. ' In other 
174 
instances where ministers, including John Silkin and Roy Hattersley, 
spent time talking things over with a close-knit group, the advisers 
would, in addition, have frequent opportunities for private discussion 
with the minister and there was more scope for playing an aide/confidant 
role. 
Discussing issues with the minister overlaps with 16i), attending 
meetings, visits and receiving deputations with him - another major way 
in which advisers spent their time. They generally had free access to 
departmental meetings with the minister, sometimes choosing which to 
attend and at other times being requested by him to appear. Where there 
was a team of advisers, for example in the Treasury after 1979, some 
meetings including budget ones, might be attended by more than one 
adviser. Rob Shepherd and Stuart Sexton are amongst those advisers who 
said that their ministers deliberately brought them into the 
discussion at some meetings. Other ministers, including Tony Crosland 
and Merlyn Rees, did not expect their 'chocolate soldier' (i. e. former 
Rowntree funded research assistant) to start arguing on substantive 
points with senior officials. Irrespective of how involved they had 
been in the discussion, some advisers, including David Lipsey, Elizabeth 
Thomas, and John Whittingdale, frequently remained with the minister 
after meetings to consider the decision, the politics involved, and/or 
how it should be presented. How far advisers were invited to meetings 
between the minister and other Cabinet ministers, or distinguished 
guests from outside the department, varied but could be controversial. 
Ministers who travelled extensively often took advisers along. 
This could be domestically, for example Ken Griffin accompanied Tony 
Benn, when he was at Industry, on industrial visits including his 
meetings with workers. It was particularly important for ministers with 
many overseas visits and negotiations. Several Foreign Secretaries took 
advisers with them, including Alec Douglas Home who was accompanied by 
Miles Hudson to Rhodesia where he would be 'the sort of fellow on whom 
you could sharpen your wits'. Ann Carlton was regularly in Brussels as 
part of John Silkin's team when he was Minister of Agriculture and Tony 
Banks, Margaret Jackson, and Maggie Sidgreaves all, at different times, 
accompanied Judith Hart on trips, or to negotiations in Brussels or for 
the Lome Convention. On such occasions the adviser could act as a 
175 
sounding board and provide an immediate opinion about the likely 
political reaction to the negotiating position and also be, in the words 
of Judith Hart, 'someone to blow one's top to. ' Furthermore, in the 
case of Carlton, the adviser was able to get points out of the 
negotiations to people such as the fishermen for an instant reaction. 
Since 1979 there have been much greater restraints on the foreign travel 
of advisers. 
Question 16j) proved to be ambiguous. A few advisers thought they 
had done things 'on behalf of the minister' including: attending 
departmental meetings; receiving deputations; presenting conference 
papers; and talking to pressure groups. David Coleman, for example, was 
sometimes asked to 'field' groups, especially on the political side, who 
wished to see the minister when he was particularly busy and, according 
to John Patten, Coleman sometimes, 'spoke at conferences, as it were, 
with my voice. ' The account by Edwards al. (1989, p. 36) of Sexton's 
role in promoting the Assisted Places Scheme illustrates how this 
activity could be seen as an exception that proves the rule: 'far from 
remaining discreetly in the background, as political advisers were 
generally expected to do, he appeared increasingly as a public spokesman 
of the Party's commitment, often deputising for Carlisle at official 
functions both before and after the Election. ' 
Generally the response to this question was low, partly reflecting 
the ambiguity of the phrase 'on behalf of - especially in relation to 
advisers whose status is somewhat unofficial. Only rarely did advisers 
attend departmental meetings or receive groups in a clearly deputizing 
role for the minister who would normally have been expected to do it. 
Some advisers attended departmental meetings, but they were generally 
ones the minister would not have expected to attend because of lack of 
time and/or it would have been inappropriate. This was a method by 
which some advisers fulfilled the 'eyes and ears' role, although it was 
sometimes made clear to them that they should not immediately report 
everything to ministers before the department was ready to present its 
submission. How far advisers' attendance at departmental meetings could 
be interpreted as being on behalf of ministers varied. In one sense 
virtually everything done by most advisers, as personal appointees, 
could be thought of as being on behalf of their masters. Sometimes, 
176 
however, ministers explicitly stated that advisers, including Sexton and 
Anthony Lester, had a specific brief to work alongside officials on the 
production of White Papers and plans for legislation. Some acted in a 
liaison capacity for the minister with the department's Planning Unit 
and sometimes advisers were asked to represent the minister on a 
departmental working group. 
On other occasions advisers attended departmental meetings on a 
more ad lid basis, or even at the request of civil servants. Several 
permanent secretaries invited advisers to the permanent secretary's 
policy group meetings with deputy secretaries, at which they examined 
the policies being developed. In explaining to colleagues why he 
intended to ask Michael Portillo to the permanent secretary's steering 
committee in the Department of Energy, Sir Donald Maitland 
argued that it would be very much better for the political 
adviser, who was an utterly discreet person, to hear our 
discussions and how it was we decided on our advice. I thought 
he would be an ally if he had taken part in the discussions, 
and felt able to subscribe to the advice we were offering. 
Alternatively, if we were going off the political rails, he 
would be able to alert us. 
Ann Carlton and Maggie Sidgreaves attended the meetings at MAFF and 
ODM respectively and Derek Scott, Denis Healey's adviser in the late 
1970s, attended the equivalent meeting in the Treasury, called the 
Policy Coordinating Committee. George Cardona (1981), one of his Tory 
successors, thought it a pity they did not go to it. 
Aspects of the independent work of advisers within departments on 
behalf of their ministers are both complex and controversial. Thus, on 
advisers attending interdepartmental official committees, Mitchell 
wrote: 'Harold Wilson says firmly they do not. This is not literally 
so, occasionally they have done so, but only at lower working party 
levels. ' (1978, p. 95). Mitchell, for example, attended some 
interdepartmental meetings on energy pricing by nationalized industries, 
and advisers from other departments were present. Anthony Lester was a 
member of two interdepartmental committees - on nationality and on the 
legal protection of human rights. Advisers were officially encouraged 
to join in departmental deliberations on matters being prepared for 
submission to the ministers. 
177 
A further reason why many advisers replied that they spent only a 
slight or insignificant amount of time acting on behalf of their 
minister was because the question referred to departmental meetings. 
Many spent more time tallcing to officials on an informal basis than they 
did at formal departmental meetings. An adviser such as Brian Abel- 
Smith argued that he was too busy to spend perhaps three hours at an 
official meeting. Rather, he would wait for a copy of the submission 
and spend an hour or so commenting on it, informally discussing the 
issue with officials when necessary. 
Sometimes a minister asked his adviser to talk to a civil servant 
and perhaps explain the minister's thinking on a particular issue or his 
comments on a submission. Geoffrey Howe requested Adam Ridley to do 
this a number of times and Norman lamont stated, 'if I am uneasy about 
something I might ask a political adviser to think about it and discuss 
it further with the department. ' Occasionally ministers asked officials 
to talk to the adviser for a fuller explanation of the minister's 
thinking than the latter had time to give. In the above cases the 
discussions could be regarded as being on behalf of the minister. More 
frequently the meetings were initiated by the adviser or by the 
official. 
Some permanent secretaries were unhappy at special advisers, in the 
words of one, 'getting at subordinate staff. ' Furthermore, several 
officials felt it was inappropriate to suggest there was a role for 
advisers to play in helping to convey the ministers' policies into the 
departments. However, the subtlety of the additional nature of the 
adviser's contribution is demonstrated in the following quotations, 
starting with Donald Maitland referring to circumstances in which Tom 
McNally made himself useful: 
One would be where the party view represented quite a 
departure from previous policy, in which case people had to be 
coached in that. Although everyone had read the manifesto and 
knew what was entailed, nonetheless, in the detailed 
application of that, Tom McNally might well have thought it 
helpful for people to get a bit of guidance about the way 
ministers wanted to play it. 
178 
When I arrived at the DoE I was astonished by the word perfect 
way in which senior officials could recite our programme. I 
spent happy hours instructing them on the correct exegesis of 
some of its less pellucid passages (Lipsey, 1980). 
I was not really there at the beginning when Keith Joseph 
first handed down his reading list of about a dozen books.... 
That was the method that Keith chose to ensure that his civil 
servants made policy suggestion along lines that were likely 
to be acceptable to him and his colleagues. ... I ended up with an additional job, as for many months afterwards I acted 
as a sort of unofficial interpreter. I was always being asked 
what would be the monetarist line on this, or where should the 
line be drawn between the state and the private sector (almost 
invariably those in the Department wanted to do too much) or 
how should we express this or that in a minute to the 
Secretary of State (Young, 1990, p. 37). 
These quotations give only a flavour of the diverse reasons for, 
and nature of, the informal contacts between advisers and officials. 
The advisers might initiate the face to face or telephone discussions to 
emphasize points in the manifesto, or as Lipsey did, to explain the 
philosophy behind it. They might wish to advocate the addition of extra 
options in the submission being planned by the officials. Tony Lynes, 
especially after he became based in the Supplementary Benefits 
Commission rather than the DHSS's main offices, spent more time talldng 
informally to officials at meetings than most advisers did. He thought 
it important, 'to persuade the official that even if you are not right, 
at least you have got a serious, arguable, point of view that should be 
incorporated in the advice they are giving. ' Advisers also initiated 
contact with officials when they were helping their minister to pursue a 
particular strategy and when they had useful information from the 
political field. Thus Jim Prior stated: 
We used to have a weekly meeting with the officers of the 
backbench committee. Civil servants would never be present at 
that meeting but Rob Shepherd and Robbie Gilbert were there. 
They would tell the department what went on ... The meetings 
with the backbench committee were very important and bound to 
have an effect on policies pursued within the department; but 
without a special adviser there is no way the department can 
find these things out. I suppose a minister can always tell 
the department what the political nuances are, but ministers 
are fairly busy people. 
179 
A range of civil servants initiated contacts with advisers. At the 
DoE, Ian Bancroft, 'used to have a regular weekly chat with David 
Lipsey. ' A similar procedure was adopted in the DHSS under Labour by 
the permanent secretaries. The advisers involved in these meetings were 
also amongst those who, in the words of Mike Hartley-Brewer, acted as a 
'conduit from assistant secretaries and principals to the minister. ' 
David Ennals saw Hartley-Brewer as his eyes and ears across the whole 
field, and the concept implied here of an adviser as somebody capable of 
hopping up and down the hierarchy of the department and acting as a 
channel of information fits with the model developed earlier. 
Furthermore, given the informality of their position, advisers, in 
discussions with officials or at formal meetings, could do as Maurice 
Peston did: 'I would always make it clear if I went to a meeting, that 
if the meeting came to some conclusion I certainly didn't regard myself 
as necessarily committed to that conclusion, because to me it was just a 
meeting at which we were discussing the issues; and therefore none of 
this agreed view stuff would I ever go for. ' 
Civil servants, to varying degrees, are under pressure to support 
the agreed line contained in the submission to the minister which helps 
explain why assistant secretaries sometimes seek out advisers. 
According to David Stephen, 'Officials use the special adviser to say, 
"look the paper coming up says this, but we think that. " There was 
quite a lot of what the State Department calls "the Dissent Channel" 
there and I had to be very careful not to become that. I wasn't a 
Dissent Channel. ' Stephen, and many other advisers, believed there were 
other, more common, reasons why officials approached advisers including 
to increase their understanding of the political perspectives involved, 
and to get a steer on the minister's likely reaction to their planned 
submissions. Occasionally officials turned to advisers for guidance as 
to why their submission had been rejected by a minister. The full 
variety of reasons that officials had for viewing favourably the 
opportunities to discuss points with advisers will be examined later. 
From her perspective of having been, at different times, diary 
secretary and special adviser, Maggie Sidgreaves described several ways 
in which advisers could sometimes explicitly do things on behalf of the 
minister. Periodically as diary secretary she would put the advisers in 
180 
to see Labour Party people if Judith Hart became involved with other 
matters and was, at the last minute, unable to meet them. When she 
became an adviser Sidgreaves sometimes explained points to civil 
servants on behalf of the minister and she accompanied Hart on her 
overseas visits. On such trips she often had her own programme of 
events and sometimes, for example, visited refugee camps and made 
contacts it would have been difficult for either ministers or officials 
to have made. Occasionally it was also planned that she would open 
things or meet people when Hart had a full programme and could not 
perform those tasks. 
Some advisers went on trips without their minister, but often 
accompanied by officials. Gwilym Prys-Davies, for example, spent three 
days looking at the Islands and Highlands Development Board with a civil 
servant from the Welsh Office when they were developing ideas about the 
proposed Mid Wales Rural Development Board. In addition to travelling 
extensively with the Foreign Secretary, several special advisers made 
visits on the minister's behalf: John Harris to Vietnam, Miles Hudson 
to Rhodesia, and David Stephen not only went alone on fact-finding 
missions for David Owen to various countries, including Mozambique, 
Zambia, Namibia, and South Africa, but was also used at times as an 
emissary, in Belize, for example, meeting the whole Cabinet for 
discussions in June 1978. 
Part of question 16j) included a reference to receiving 
deputations, other than party ones, on behalf of the minister. A few 
examples were given above; however, it was sometimes difficult to 
distinguish between party groups and groups of people not officially 
from the party but consisting largely of people from one political 
persuasion. The phrase 'on behalf of again caused difficulties. 
Despite allowing for this, the interview evidence supports the picture 
given by Table 3 that even when the wider concept of any contact with 
members of relevant pressure groups was considered, for many advisers it 
was not an important activity. Over 60 per cent had such contact either 
less frequently than weekly, or never. One area where the contact was 
least obviously 'on behalf of a minister was where it was initiated by 
the groups. The point is illustrated by successive advisers appointed 
to the DHSS in 1978 and 1979. Malcolm Dean, having been a journalist 
181 
specializing in social policy, was appointed by David Ennals. He found 
that many groups that he had written about contacted him believing they 
now had a friend at court. Although Roger Dyson thought that the 
gathering and relaying of information from the field was something 
Patrick Jenkin wanted, it got rather out of hand: 'I found myself 
continually got at, sought out, and invited to do activities all over 
the country, far more than I could manage. ' 
One variant of the contact being initiated by groups is the 
expanded role of political lobbyists. Increased use of special advisers 
by lobbyists was advocated by Miller (1987) and in Business Magazine, 
'Scrutator' wrote: 'Political lobbyists these days often refer to the 
importance of making one's number with special advisers' (1987, p. 22). 
Jenny Jeger, a political consultant or lobbyist with experience of 
having previously worked at the Number Ten Political Office under 
Labour, also stressed the importance of having good contacts with 
political advisers. In addition to the regular two-way liaison she 
thought the contacts could prove particularly important in "'cases of 
desperation" when you have got to speak to the minister. ' If you had a 
political point to make it was much better to go to the political 
adviser who had direct access than filtering it through elsewhere. 
John Whittingdale, whilst special adviser at the DTI, was in 
contact with pressure groups and industrialists three or four times a 
week. He would listen to them, find out if they had a case, usually 
discuss it with officials, and see what the Government's line was. If 
it was appropriate he, 'would say to the Secretary of State, "I have 
been contacted by so and so and he has got a case, why don't we do 
something? "' He also felt that advisers had become, 'one of the prime 
targets for political lobbyists ... they were constantly ringing me up 
and would regard me as a route in to the minister. ' At least for 
advisers serving up to 1987 Whittingdale was unusual in having so much 
contact with groups and lobbyists. This was probably a reflection of 
his working at the DTI but such activity has increased in importance for 
advisers since 1987. Lobbyists can sometimes be of value to advisers who 
wish, for example, to find out the facts behind an argument, or gain 
information quickly about an issue that is just breaking. 
182 
As noted earlier, Douglas Hurd, and other ministers, came to 
realize the value of having an adviser who was able to, 'do a little 
skirmishing work of the kind the civil servants also do, but he can do 
it a little more freely, a little more loosely. ' His adviser, Edward 
Bickham, agreed he spent quite a lot of time talking to groups including 
ones concerned with broadcasting, and the National Association for the 
Care and Resettlement of Offenders. He would convey their ideas 
directly back to the minister and/or the department. Other aspects of 
this role that ministers appreciated include the advocacy performed by 
some advisers and their ability to assess the likely reaction to planned 
proposals - especially any political dangers. Liaison with trade unions 
was performed by several Labour advisers. Amongst the Tory orientated 
groups Richard Ehrman talked to whilst he was Tom King's adviser at 
Employment were the Centre for Policy Studies (CPS), the Institute of 
Economic Affairs (IEA), and the IOD. He relayed their views; told them 
of, and justified, King's policies; and tried, 'to influence their 
policies and the tone of their publications. ' 
Sometimes advisers already had clear links with groups relevant to 
the minister's portfolio - in some cases it was a reason for 
appointment. Certain advisers, for example Tom Baron, could talk to the 
group with which he had good links and play a number of the above roles. 
Several of the Treasury advisers, including Peter Cropper, Douglas 
French, Rodney Lord, and Alastair Ross Goobey had good links with groups 
in the financial and/or taxation field. However, the necessary secrecy 
surrounding activities such as the preparation of the Budget meant that 
sometimes more emphasis was given to bringing ideas directly in to the 
Treasury ministers, than advocating proposed changes to outside 
audiences. 
One of the reasons why contact with groups was generally not 
important, and those who did engage in it were often very circumspect, 
is that leading interest groups often had very good links with officials 
and a deputation from such a group would expect to meet a minister 
and/or senior officials. According to Clive Booth, former principal 
private secretary at the DES, if a group such as the Committee of Vice- 
Chancellors and Principals came to meet the Secretary of State, 'it 
would be unthinkable to say, "the Secretary of State can't make it, but 
183 
the special adviser is here. "' Advisers were sometimes seen as 
attempting to dilute the strength of the traditional relationships 
between departments and established interest groups. Thus in respect of 
the DES Kogan suggests, 'Advisers are brought in to help cause radical 
change. Their concern is not with the practitioner networks and the 
more enduring achievements and liabilities of the system but with ways 
of dislodging them' (1987, p. 230). 
For ministers wishing to challenge the existing policy community 
and bring a wider range of interest groups or policy think tanks into 
the discussions, advisers could play an important part. Advisers played 
a variety of roles: encouraging ministers to develop such consultations; 
encouraging groups to be more forthcoming; facilitating links between 
the groups and the minister and his officials; and acting as a conduit 
for the ideas of the group or think tank. Perhaps the clearest example 
comes from MAFF where, as noted in Chapter 3, a strong policy community 
exists. John Silkin's adviser, Ann Carlton, wrote in Farming News on 27 
January 1989: 
in 1976 the civil servants suggested that the new minister, 
John Silkin, should meet the NFU. They were surprised when he 
also wanted to meet the fishing industry's representatives at 
the earliest possible opportunity. Similarly the idea that he 
should meet consumer groups and the agricultural unions had to 
come from the minister or his adviser and not from the 
permanent civil service. This was not because the civil 
servants were malevolent; but because they were going by past 
precedent. 
The press officer at MAFF, Terry Dawes, suggested that Carlton 
had an important role in liaising with some of these groups - 
especially, for example, with the owner-skippers in the fishing 
industry, in particular during negotiations at Brussels. Not only did 
Carlton play a part in the liaison, sometimes facilitating it, she also 
felt that in some cases, such as with consumer groups, she had to 
encourage the interest groups into greater activity. She claimed, 
'maybe the civil servants could have done that but they wouldn't have 
had the will to do it, or the contacts, and I don't think the minister 
would have had the time. ' This is partially compatible with Martin 
Smith's argument that, 'in British agricultural policy the existence of 
a closed policy community and a firmly established agenda limited the 
184 
role that excluded pressure groups could play in raising new issues ... 
The difficulty of challenging the agenda from outside means that often 
the pressure for change will only come from within government. ' (1989, 
pp. 163-4 and 161). However, whereas Smith stresses that major changes 
generally did not occur in agricultural policy until the 1980s, and did 
so then because of the emergence of new external problems, Carlton 
emphasizes the importance of the role in the late 1970s of various 
individuals - the minister, backed by both his adviser and changes he 
forced through at senior levels in MAFF. 
Helping with presentation, 16k), occupied a great deal of most 
advisers' time (almost two thirds spent a substantial or considerable 
time on it), and encompassed more than just speech writing. Advisers 
could be involved in: discussing the strategy for presentation; talking 
to journalists - especially political ones; drafting and/or redrafting 
press releases; organizing the release of political speeches; drafting 
articles for the minister; preparation for Parliamentary Question Time; 
briefing the minister before television and radio interviews. John 
Harris and Michael Dobbs are examples of advisers who were effective at 
presentation and yet never, or in the case of Dobbs rarely, became 
classified as speech writers. They illustrate, however, that 
involvement in presentation overlaps with the roles described earlier 
because, for example, both were heavily involved in discussing with 
their ministers presentational strategy and the handling of specific 
issues. 
Discussing the way to present an immediate issue can itself be part 
of crisis management. When the DHSS was split into two departments in 
1988 Margaret Thatcher said in Question Time on 26 July that the 
burden of the two departments was, 'more than one person could 
legitimately undertake' (Official $e=. Vol. 138, col. 251). It is, 
therefore, perhaps not surprising that Norman Fowler, who was Secretary 
of State at the DHSS for five years, described the key role of Nick 
True, his adviser, as helping with crisis management and that in most of 
the crises he faced he required help with presentation, 'particularly in 
getting draft statements/speeches to the minister quickly. Speed is of 
the essence. ' Similar points were made by Labour advisers at the DHSS. 
Brian Abel-Smith commented, 'Jack [Straw] was very good at presentation 
185 
and he was much better than I on thinking how to react to a mini- 
crisis. ' Mike Hartley-Brewer also felt there was a role for advisers in 
helping to handle the many crises that beset the department. According 
to Francis Cripps there is often a need in politics to respond very 
quickly, for example, by sending out press releases; but it is not just 
a question of presentation: 'creative thinking in a hurry is 
required ... [as] lines get developed to respond to emergencies'. Tony 
Benn's Diaries (1989, and 1990) record many examples of Cripps and 
Frances Morrell discussing aspects of presentational strategy - both in 
crises and, more generally to expound his position during disputes 
within the party and the Government. Assisting with crisis management 
could combine several of the activities described earlier with some 
presentational ones and again demonstrates aspects of the model of the 
place of advisers. It shows why they have to be on hand, close to 
ministers, and perhaps flexible enough to be free from too many 
compulsory, routine activities. 
There was similarly a range of motives among those advisers who 
spoke frequently to journalists. Often advisers talked most frequently 
to political correspondents. John Harris even retained his lobby card. 
However, a division of responsibilities was again clearly seen between 
Shirley Williams's advisers: Stella Greenall talked to educational 
correspondents and John Lyttle to political ones. In talking to 
journalists, often over the phone or at lunch time, advisers might 
provide the background behind recent speeches or policy developments, or 
trail certain stories in the press. Having talked to a journalist an 
adviser sometimes suggested to his minister that he should meet the 
journalist. Several advisers, including Edward Bickham, also talked to 
journalists working on the increasing number of current affairs 
programmes. They would 'have a background, off-the-record chat about a 
subject rather than wanting to work on a news story. ' Some advisers 
spend a considerable time briefing the press about their minister's 
position on departmental and general issues and this fits with the view 
of advisers as people who assist ministers in their continuous 
competition with colleagues. One Labour adviser, whilst admitting to 
some liaison with the press, said, 'I wasn't the constant call box that 
a number of my colleagues were. ' A permanent secretary suggested that 
one of the main roles of the adviser in his department was to ensure 
186 
that the minister received better coverage in the Guardian than other 
ministers. 
Advisers who had been journalists were in a good position to assist 
with presentation. Thus one of Malcolm Dean's activities was to draft 
articles for his ministers. In helping prepare ministers for interviews 
some advisers would play the part of 'a nasty left wing interviewer. ' 
Similarly, many advisers, including Lynda Rouse, were part of the team 
which helped prepare their minister for Question Time. 
In addition to all these activities advisers such as Abel-Smith 
were, as noted above, involved in drafting or amending documents coming 
out of the department for public consumption including Green Papers and 
Circulars. Where, however, advisers became directly involved in 
journalism, there could be controversy. Thus Tony Benn's Dry entry 
for 11 March 1979 reads: 'I had a note in my box that the Prime Minister 
wants to talk to me about Frances's work on j&bQu Activist, saying that 
she is in breach of her status as political adviser' (1990). On the 
other hand it was recently conceded officially that advisers were 
entitled to be involved in some controversial areas of presentation. In 
1990 a memorandum entitled Costing Qf Jg Policies Qf sition 
Parties was submitted by the Head of the Home Civil Service, Sir Robin 
Butler, to the Treasury and Civil Service Committee for its Fifth 
Report, Session 1989-90: Tg Civil Service EU and Conditions Q Service 
Code. In it he explained the role that civil servants could 
legitimately play and stated that, 'When the factual material has been 
provided, it is for Ministers (assisted by their special advisers) to 
determine the form of presentation. ' (1990, p. 30). Advisers such as 
Nicholas True had been involved in this activity prior to the 1987 
election. 
Another long-standing area of controversy and discontent referred 
to earlier is coordination of government policy. Michael Wolff assisted 
with this in the early 1970s. In 1986 Butler wrote, 'This Government 
has had immense difficulties in coordinating its actions and 
presentation ... 
Attempts have been made to cast special advisers as 
"banana skin spotters", and to make them pool timings of all major 
departmental manoeuvres and policy announcements into a central clearing 
187 
house' (p. 20). 
To varying degrees, advisers also performed a similar range of 
roles for junior ministers although in most cases they spent far less 
time working for them. We have seen how Norman Lamont valued the 
assistance of the advisers at the DTI, and when he was a junior minister 
at the Department of Energy he thought Michael Portillo was 'excellent' 
at providing speeches and felt free to approach him whilst recognizing 
Portillo's first loyalty was to David Howell, the Secretary of State. 
Some advisers, including Stuart Sexton (especially after Mark Carlisle's 
departure) although attached to the Secretary of State, carried out 
various functions for certain junior ministers. In the DHSS under 
Labour and the Treasury under the Tories the existence of a team of 
advisers made it easier for assistance to be given to junior ministers. 
In particular, several DHSS advisers, including David Townsend, found 
themselves supplying special adviser services for junior ministers, 
especially Alf Morris, the Minister for the Disabled. This involved 
discussing issues, attending meetings, writing speeches, and briefing 
directly on submissions. The Welsh Office covers a wide range of issues 
and both Gwilym Prys-Davies and Chris Butler sometimes worked for the 
junior ministers with responsibilities in particular fields. On 
becoming an adviser in 1974 Prys-Davies, who had chaired the Welsh 
Hospitals Board since 1968, was especially active in advising the 
Parliamentary Secretary dealing with health matters. 
In keeping with the wide ranging nature of the role described at 
the beginning of this section, some advisers were involved in more 
activities than would fit neatly into even the exhaustive list covered 
in the questionnaire. These included helping to prepare the election 
manifesto and occasional work in relation to their minister's 
constituency. Again there could be overlap with other activities. Thus 
several advisers, including Derek Scott and Roger Liddle, travelled with 
the minister to his constituency, taking the opportunity to discuss 
departmental or other issues. 
Whether advisers had any involvement with election manifesto 
preparation, and even the election campaign, depended partly on the time 
at which they served. Such activity could necessitate considerable 
188 
liaison with the party. John Houston spent 70 per cent of his first 
year working for the Foreign Secretary in preparing for the 1984 
European elections. An interesting example of how work on the election 
manifesto links with the role of some advisers in attempting to ensure 
policies were developed in the department in line with the manifesto 
commitments came from Gwilym Prys-Davies. Based on his experience as 
special adviser in the Welsh Office from February 1974, he felt it would 
be useful if there was a stronger commitment to a Mid Wales Rural 
Development Board in the October 1974 manifesto so as to help overcome 
resistance to the idea from within Whitehall. He helped edit the Welsh 
Labour Party manifesto for October and was therefore able to draft 
appropriate changes to strengthen the wording that had been used in 
February. Several Labour advisers, including Malcolm Dean and Vincent 
Cable, referred to working on manifesto preparation in 1979, with David 
Lipsey playing a coordinating role. In the Tory Party in 1982, Geoffrey 
Howe invited Conservatives to serve on nine groups considering different 
aspects of policy which crossed departmental boundaries. Their remit, 
was less to suggest items for the manifesto than policies for 
the longer term, i. e. five years ahead. The reports were 
collated by Peter Cropper (Director of the Research 
Department) and Adam Ridley (Political Adviser to Sir Geoffrey 
Howe) and submitted to Sir Geoffrey Howe, to Cecil Parkinson 
('to reassure ministers that the political factor would not be 
neglected'), and to Ferdinand Mount, the head of the Prime 
Minister's Policy Unit. In effect this was to be the 
manifesto drafting team ... The 
first complete draft of the 
document which took account of new ministerial proposals was 
written by Ferdinand Mount and Adam Ridley (Butler and 
Kavanagh, 1984, p. 39). 
The role of advisers during election campaigns varied enormously 
but in general if they became actively involved, they had first to 
resign their special adviser's position. The value placed by Mrs 
Thatcher on the contribution of Tory advisers has been described. Again 
this demonstrates the ability of advisers - in this case ones who have 
just resigned their posts - to cross boundaries. According to Adam 
Ridley, the role of briefing ministers for press conferences and 
responding to leak stories was very complex and required a knowledge of 
official business, election timetables, and how public relations works. 
189 
Many other items accounted for a small part of certain advisers' 
time, for example, several, especially in the DHSS, were consulted about 
appointments such as those of chairman of health authorities. A few 
other advisers played very different roles from those described so far 
in this section. When he moved to the Supplementary Benefits 
Commission, Tony Lynes almost became, unofficially, special adviser to 
the chairman, David Donnison, who greatly valued his assistance 
(Donnison, 1982). 
The impression that advisers were very busy is reinforced by the 
record of a month's work for one adviser complied by his secretary at 
the time. During the month the adviser wrote: 65 minutes (covering 131 
pages); 56 letters; eight draft ministerial letters; two speeches (and 
substantial modifications to speeches drafted by officials); two press 
releases; and seven other papers. He spent 63 hours in meetings and his 
secretary arranged 196 outgoing telephone calls in addition to those he 
made himself. The wide range of individuals to whom the items, 
especially letters, were sent is in keeping with the model set out in 
Chapter 3. 
SECTION $; ROLE QE MINISTER'S POLICY UNIT. 
When he returned to Number Ten in March 1974, Harold Wilson not only 
permitted his ministers to appoint special advisers but also established 
his own Policy Unit under Bernard Donoughue. The Policy Unit has 
remained in existence since 1974 - which is far longer than any of the 
earlier attempts to establish an equivalent unit that were described in 
Chapter 2. The Policy Unit, as its name implies, concentrates primarily 
on policy whereas more overtly party political functions are mostly 
dealt with by the Political Office and Political Secretary. 
Despite its comparatively brief history, three clear periods were 
identified by David Willetts (1987) in an authoritative article: 1974-9; 
1979-83; and 1983-7. In 1987 Donoughue gave a detailed description of 
the recruitment and role of the unit from 1974-9 in his book, pri 
inister. He was responsible for recruiting the unit's members. In 
this way the selection process was similar to that of only those very 
few of the departmental special advisers who were recruited by the 
190 
senior adviser in their department. All the members of the Policy Unit 
in 1974 were special advisers and Donoughue was offered the title, 
'Coordinator of the Special Advisers', but declined on the grounds that 
he did not wish to be responsible for people (the departmental advisers) 
over whom he had no control. This is important because it is the first 
of a number of points in this section that reinforce one of the central 
features of the model of departmental special advisers, which is that 
they are the minister's 'own people'. 
The members of the unit were mostly chosen for their policy 
expertise as well as their political commitment. Wilson described their 
role to the Commonwealth Heads of Government Conference: 
They advise me directly on the immediate decisions to be made, 
whether in Cabinet or elsewhere, and on longer term issues and 
developments. They work closely with my Private Office staff 
as well as with the network of Special Advisers serving other 
Ministers and with the CPRS and the Cabinet Secretariat, and 
keep in touch with thinking outside Government through 
contacts in universities, industry, trade unions and pressure 
groups. The purpose of this Policy Unit is not only to bring 
in experts to extend the range of policy options from which 
the Government - and particularly the Prime Minister as head 
of the Government - has to choose. The Policy Unit was set 
up, and its members were selected, to provide a team with 
strong political commitment to advise on, propose and pursue 
policies to further the Government's political goals. For 
policies without politics are of no more use than politics 
without policies (1976, p. 204). 
Some people thought this was rather an idealized picture, but, to the 
extent that prime ministers gave it its head, others believed it 
operated effectively. When interviewed Donoughue felt there were 
considerable similarities between the work of special advisers in 
departments and the Policy Unit in: acting as the minister's 'eyes and 
ears'; looking for landmines; and making suggestions on policy 
initiatives. The concept of assistance to the person at the nodal point 
is again appropriate. Donoughue negotiated good access for members of 
the Policy Unit to a range of committees and they spent much time 
monitoring what was happening and in giving the Prime Minister policy 
advice. Mike Hartley-Brewer, whose wife Elizabeth Arnott was a member 
of the unit, thought that to the extent that advisers were providing a 
politically sensitive, independent, and technically competent input to 
policy issues, their role was similar to that of effective members of 
191 
the unit. Furthermore, the unit was well placed to be highly 
influential because of the power of Number Ten. 
It was not always easy for the unit to obtain information from 
departments under the British system, which is 'very tribal', in the 
words of the former Cabinet Secretary, John Hunt (now Lord Hunt of 
Tanworth). He observed that the Policy Unit members, 'fairly rapidly 
found it was as difficult to get information out of special advisers in 
other departments as out of other civil servants because a special 
adviser owed his allegiance to his own minister and not to Bernard 
Donoughue. ' 
Under Margaret Thatcher the Policy Unit was reduced in size. 
Initially there were only two members - John Hoskyns and Norman Strauss. 
Although a civil servant was soon seconded to it from the Department of 
Industry, it remained small and was essentially concerned with key 
strategic objectives to do with, Hoskyns claimed, 'the economic turn 
around'. They briefed the Prime Minister on these. Thatcher soon also 
appointed her own Economic Adviser, Alan (now Sir Alan) Walters, who was 
not a member of the unit but worked closely with it at times (Burch, 
1983). Although not responsible for devising it, Hoskyns played an 
important role in supporting the Medium Term Financial Strategy (Hoskyns 
interview; Thain, 1985). 
Willetts suggests that, 'Under the leadership of Ferdinand Mount in 
1982-83, the Policy Unit went through a period of transition with the 
new style emerging clearly under John Redwood who arrived in November 
1983 and became Head in January 1984' (p. 446). The unit expanded - 
especially with the abolition of the CPRS following the 1983 election - 
and included several permanent civil servants on secondment from their 
departments. In interview Mount, Redwood, and Willetts all stressed the 
extent to which the post-1983 election Policy Unit should be seen as 
successor to the CPRS as well as to earlier Policy Units and that it was 
the abolition of the CPRS that allowed a cost-conscious Thatcher to 
expand the unit. With its larger size and new style the unit aimed to 
cover virtually all areas of domestic policy. It played both a reactive 
role in commenting in papers going to the Prime Minister from 
departments, and a proactive role in making policy proposals to the 
192 
Prime Minister, and in working with the departments on suggestions that 
had the Prime Minister's backing. The presence of career civil servants 
in the Policy Unit highlights the importance of making a distinction 
between the unit and other advisers. According to Redwood, 'the Policy 
Unit isn't like the departmental advisers for a number of reasons. The 
first, and most important, reason is the Policy Unit is a group of 
people who are part of the civil service and work as career civil 
servants would work. ' 
Mount emphasized that on their own the small group in the unit 
lacked the capacity to generate many new ideas. However, they were in a 
position to talk to policy research centres and, when they thought their 
ideas were good, feed them into the Prime Minister and eventually 
sometimes to departments. The policy research centres - including the 
CPS and the IEA - often included academics in their research groups. 
Mount agreed it was appropriate to see special advisers and the unit as 
brokers for ideas produced by these centres. He commented: 'to think 
purely in terms of special advisers as isolated beings underestimates 
the extent to which they must feed off the humus outside. ' 
An important source of policy ideas, according to Kavanagh, 'has 
been policy - brokers who operate between the political and academic 
worlds' (1987, p. 68). He examined the role played in developing 
Thatcherism by various individuals and groups, including the ASI, CPS, 
IEA, IOD, and the Social Affairs Unit. More recently he re-examined 
some of the ideas produced by these groups and claimed that, 
Reforming ministers could use these ideas to challenge 'yes 
minister' officials in their departments. Members of Mrs 
Thatcher's Policy Unit kept in touch with the think-tanks and 
helped her in battles against allegedly status-quo inclined 
departments ... There 
is an impressive overlap between 
members of these think groups, Conservative MPs, special 
advisers to ministers and desk officers in the Conservative 
Research Department. Members of think-tanks get appointed to 
Conservative policy groups and consult with special advisers 
to ministers (1992, p. 27). 
It might be appropriate to adapt a figure developed in the United 
States by Sundquist (1978 p. 127) and apply some British labels to 
illustrate how policy research brokers sometimes could operate in the 
process of transferring ideas from researchers ('A' in Figure 6) to the 
193 
FI !L dial Advisers M Research Brokers. 
A 
__ 
B 
__C __\ 
D 
Terms Used by 
Sundquist: Researchers Academic Research Policy 
Intermediaries Brokers Makers 
Sundquist's 
Terms 
Applied to Researchers Policy Research The Policy The PM, 
British Centres Unit and Ministers, 
Special Special and senior 
Advisers and Advisers officials 
Policy Unit: 
Adapted from Sundquist, 1978, p. 127. 
politicians and senior officials ('D' in Figure 6). David Willetts, as 
Director of CPS, thought advisers were one of their target audiences and 
The Economist (6 May 1989) referred to the Policy Unit as being 'a 
conduit' (p. 28) for research centre ideas. Figure 6 is an 
oversimplification and many ideas may get through to the politicians and 
senior officials directly, without going through the Policy Unit and 
advisers, but, on occasions, there is no doubt that the unit and 
advisers can have an important brokerage role. It might be argued that 
the policy research centres are really the research brokers. Given the 
links between some groups and certain individuals in the Policy Unit it 
is perhaps more appropriate to view it as a continuum. However, in his 
article Sunquist referred to: 'the staff units or individuals who serve 
Presidents, department heads, bureau chiefs, congressional committees, 
and individual members of Congress as links with the academic world. 
They carry many titles - economic advisers, research and statistics 
offices, policy analysts, legislative assistants, and many others. They 
need a generic title and "research broker" is as good as any. ' (p. 127). 
The Policy Unit could also be seen as a broker in those cases, 
highlighted by Redwood, where the unit had a role in bringing the views 
and interests of various previously under-represented groups into play 
in Whitehall. Redwood argued that his slightly enlarged group was too 
small on its own to provide a serious critique of all the material 
coming from departments, so they relied on gaining information from 
business, interest groups, policy research centres, and academics and 
specialists outside Whitehall. 
Several aspects of the Policy Unit's post-1983 change in style were 
important. Greater emphasis was given to the details of a range of 
policies rather than a concentration solely on strategy. Furthermore, 
it played a more active part in discussing policy issues with 
departments. This went far wider than just involving the departmental 
special advisers but they could be an obvious point of contact for 
members of the Policy Unit and some strong links were formed. This was 
perhaps symbolized by the exceptional role of Oliver Letwin in being 
simultaneously an adviser to Keith Joseph and a member of Margaret 
Thatcher's Policy Unit - only possible because of the extraordinarily 
close relationship between the two. Within the unit Letwin also had 
194 
responsibility for Employment matters and this department provides a 
good example of the Secretary of State (Tom King), his adviser (Richard 
Ehrman), and the relevant Policy Unit member, all emphasizing the value 
of the link between the departmental advisers and the unit. 
According to Ehrman the liaison took several forms including trying 
out ideas from the minister on the unit which would be able to give the 
adviser an indication of the likely response and any possible re-shaping 
that might be desired by Number Ten. The unit could sometimes play a 
central role in helping to resolve inter-departmental wrangles by, 
'being the broker almost, in the case of someone like Oliver, who was 
very effective and worked very closely with John Redwood who was an 
equally effective head of the unit. ' By operating with them Ehrman 
would be able to inform King of the likely attitude of Number Ten in the 
dispute. The unit did not deal with Northern Ireland, therefore, Ehrman 
believed, when he moved with King to the NIO one reason for his reduced 
effectiveness was that he lost much of his clout and usefulness because 
he was much less part of the network with the Policy Unit. 
Similarly, Tom King believed that when he was developing new 
policies it was useful for the adviser to liaise with the Policy Unit. 
The unit would have the freedom to say whether or not they thought the 
policy was going to run and they would have the broader view and know 
how the proposal might fit with others from elsewhere: 'it was very 
helpful to have these sounding boards at a lower, more informal, level. ' 
Letwin viewed the situation in the same way and commented: 
In many ways we enhanced the position of advisers ... I 
had in 
the end a closer and more open relationship with the advisers 
than with anybody else in the departments with which I 
dealt ... it was only with the adviser I didn't 
feel any kind 
of distance. I thought we were part of the same team trying 
to achieve the same things always. Sometimes with ministers 
there would be a distance because I was the servant of another 
minister ... I was on the 
'phone very frequently to advisers 
in all the ministries with which I dealt ... It was a common 
enterprise. They would ring and say, 'look my minister is 
coming forward with this, it has got this sentence in it. 
What do you think? ' ... and vice versa we were always trying to make sure that ministers came forward with plans which the 
Prime Minister would accept. 
195 
The Treasury and DTI were other departments where several of the post 
1983 advisers, including Howard Davies, Rodney Lord, and John 
Whittingdale referred to the existence of close links with the Policy 
Unit. Links between the Policy Unit and departmental special advisers 
were not always good; certain Policy Unit members regarded some 
departmental special advisers as being uninformed about policy 
developments in their own department and, therefore, not of great 
influence or help. Despite the post 1983 changes, neither Mount nor 
Redwood saw themselves being the coordinator of a network of special 
advisers any more than had Hoskyns. Similarly, most departmental 
advisers, including Lord, did not see the unit as playing a coordinating 
or focal role amongst the advisers in the various ministries. Apart 
from Letwin and Lipsey there was virtually no interchange of personnel 
between the advisorate and the unit between 1974 and 1987. Throughout 
its history, relations between different ministers, departmental 
officials and the unit have varied. Letwin believed that the presence 
of an adviser in a department was a necessary, though not on its own a 
sufficient, condition for a good relationship between the department and 
the unit: 'The biggest difference was between those ministries that had 
advisers and those that didn't. ' 
A former member of Mrs Thatcher's Policy Unit, Christopher 
Monckton, wrote of John Redwood: 'He was a devastatingly effective head 
of the Policy Unit and, like other special advisers throughout the 
Government, was quick to learn how to overcome the inertia, obstruction 
and obscurantism that is still endemic in the civil service. ' vening 
Standard, 10 May 1988). Such thinking would clearly not endear the unit 
to Whitehall. Whereas some ministers and officials regarded the unit as 
uninformed and. meddlesome and some thought it uninfluential, others 
have viewed its contributions as effective and constructive. 
Frequently, but not invariably, the relationship between departmental 
special advisers and the Policy Unit reflected their minister's attitude 
towards the unit. This is yet another reinforcement of the concept of 
the special adviser as the minister's 'own person'. One official agreed 
that the adviser could be a contact person with the relevant Policy Unit 
person: 'Yes, that is right, "find out what he is up to and stop him. 
Let's muzzle it. " It was fascinating to see the special advisers 
operating as civil servants, protecting the minister ... the 
196 
departmental minister is still the great power in the land. ' In the 
late 1980s the role of the Policy Unit was at times more publicized and 
controversial. 
197 
CHAPTER SEVEN: INFLUENCES QN ROLE QE SPECIAL ADVISERS 
_In 
AND HOW FAR A PLACE HAS EVOLVED FOR THEM IHE SYSTEM. 
It was established in Chapter 4 that not all ministers had clear reasons 
for appointing advisers and, even when they did, these were not always 
firmly linked to a perception of needs. Furthermore, the functions 
carried out were not always strongly tied to reasons for appointment or 
an analysis of needs, and even where there was a link, the functions 
appropriate to fulfil a particular reason could be variously 
interpreted. 
Many advisers at the time of appointment were not exactly clear as 
to the functions they were expected to perform - only a quarter said 
that they had a formal job description or terms of reference. Many 
people opined that the role of each special adviser evolved. A number 
of overlapping and interacting factors influence the process of 
evolution. They include: 
(A) the minister's developing wishes and needs; 
(B) the capabilities of the adviser; 
(C) the capabilities, expectations and attitudes of people already in 
post; and the extent, therefore, to which there is a place for 
advisers; 
(D) the exercise of discretion by the adviser in the light of 
other factors. 
This list is similar to the one, already described in Chapter 3, Section 
D, that Meltsner used when discussing the influences on the role of 
policy analysts in America. He did, however, also include 'the policy 
arena' (1986, p. 4) and in his 1988 review of James Walter's book he was 
critical of the failure to address this issue, claiming: 
we must consider the effects of the policy area, because some 
essential aspects of advisory behaviour are likely to differ 
by the type of policy. Some policy areas may have a great 
deal of knowledge that supports a political consensus about 
the design and choice of policy; other policy areas have 
little knowledge and policy may have to be formulated under 
conditions of political disagreement. With different 
knowledge and political conditions, advisers may have to use 
different skills and do different work (pp. 227-8). 
198 
Whilst this issue will be further examined when the impact of 
advisers on policy is considered, the small number of British advisers, 
and the variety of roles most performed, make clear generalizations 
difficult. Several ministers who challenged the existing consensus 
found advisers valuable, but the analysis in this chapter will 
concentrate on the four points listed above and end with an examination 
of the evolution and formalization of the role. 
SECTION AT, THE MINISTER'S DEVELOPING NEEDS AND WISHES 
The functions performed by special advisers correlate fairly well with 
reasons for appointment. This might indicate that the minister's wishes 
do exert considerable influence on their functions. This was most 
obviously demonstrated in many of those cases where, sometimes despite 
the lack of a formal job description, the adviser felt at the time of 
his appointment that the functions he was expected to perform were 
clearly defined. The letter of appointment received by many advisers 
stated that their duties would be 'those set down by the Secretary of 
State'. The evolution of an adviser's role was frequently dictated by 
functions his minister wished him to perform. Even with a minister who 
was as clear about the need for advisers as Tony Benn the adviser could 
initially still feel unclear about her precise role: 'we political 
advisers had no job description. It was like being put into the army 
and having to work out what your duties were in the middle of a pitched 
battle, shells falling overhead' (Morrell, Guardian, 25 March 1980). 
Despite this she felt, as did many other advisers, that their role, 
'was determined by the needs of the minister. ' Such an opinion was 
generally shared by many ministers and officials with Clive Booth 
stating: 'You could define the special adviser's role as being entirely 
that which the minister who has appointed the special adviser wants it 
to be. ' The general rule and the way it operates, is well illustrated 
by the exceptional position of Paul Chapman, one of the few advisers who 
was basically selected by another adviser. Just as most advisers worked 
to the minister, Chapman, in practice, worked to the senior adviser. 
His role was never formally stated: 'it was very much on an ad IMF, 
basis, responding to what Brian [Abel-Smith] wanted doing, which could 
199 
be anything, even to delivering things to the minister. ' 
Even when it is asserted that a range of factors influence the role 
of advisers, it is often accepted that the ministers' wishes and needs 
are the major determinant. In his pamphlet, Darlington lists a wide 
range of roles played by advisers but stresses that not all advisers 
played all the roles. The choice and balance in any particular case 
depended on: 'the nature of the Department, the seniority of the 
Secretary of State, the abilities and interests of the Political Adviser 
and, above all, the requirements and wishes of the Secretary of State' 
(p. 30). Darlington's minister, Merlyn Rees, also felt that the role of 
the adviser depended upon what the minister wanted. 
Evidence to support this point comes from advisers, including John 
Whittingdale, David Coleman, and Stuart Sexton, who served more than one 
minister and found that their role varied depending on the requirements 
of the different ministers. Whittingdale served three successive 
Secretaries of State for Trade and Industry and not only thought that 
each required him to fulfil a somewhat different role, but also found 
that as he gained more experience and knowledge of the department's 
affairs he was increasingly able to brief his ministers on them. The 
further factor sometimes thought to influence the role and impact of the 
adviser is the nature of the policy issue with which he is dealing. 
Coleman felt that whereas both the ministers of state for whom he was 
working wanted him to be involved in political work, he had a slightly 
different role in relation to the policy matters with which each dealt. 
William Waldegrave, as Minister of State for Environment, put particular 
emphasis on his assisting in maintaining contacts with outside bodies 
and bringing in new ideas. In housing, for which John Patten was the 
minister, there was a major review of policy and therefore a substantial 
role for the adviser in participating in far-reaching discussions with 
the minister and officials and in scrutinizing and commenting on 
submissions from officials. 
Even when an adviser was serving the same minister, he often found 
that the minister's requirements evolved as circumstances changed and 
the minister became more aware of his needs. Sometimes ministers, for 
example Robert Carr, found there was less need than they had anticipated 
200 
and the adviser's role diminished. More usually, however, the minister 
became aware of new demands and the adviser, being 'the minister's 
person', and always on the spot, was often amongst the first to be asked 
to respond to them, even if, later, more permanent and official ways 
were developed. Ministers often discovered a need for contact, perhaps 
of an informal nature, to be made with people within the party or 
pressure groups, and the adviser was on hand to provide it. The 
minister, for example Bill Rodgers, then sometimes realized, especially 
if he had dealings with local councillors, that it was useful to ask the 
adviser to develop this function. Similarly, many ministers found they 
wanted extra assistance with presentation and again relied on the 
special adviser. Although involvement with presentation was often a 
major reason for appointment, some advisers said that speech writing 
became a more important function than they had originally expected. 
This was the case with several advisers at the DHSS including Nicholas 
True and Abel-Smith. The latter said, 'most of my time was spent 
presenting policy, either writing White Papers or writing speeches, and 
I hadn't realized that this would be a major part of the time compared 
with that spent discussing policies. ' Treasury ministers after 1979 
(according to Hennessy, 1988, in common with other ministers and their 
officials) found that the development of the new select committees of 
the House of Commons involved them in more work. Consequently, there 
was a role for advisers in preparatory activities. 
Despite the importance of the minister's wishes and needs in 
determining the role of advisers, there are limitations. In describing 
the influences on the ministerial staff in Australia, R. Smith (1977), 
covers a similar list to the one given above. He goes on to argue that 
they did not form a rigid framework: 'Within the boundaries of the 
specific situations in which ministerial officers found themselves they 
had important opportunities for defining their own roles. Indeed, this 
became a responsibility, for if they did not do so, many ministers did 
not have the time and skill to define their role for them' (p. 145-6). 
In the UK a few advisers were critical of their minister's 
inability to define their role or to use them properly. But before 
considering the degree of discretion advisers can exercise, other 
influences must be examined. 
201 
SECTION B. CAPABILITIES QE SPECIAL ADVISERS. 
Although it is difficult to distinguish capabilities from discretion, the 
aim in this section is to consider how far advisers' abilities determine 
their role. In the selection process - especially of specialists - 
ministers choose people with certain talents because they want specific 
roles fulfilled. Here, the concern is more to examine how advisers' 
capabilities interact with other factors in the continuing evolution of 
their role. Inevitably ministers sometimes wished their adviser to be 
more involved in certain activities because they noticed the adviser's 
success in fulfilling that task. For example, ministers who found an 
adviser, such as Tim Boswell, to be good at speech writing usually asked 
him to write more. Conversely, advisers who did not perform well in 
certain areas were less likely to be used again in that role. Several 
ministers found that their advisers were not as good at speech writing 
as they had hoped. 
Efficacious advisers generally found that their role expanded. 
Perhaps the best example is David Young. Keith Joseph recalled that, 
'he was given a cubby hole somewhere remote in the department until by 
sheer force of niceness and effectiveness he was given a proper office 
near me. ' In his autobiography Young describes his transformation from 
a specialist role to taking 'a wider interest in the work of the 
Department' and actually becoming a special adviser. (p. 45). Various 
other advisers whose role was initially seen in rather specific terms, 
including Roland Brown, John Harris, and David Metcalf, were, according 
to their various ministers, increasingly brought into departmental 
affairs because of their capabilities and inclinations. Also advisers 
with specialist knowledge, though recruited to play a general role, may 
find themselves, as happened with David Stephen and Latin American 
issues, increasingly drawn into discussions on substantive matters in 
their specialist area. 
Civil servants as well as ministers may make increasing use of an 
obviously capable adviser. Some of the younger political advisers who 
proved that they could usually be relied on to give an accurate steer as 
to their minister's likely reactions to a proposal, and/or the political 
constraints in a situation, came to be consulted more frequently by 
202 
officials. Examples include Edward Bickham, Ann Carlton, Richard 
Ehrman, Robin Harris, David Hill, David Lipsey, Tom McNally, Michael 
Portillo, Roger Liddle, Rob Shepherd, Stephen Sherbourne, Jack Straw, 
and John Whittingdale. This is extremely important. It links back to 
the earlier discussion on the informal role of talking to officials and 
thus adding flexibility to the system by being an additional channel of 
information in the way proposed in the model showing the place of 
advisers. Out of many possible supporting quotations the following give 
a flavour of the arguments, starting with Tom King who believed that 
they not only applied to his advisers but were also relevant when 
Michael Portillo became adviser to David Howell who was appointed 
Secretary of State for Energy in 1979 after King had been shadowing the 
department: 
I encouraged officials, if they couldn't get hold of me or the 
ministers, to talk to a special adviser if they wanted a steer 
as to what was the background to party policy or the attitude of 
government supporters. The adviser would be able to say, ' ... if you put that up to the minister he'll chuck that out 
because his backbenchers will rubbish it. ' 
He got on immensely well with the civil servants. They very 
quickly found that he was an ever-open door to which they 
could go and try their ideas: 'How is the Secretary of State 
going to react if we say this? How shall we put it. ' ... [He 
got on well with both the private office and] with assistant 
secretaries and senior principals and people of that level who 
suddenly found that they had access, a short cut, to the 
political top of the department without having to go up 
through the whole rigmarole, and the whole thing being done on 
an official level (Patrick Jenkin on Stephen Sherbourne). 
I don't think at the beginning we had quite thought of the way 
that David would be involved with the department as things 
were worked up... become in a sense, a sort of political 
adviser to senior civil servants as well ... pointing out to them the constraints of party policy and pressures that they 
would have to allow for (Andrew Semple on David Lipsey). 
Towards the end of the three years, under secretaries would 
seek him out and say ... 
'could he just look at this note 
before they put it up' (Roy Hattersley on David Hill). 
He wasn't long there before people in the Foreign Office were 
coming to him and saying, 'look, there is this problem, we are 
thinking of putting this proposition, what do you think? ' I 
would say he was in many ways the ideal special adviser ... They were absolutely delighted to have somebody like that they 
could try things out on before they got to the minister. It 
was like litmus paper really. (Sir Tom McCaffrey, Head of 
Foreign Office News Department, 1974-6, on Tom McNally). 
203 
Sometimes it was felt that the adviser, for example Lipsey, made an 
effort to demonstrate to officials that by involving the adviser in 
their deliberations, and taking note of what he said, they would enhance 
the likelihood of a favourable response from the minister. This 
illustrates the subtle processes of interaction between the various 
factors. Thus Jack Straw recalled that a civil servant told him they 
had expected him to be a conduit from the minister to the department 
but, 'as things had turned out it was also the other way. ' The role 
evolved, Straw thought, depending upon one's skills and people's 
judgment about how useful you were going to be: 'The key was what use 
you were to the minister you were working for and how far the department 
saw that the minister thought you had a use. ' 
There are further considerations where there are several special 
advisers, each with a range of capabilities. When he became Chancellor 
of the Exchequer in 1983 Nigel Lawson inherited Adam Ridley, took with 
him Lynda Rouse who had been his adviser at Energy, and brought in 
Rodney Lord. Lord felt that, 'the job to some extent develops rather 
according to one's own interests and talents and of course one's 
minister's requirements'. Lord was brought in chiefly to write speeches 
for the Chancellor, but soon Rouse left and, 'when Michael Portillo 
arrived, he took over that role. ' Lord was also the main adviser 
concerned with public expenditure matters, his area of specialist 
interest. When Rouse went, Lord, 'was asked to take a close interest in 
tax policy', which had been Rouse's area. Peter Cropper later filled 
the place of the departing Ridley and, 'he took over the tax role 
because that was very much his scene. ' 
SECTION CAPABILITIES. EXPECTATIONS AND ATTITUDES QE 
PEOPLE ALREADY III POST: HOW FAR IA PEE 
PQR ADVISERS? 
The extent to which an adviser's role is influenced by other people is 
complicated. To some degree the use of advisers implies that others are 
not allowed to, or are not totally capable of, satisfactorily performing 
certain functions. Partly, therefore, the adviser's role is prescribed 
by the gaps that are perceived in the services rendered by others. 
204 
However, especially as it becomes more formalized, other people might 
have expectations of the role an adviser will fulfil, or, by their 
positive attitude, encourage the adviser to work with them in particular 
activities. Furthermore, officials might encourage an adviser to 
perform some tasks as a way of preventing him from having the time to 
perform more sensitive ones. 
In Chapter 3, Figure 2 showed the place of many of the categories 
already assisting the minister. Figure 4 showed that some of the areas 
in which advisers might operate are already fairly crowded. The 
question must therefore arise as to how far there is room for the 
special adviser. As Blackstone asked (1979, p. 8), 'How far then can it 
be said that this new animal does anything more than poke its nose in a 
variety of other areas where other people were already doing an 
effective job? ' These issues will be explored with each category, 
although, as Bickham claimed, there is a case for having one person 
performing the range of tasks that constitute the adviser's role, even 
if, in some areas, the adviser is merely providing something similar to 
existing services: 
For many years others did work that advisers do. The fact 
that ministers felt the need, however, to bring in special 
advisers suggests that perhaps they weren't doing it in as 
coordinated or effective a way as could have been possible ... I was just an extra pair of hands for certain duties; an extra 
mind that wasn't weighed down with departmental wisdom, to 
take an independent look and be somebody else they could rely 
on. 
The categories to be considered are: 
(i) The private office 
(ii) Other civil servants 
(iii) Junior ministers 
(iv) Parliamentary private secretaries 
(v) The press office 
NO Party officials 
205 
(i) 'ýh Pri vatý ýffi ýg 
Relations with the private office although often good, were 
occasionally difficult. Some advisers were physically located in the 
private office and others regarded as part of it by ministers and 
officials including some serving Roy Hattersley. A few were seen as 
'the political private secretary'. Reference was made in Chapter 3 to 
the difficulties faced by someone liaising between people, or parts of 
an organization, with different organizational cultures. It was 
suggested that such a person might welcome assistance. Many private 
secretaries were glad that the adviser was there to carry out tasks 
including party political liaison, letter writing, and speech writing. 
They often gratefully encouraged advisers to be involved. 
Interview evidence supported the picture revealed in Chapter 3 of 
practical, constitutional, and time limitations on the private office 
staffs ability fully to service their minister in some of these 
activities - especially the party political ones. On the other hand, 
before the advent of special advisers, ministers and private secretaries 
coped. There is some evidence that in the past the demands were not so 
great. Sir Geoffrey Otton, a DHSS second permanent secretary, suggested 
there is a dimension of activity, 'which is better done by non- 
civil servants, and indeed in propriety I think ought not to be done by 
civil servants. ' Having special advisers, 'helps to unravel some of the 
conflicts of responsibility that arise at these top levels for permanent 
secretaries and private secretaries, in a world which has become 
increasingly political. ' He did not think people 30 years ago had 
worried about these issues; even when he was private secretary in the 
Home Office he could not recollect having much to do with party 
organizations. This suggests increasing demands have resulted in gaps 
appearing in the private office's ability to respond. 
As principal private secretary to the Secretary of State for the 
Environment, Andrew Semple contrasted the situation under Geoffrey (now 
Lord) Rippon with that once Tony Crosland took over in 1974 and brought 
in an adviser, David Lipsey. Planning the programme for a visit, for 
example, for Rippon might have involved discussion with the minister, 
the constituency secretary, and Central Office for the party political 
206 
part and inevitably the PPS was not always immediately available. Under 
Crosland, the presence of an adviser made it easier than it otherwise 
would have been to sit down together and develop a single programme. 
Similarly, as private secretary for a Labour Secretary of State, contact 
with the party, without Lipsey, 
would all have been very awkward and we'd have had to have 
made Crosland make his own calls. We'd have inevitably been 
dragged in, you always are at the margin; ... It was far 
easier to know that party liaison directly was not our 
business and that there was somebody who actually understood 
it and would do it. 
The party offices too, regarded it as generally easier and more 
satisfactory to liaise with a minister through the special adviser than 
the private office directly. 
Responsibility for preparation of speeches straddles many people 
within a department especially given the multi-modality of speeches. 
Again there are grey areas surrounding the extent to which the 
department and private secretary may help gather and collate material 
for a speech to a party audience or on general political matters. 
Sometimes the private office is left with the task of rewriting 
departmental speeches so that they are more to the minister's liking. 
Clearly ministers often explicitly wanted advisers to help fill some of 
the gaps in the speech writing services, but private secretaries too, 
frequently welcomed and encouraged such involvement of advisers. Thus 
Sir John Graham, principal private secretary at the Foreign Office said 
that Miles Hudson, 'did increasingly turn to writing speeches and that 
certainly was a burden off one's back. ' At the DTI an official claimed 
the private office was glad to have Stephen Sherbourne to prepare 
speeches. Norman Warner at the DHSS felt that although civil servants 
had always written speeches, the issue was the time the ministers or 
private office had to rewrite them. The advisers, he thought, made that 
process easier and probably enabled the minister to take on more, major 
speeches on policies. He stated that given the existing staffing levels 
in the private office, 'it would have been impossible for me to provide 
to the minister the kinds of services that were provided by Jack Straw, 
Brian Abel-Smith, and Tony Lynes ... the quality of the briefing, the 
speeches, the material that was provided to Mrs Castle was much higher 
207 
with them than it would have been without them. ' 
Evidence from David Willetts perhaps best illustrates that there is 
a role for advisers even where the private secretary is explicitly both 
politically and personally sympathetic to the minister. Willetts 
briefly served as a House of Commons research assistant to Nigel Lawson 
prior to becoming a civil servant. He was later at an appropriate stage 
in his career to be appointed private secretary when, as Financial 
Secretary to the Treasury, Lawson was looking for a new one and chose 
him. Despite his background, Willetts felt there was still a place for 
advisers because, for one thing, he did not attend the ministerial 
prayer meetings. Furthermore, he continued: 
Private secretaries are often personally close to their 
ministers but it still leaves a whole host of jobs for the 
special advisers, simply because people are all very busy ... you are not fighting demarcation disputes trying to keep 
people off your patch. If anything, what you are trying to do 
is to unload some of this work on to somebody else to help you 
do it, otherwise you are not going to get home until 
midnight ... if the adviser could possibly do that speech 
writing rather than the hard pressed official or the hard 
pressed private secretary, you were grateful. 
In several areas respondents were less agreed about the need for an 
adviser to fill gaps. This raises questions about how far there is a 
role for advisers to play in assisting with the traditional private 
office role of progress chasing and of helping to make the minister's 
mind known in the department. The limitations on the advisers' role in 
progress chasing were discussed earlier as was the scope for advisers to 
talk to officials in departments. It is in the latter case that 
possibly the greatest difficulties arise in distinguishing what advisers 
are for, as opposed to what they can usefully do. Some officials 
believe that if a minister feels his mind is not being made clear to the 
department, he should change his private secretary rather than appoint 
an adviser. Some interviewees criticized the idea that advisers are 
better able to advocate a minister's policies within his department 
because they are committed to them. 
The earlier account of discussions between officials and advisers 
revealed many strands in such contact and that there were aspects, 
including political sensitivities, and the background to manifesto 
208 
commitments, where advisers could have a depth of knowledge which it 
would be unreasonable to expect private secretaries to have developed. 
Advisers sometimes had access to meetings, for example David Hill to Roy 
Hattersley's prayer meetings, denied to private secretaries. 
Furthermore, many officials saw advisers as a valuable additional, but 
secondary, source of information - more usually on how the minister 
might react, than on the policy commitments of the incoming minister. 
At Energy Donald Maitland saw Michael Portillo as, 'an additional 
channel between the political head and the department as a whole. ' The 
private secretary and other officials were the main link but, 'the fact 
that there is this other channel does not diminish the channel of 
communication of Secretary of State to his private secretary or to his 
officials. ' Similarly Sir Michael Palliser thought that Foreign 
Secretaries found it useful to have advisers (for example David Lipsey 
and David Stephen), in addition to private secretaries, as two way 
channels with the Foreign Office. 
In some instances ministers felt that even private secretaries 
found it beneficial to discuss the minister's priorities with advisers: 
A lot of officials at middle level would actually regard the 
advisers as sounding boards. Is the minister really set on 
doing this? ... in that sense 
it is a two way flow rather than 
one of the advisers going to the appropriate civil servant and 
saying she is absolutely determined to do this thing ... one 
way in which they were very helpful - even in relation to the 
private offices - was in being able to say to the private 
office, 'she really does mean this. ' (Judith Hart). 
The general picture emerges of advisers playing a role in this area that 
is at least as much adding to existing resources as filling gaps. To 
this extent the private office is not exercising a major influence on 
the role. A further aspect of this, however, is the argument that most 
advisers have a freedom to pursue and advocate the minister's policies, 
irrespective of the traditional values and consequent policies favoured 
by the department. This links with another disagreement - how far 
ministers wish advisers to play the aide/confidant role because they 
believe advisers have a sole loyalty to them instead of the dual loyalty 
of the private secretaries. Most people accept that private secretaries 
have a dual loyalty. There is perhaps a greater diversity of opinion 
about whether this is detrimental. Generally the stronger the belief it 
209 
is bad, the greater the feeling that the balance of private secretaries' 
loyalties lies too much in favour of the department and the permanent 
secretary. The point can be illustrated from various interviews 
commencing with Francis Cripps who thought the private office could not 
perform the same role as advisers because: 
They are civil servants - they spy on the minister. They have divided loyalty 
... they are 
incredibly tactful, very nice, 
very helpful but they are briefed by permanent secretaries 
almost non-stop to try to guide the minister in particular 
directions by sabotaging appointments, manipulating his diary, 
in the interests of preserving the department's policy line. 
Whilst I don't hold the Tony Benn view about divided loyalties 
and sabotage and all that, you always feel that private 
secretaries have a vested interest in telling the permanent 
secretary things that you may not want the permanent secretary 
to know (Roy Hattersley). 
It is a big problem they've got ... although I think to be fair we had two private secretaries during those three years, 
both of whom were excellent, extremely good, extremely able, 
very easy to work with, played it straight and well. Did a 
very good job of balancing their minister versus the permanent 
secretary (David Hill). 
Mostly it's true that a private secretary, if you like, has a 
divided loyalty, but his main loyalty will be to his 
minister ... And there 
is a positive advantage to a minister 
in having a private secretary who does these things for the 
department, knows how to operate with the department to their 
minister's advantage (Sir Kenneth Clucas, permanent secretary, 
DPCP whilst Hattersley was the Secretary of State). 
The special advisers were personally committed to the 
minister, so that the minister felt when she was talking to 
them, that these people were wholly on her side. When I was a 
private secretary ... primarily I was there to 
help my 
ministers, but my ministers also knew it was my duty, they 
wouldn't have had it otherwise, to represent my permanent 
secretary's views and the views of the department .. a good 
private secretary has got to be an open double agent (Patrick 
Nairne). 
These diverse comments reveal how gaps in the service provided from the 
private office might influence what ministers require from advisers to 
satisfy the need for personal support described in Chapter 3. 
Further clear analysis of how this impacts on the adviser's role 
comes from Bill Rodgers: 
210 
A busy minister leading a very hectic, emotional life, 
therefore needs somebody around with whom he feels 
comfortable. A private secretary can do this but he has 
executive responsibilities and cannot share your party 
political views and exhilaration or sadness at by election 
results etc. Ministers need somebody to talk to, drink with, 
without cutting the private secretary out ... civil servants are very adaptable but you cannot expect them to be totally at 
home with you and share your political role. 
Rodgers's comments highlight the importance of the triangular 
relationships between ministers, private secretaries and advisers. 
Usually the adviser's role was seen as the subsidiary one and often 
private secretaries thought it was important that they controlled even 
the advisers' access to the minister's room. Many private secretaries 
believed that they could have made life difficult for the special 
advisers had they wished to do so. Some appreciated, however, that 
getting on with somebody in whom the minister already had confidence 
could be useful for them. There was an element of this in the Foreign 
Office when Tony Crosland and David Lipsey arrived from the DoE. 
According to Susan Crosland, her husband's former private secretary told 
his new one, "'he has his extended family to which D. Lip. is admitted. 
Don't you attempt to mix personal and official life. "' She continued, 
'except with D. Lip. and Margaret [his diary secretary] he drew a 
boundary round himself which the sophisticates of private office were 
very hesitant to cross' (1982, pp. 322-3). 
Most advisers felt that a good relationship with the private office 
was crucial if they were to function effectively and receive key papers. 
The relationship could not only influence the type of activities 
advisers engaged in, but also the depth and effectiveness of their 
involvement in key issues. Good relations were highly desirable where 
the adviser sat in the private office. Alec Douglas Home's belief that 
there was a good accord between his private secretaries and his adviser 
was shared by John Graham, who referred to 'total trust', and Miles 
Hudson, who thought that Graham's attitude was very important. Although 
Tom McNally moved out of the private office after a while, he stood by 
his remarks to the Re-skilling Government Seminar in May 1986: 
211 
the five years that I did spend as a political adviser in 
Whitehall were both enjoyable and educative. This was helped 
by the attitude of the two private secretaries I 
encountered ... there is a lesson there in how to make 
political input mutually advantageous; if the civil servants 
themselves are receptive and constructive, the idea of 
political advisers in Whitehall can be made to work (IOD, 
1986, p. 9) 
As permanent secretary in the Foreign Office at the time, Thomas 
Brimelow also felt that, 'if the political adviser is to work 
effectively he has to work in harness with the private office. ' As a 
result of their expertise in the relevant field, at least two advisers, 
Tom Baron and Vincent Cable, initially knew the private secretary better 
than they knew the minister. Both greatly valued the assistance they 
received from the private offices. It had been arranged that John 
Whittingdale should take up his appointment as special adviser to Norman 
Tebbit on the Monday following the 1984 Tory Party Conference. 
Whittingdale thought that the private office was very helpful to him in 
the exceptional circumstances of his commencing work whilst his minister 
was in hospital following the IRA bomb. Furthermore, he established a 
very good, cooperative, relationship with a series of principal private 
secretaries from which he, and they, benefited and he suggested that 
that relationship was, 'the key to the job'. 
The attitude adopted by private secretaries was not always so 
positive and could vary within one department. Thus Willetts suggested 
that some Treasury private secretaries wrongly regard special advisers, 
'as a threat and try to keep them out of the way ... unfriendly private 
secretaries who just want to keep special advisers down because they 
regard them as amateurs. ' Sensible private secretaries, however, 
cooperate and find advisers useful: 'they can exchange information, and 
the special adviser can do the tasks that the private secretary does not 
think it is quite proper for him to do. ' 
This is but one example of the widely, but not universally, held 
view that the roles are complementary. The strong relationship formed 
between Roy Jenkins and his principal private secretaries, David Dowler 
and Hayden Phillips, underlines the argument that the aide/confidant 
role can be played by civil servants. Nevertheless, Jenkins also found 
it very useful to have advisers who could play this role and provide a 
212 
political dimension. He regarded Dowler and Harris as being equally 
important to him in providing advice, but both could perform tasks he 
could not expect from the other. John Smith believed the roles to be 
complementary because although the private secretaries could help 
sustain the Secretary of State and be loyal they may not share the 
political commitment of the minister. Therefore there is 'room for 
somebody to look at departmental affairs from a political standpoint ... 
a Secretary of State can come to grief if he relies totally on civil 
servants. ' Barbara Castle demonstrated in her Diaries (1980) how good 
private secretaries and good advisers can work well together with a 
positive attitude towards each other's role. Top quality ministers, 
respondents felt, can get the best out of their private secretaries and 
their special advisers. 
The principal private secretary with perhaps the most extensive 
experience of working with special advisers is Callum McCarthy who 
served both Roy Hattersley in 1976-7 and Norman Tebbit between 1983-5. 
He felt that whilst the private office could have been run without 
advisers it would have been somewhat less easy and he would have 
missed them. One principal private secretary commented: 
I never felt when I was doing the job of principal private 
secretary that the special adviser was in any way a threat to 
my position and I actually felt that I could do my job very 
much better, and the Secretary of State could do his job very 
much better if there was a good special adviser working in the 
right way. 
For Keith Joseph the roles were not complementary, but 'quite 
different'. The private secretary's role was, 'service to the minister, 
not service to the minister's ideas ... They can't provide that 
particular pepper and salt that the advisers can. ' Such an approach 
leads to an examination of the role of other categories who work for the 
minister, and who might influence the adviser's role, starting with 
departmental officials whose traditional roles have included servicing 
the minister's ideas. The remaining groups will be looked at in less 
detail than the private office, which for most advisers was the key 
relationship after that with their minister. Furthermore, it is to the 
private office that reformers usually look when considering where an 
expanded group of ministerial staff should be located; combining with 
213 
traditional private office duties a capacity to service the minister's 
ideas, is often the central focus of such schemes. 
(ii) Other iv' Servants. 
In the first edition of his book, Meltsner (1976) suggested that 
American policy analysts, as practitioners of an emerging profession, 
were more shaped by the forces around them than were members of a mature 
profession. This was one of the factors behind his view that policy 
analysts were very susceptible to bureaucratic influences. Although, as 
we saw in Chapter 5, by 1986 he thought policy analysis had, 'emerged 
with a defined identity' (p. 300), his original comments still have 
validity for the UK. We saw earlier that advisers in the UK have a 
wider range of roles than even the diverse policy analysts. It is not 
surprising therefore, that as Klein and Lewis observe: 
To the extent that special advisers play a role complementary 
to the officials, as they do in their quasi-political 
activities, so they may even be welcomed by civil servants, 
who may be relieved that they are not asked to carry out tasks 
which might endanger their neutral stance. But to the extent 
that special advisers play a role competitive to that of 
officials, as they do when they challenge the department's 
monopoly of advice-giving on policy issues, there is a much 
more direct conflict (p. 22). 
Inevitably in discussing civil service influence on the role of 
advisers, evidence can be drawn from earlier points related to both the 
constitutional limitations on civil servants assisting with party 
political activities, and the place of specialists in British 
government. The role of most advisers involved some combination of 
party political and policy making activities. Jack Straw felt that as 
the relationship with his two ministers developed it became clear in 
each case what additional skills he could bring to any particular policy 
question, and where it became obvious he was duplicating what officials 
were doing he would drop out. Straw showed how, for a non-specialist, 
the role could be influenced in both major fields by the activities of, 
and/or gaps left by, officials. Given that the administrative civil 
servant was supposed to be politically neutral, he stated: 'There are 
things that advisers can do that officials can't do ... I was bound to 
have a deeper knowledge of the Labour Party than they were and just 
214 
bring a different perspective. ' On at least one policy, removing pay 
beds from the NHS, there was departmental scepticism: 
'so I got heavily involved in that, redrafting the consultative 
document, and things like that. It could have been done by officials 
but I think that was an illustration of where you had a very contentious 
policy it was useful to have somebody around who was willing to do the 
redrafting. ' 
Advisers were more likely to find gaps, or certainly be more likely 
to be encouraged by officials to fill gaps, in the political activities 
than the policy making ones. An official believed the Department of 
Employment was much more receptive to Rob Shepherd's positive comments 
about how to get the policies through than it was to Robbie Gilbert's 
questioning of substantive points contained in the submissions to the 
minister. The picture is slightly muddied by the suggestions from some 
witnesses that officials worked more readily with advisers whom they 
could recognize as being knowledgeable about the department's field. 
Labour ministers believed that the DHSS more readily accepted 
specialist advisers than political ones. Even on policy matters, Klein 
and Lewis thought, 'there is a subtle and complex two-way trading 
relationship between civil servants and special advisers. They are both 
adversaries and allies' (p. 11). There is evidence, however, to support 
their proposition of a greater welcome from officials for the political 
role of advisers. Certainly some civil servants thought that advisers 
should (or did) concentrate on the political aspects of the minister's 
life rather than getting too involved in the department. Many ministers 
felt the department could not provide adequate assistance to meet their 
requirements for political speeches to be produced and party liaison 
maintained. The greater freedom of advisers to liaise informally with 
party offices and local politicians, is appreciated not only by 
ministers but often by officials. By carrying less authority than 
ministers or officials, advisers sometimes gain valuable information, 
for example, that a local council's private position in negotiations may 
be different than the one it feels obliged to adopt in a meeting 
attended by neighbouring authorities. Officials usually wanted their 
ministers to be as well informed and prepared as possible, without 
having to endanger their own political neutrality. Some of the best 
215 
examples of appreciating the value of this come from the DoE: 
David [Lipsey] had a different dimension and it's a dimension 
the civil servant doesn't properly understand ... civil 
servants say, 'Ah but you know that won't go down well in the 
House' or, 'Will the Party like it? ' but we are talking, not 
from ignorance but from semi knowledge; whereas the political 
adviser ought to have a genuine feeling for the party policy 
and for, just as important, the workings of the party; who 
matters, who doesn't (Andrew Semple). 
He had extraordinarily good antennae and contacts in not only 
the Labour political world but in the socio- political world 
generally and was able to paddle off to meetings of this, 
that, or the other and bring back bits of information relevant 
to Crosland, and to the department, which no civil servant 
would have been able in any proper way to get hold of, and 
which no politician in ministerial office would have had the 
time to get hold of ... the main thing was to ensure the 
minister was properly serviced and there are nooks and 
crannies to do with the responsibilities of the very big 
departments which no civil servant can get anywhere near (Ian 
Bancroft). 
It is easier to show there might be a place for advisers in filling 
gaps in the services provided by officials, than it is to suggest 
officials have a positive influence on the role of advisers. There are 
some examples of the latter. Peter Davis, again from Environment, found 
that he was able to use his contacts with leaders of the Conservative 
opposition in various councils which were opposing government policies. 
He was able to feed his minister with the inside information he needed 
to do his job. Davis stated that once civil servants found he had all 
the channels and could get good information, 'they were very keen to tap 
in on it and I had civil servants approaching me. ' They would ask if he 
could get specific papers. 
Some interviewees questioned how far there were gaps that required 
filling. In response, others argued that even if officials could 
perform the political liaison and information gathering roles, the 
advisers had a different mode of operation which resulted in their 
specializing in this type of activity, rather than dabbling in it as 
bureaucrats tended to do as one of their many duties. Ironically, it 
was aspects of the advisers' general mode of operating that were most 
liable to be influenced by the bureaucratic environment. Advisers often 
found it desirable to adopt certain civil service traits. Malcolm Dean 
216 
recalls that as a journalist he was used to discussing ideas with 
colleagues, but soon discovered the importance of the memorandum. The 
point is developed by Anthony Lester: 
The longer I was there, the more I became a civil servant and 
the less I was a special adviser in the political sense. That 
was because I learnt you could only get things done by working 
with the grain of the civil service and not always against the 
grain. Therefore a conflict developed between the original 
job specification to make a nuisance of myself for my minister 
and my wish to get the job done properly ... I was determined to be professional and to adopt the same ethos as the civil 
servants while I was there, otherwise it seems to me they 
would have grounds to complain and I wouldn't be able to be 
effective. 
By saying that being professional meant adopting the civil service 
ethos, Lester shows that advisers in the UK have not even started to 
emerge as a separate profession. According to Tom Baron, 'six months is 
long enough. At the end of that time you end up talking, writing, 
thinking like a civil servant and that is the last thing the minister 
wants - he's got hundreds already. ' 
Lester and Baron are prime examples of specialist advisers 
appointed to help develop radical policies. How far there are gaps to 
fill and places for expert special advisers to occupy raises issues 
about the role of specialists within the bureaucracy that have already 
been examined, including the argument that if there are any gaps they 
can be filled by the department appointing temporary outsiders. It was 
claimed, though, that key features of the place of expert special 
advisers are the direct link with a minister, and their commitment to 
and/or understanding of, his policies and philosophy. Many officials 
seem prepared to acknowledge and/or accept that central elements of the 
advisers' role distinguished them from other specialists. A former 
permanent secretary felt that when ministers recruited experts, 'it was 
usually because they wanted to bring about some change in attitude. ' 
Given the conservative nature of most professions it was, therefore, not 
surprising, 'they would really want to hand pick their people. ' 
A senior official at the DoE thought there ought not to be a need 
for outsiders to provide professional expertise because the department 
ought to supply it, but Tom Baron brought in business experience and 
217 
status in relation to what he was saying. Furthermore, he said, 'when 
the department takes on an adviser it feels free to ignore his advice, 
but if the Secretary of State brings in somebody he has his endorsement 
and the burden of proof is on the department. ' This highlights the 
potential significance of the role some expert advisers could play, but 
Baron shows how the department can shape the parameters of the role in 
that to preserve his credibility he thought it important not to get 
caught by arguing too strongly in an area outside his expertise: 'if you 
venture away from the subject that you're an expert in, then they run 
rings round you and that debases your expertise. ' 
Most specialists, including Lester and Baron, believed they would 
have been in a much weaker position had they been appointed by the 
department and not had a direct line to the minister. As seen earlier 
(Chapter 2 Section D) however, Timothy Josling was partial exception. 
When he moved from being a special adviser to being a consultant to the 
same department, he experienced no great change although he might have 
been in a weaker position had he started as a consultant. Access to the 
minister was somewhat less but access to information was better as the 
role became more formalized. This is perhaps explained by the part time 
nature of his role and by his concentration on only one, highly 
specialized, part of the department's work. Josling stated: 'No one in 
the department could have fulfilled the role I was playing ... I wasn't 
coming in and doing their job. ' An official thought that Maurice 
Peston's role as a specialist with direct links to the minister was not 
resented by civil servants because they could accept he was looking at 
issues from a political perspective. Similarly, speaking of Peston, and 
his predecessor, Joan Mitchell, the former permanent secretary, Kenneth 
Clucas, said, 'it was useful to have a couple of economists who were 
very much geared in to the politics. ' 
Where officials welcomed the adviser as a specialist, they could 
have an influence on his role by generally encouraging him to become 
more involved in the department's affairs. Furthermore, officials might 
request that advisers help them tackle specific problems. At the DTI a 
senior official thought that David Young was 'good news' for the 
department in providing an input that they lacked, and developing the 
capacity of the department. A permanent secretary in the department, 
218 
Sir Brian Hayes, said in the BBC profile of Jeffrey Sterling: 'He zooms 
in when he's invited to zoom in and the great advantage is that we know 
that Jeffrey's on tap, he's willing to help and when we need his help, 
we seek it and we invariably get it. ' Fryer, 1989). 
This sub-section illustrates that interactions at the point where 
the administrative and political systems meet are complex, but the 
partnership models described in Chapter 3 may be at least as applicable 
as the conflict ones. Nowhere is this clearer than in the previously 
described regular meetings held between some permanent secretaries and 
the special advisers. However, that advisers had different, and/or 
possibly greater, knowledge and skills than those held by officials in 
specific areas of a department's work certainly did not guarantee that 
the civil servants would react positively. In some such cases the 
influence of officials on the adviser's role was an attempt to curtail 
it. Thus Patrick Jenkin thought that Roger Dyson, 'got across ... the 
industrial relations people in the DHSS because it quickly became 
apparent he knew vastly more about how it actually worked on the ground 
than they did. ' The experience of Dyson, and others, suggests that 
officials have a particularly strong potential to exert negative 
influence when an adviser becomes involved in what the department 
regards as its management role. The dividing line between management 
and management policy is narrow. Jenkin, Dyson opined, 'conceived of me 
as filling a gap, I think, in other words providing something that civil 
servants didn't provide, rather than doing something instead of them 
doing it. ' 
Finally, whereas ministers recognized that departments had well 
developed links with many client groups, new ministers often wished to 
establish relations with other, possibly more radical, groups or policy 
think tanks, or strengthen relations with a particular group. Advisers 
were sometimes able to do this and on occasions have almost a brokerage 
function with outside groups, sometimes even where there were already 
good relations between the department and the group. Examples include 
David Young and Jeffrey Sterling with 'the City', Tom Baron with the 
Volume House Builders Study Group, Stuart Sexton with public schools, 
and Ken Griffin with trade unions. In each case the adviser was able to 
talk to the group in a way which would have been impossible or 
219 
inappropriate for officials. Here again, advisers are seen as the ideal 
people to liaise across uncertain boundaries. Such thinking is not, 
however, universal and others believe that between them officials and 
junior ministers and the PPS can provide all the liaison a minister 
should need with pressure groups and political figures. 
(iii) Junior Minister 
The greater number of junior ministers in the UK than elsewhere makes it 
pertinent for Theakston to observe that, 'The proliferation of special 
advisers in recent governments has been interpreted as evidence that 
Cabinet ministers are failing to use their existing resources of 
political support as fully as they might' (1987, p. 98). How far there 
is a place for advisers to fill gaps that otherwise could be occupied by 
junior ministers will be examined, before the potentially positive 
influence of junior ministers on advisers is considered. 
Theakston claims one reason why governments in Germany and France 
are smaller than those in the UK, 'is that in those states top civil 
servants are politicized' (1987, p. 178). Robert Jackson has served as a 
political adviser; as a member, and director, of cabinets in Brussels; 
and most recently as a junior minister. He believes that, 'the 
functions junior ministers perform are in many ways similar to those 
that members of the cabinet on the continent perform ... [but] ... they 
do have, because they're political figures, an independent political 
position, and a high profile political role, or public relations role, 
that members of the cabinet don't have. ' His experience as a 
parliamentary under-secretary suggested to him that despite his earlier 
support of cabinets, 'if you thought of the ministerial team as like a 
cabinet and stressed its collegial aspects, you could do without a 
cabin .' Perhaps one or two advisers could be appointed to work with 
such a team. 
Special advisers remain, however, 'an understandably attractive 
option for secretaries of state. ' (Theakston, 1987, p. 99). In contrast 
to most junior ministers, they owe their position and influence to their 
personal loyalty to him; they are more readily available; and they 
sometimes offer impressive subject expertise. Much of the evidence 
220 
gathered in this study supports Theakston's view. But respondents had 
diverse views about where there were gaps in the services provided by 
junior ministers that could be plugged by advisers. Thus Jackson still 
thought there was some role for advisers, partly because junior 
ministers were unlikely to provide a briefing service on Cabinet items. 
Similarly, whilst Michael Heseltine argued that a minister did not need 
political advisers, he did appoint several expert special advisers. 
When ministers want to introduce more capacity for specialist 
advice to be given directly to them, they are not usually able in the UK 
to select a suitable junior minister to do this. Sometimes MPs possess 
expertise in the field for which they are given ministerial 
responsibility, and very occasionally a non-parliamentarian with 
relevant knowledge and/or experience is ennobled and thus available for 
ministerial appointment. Heseltine himself was involved with one such 
instance when the Conservative Leader of Leeds City Council, Irwin 
Bellwin, was given a peerage and ministerial responsibility for local 
government within the DoE. Generally though, Heseltine, in common with 
others, felt specialist advisers could make a contribution in a way that 
ministers could not: 'The junior ministers haven't got the time and 
they often haven't got the experience ... and that is why the fusion of 
talents and experiences is so valuable. ' 
Theakston also referred to junior ministers' lack of time. There 
used to be a contrary view, expressed for example by Boyle (Kogan, 
1971), that there were too many underemployed junior ministers. This 
opinion is still heard but many think there has been a change in the 
last two decades. Thus Brendon Sewill suggested that it was only as 
government grew more complicated that junior ministers developed their 
own empires, needed to spend more time in the House dealing with the 
increased volume of legislation, acquired tasks to fulfil and talks to 
give and, therefore, were not always available for chats with the 
senior minister. Brian Cubbon felt that the development of special 
advisers happened at the same time as the role of junior ministers 
expanded and, as explained in Chapter 4, Section B, there were the same 
forces behind both. Indeed, Cubbon's department, the Home Office, was 
one in which in the late 1980s junior ministers felt very busy. So much 
so that far from believing advisers were usurping their role, they 
221 
joined with the Home Secretary in successfully arguing for an extra 
adviser to be appointed to help them and relieve the considerable burden 
on the one existing adviser who had been assisting them in addition to 
fulfilling his commitments to the Home Secretary. 
Some still believe that junior ministers are not used properly, but 
this idea is not necessarily incompatible with the idea that they are 
too busy. John Hunt claimed they were 'too busy opening things', but he 
thought the advent of advisers had not been responsible for the lowly 
status of junior ministers, which had recently improved. The majority 
view is that junior ministers have neither the time to perform the full 
range of advisers' tasks - especially onerous ones such as speech 
writing - nor the availability to be 'on the spot', as and when 
required. This is consistent with our model of the place of advisers. 
The concept of the adviser as the minister's 'own person' was also 
a major element in the model because junior ministers are not usually 
selected by the senior minister. They may even dislike him and/or be on 
the opposite wing of the party. The argument was strongly put by one 
official: 
I couldn't underline too strongly how ineffective were the 
ministerial teams that I observed in the 60's and 70s - very 
much people who wanted to get on and do their own things; 
pretty awkward at working together; more jealousies and back 
biting than cooperation ... It ought to be that a special 
adviser is your person and offers you total loyalty and 
doesn't have an independent agenda of promoting him or herself 
on the political stage. 
However, the case for saying that there could be a place for 
advisers in addition to junior ministers goes wider and is valid even 
where relations are much better. Favourably disposed junior ministers 
will still usually have their own careers to think about. Thus a junior 
minister might not have the time to play an aide/confidant role. 
Richard Ehrman suggested, 'the special adviser is in the personal 
service business, and the junior minister isn't. ' Ministers who have 
been demonstrably happy with their ministerial teams have still been 
keen to appoint special advisers. The best illustration that even the 
presence of a strong friend and confidant in the ministerial team does 
not necessarily obviate the need for advisers comes from Roy Jenkins. 
222 
Despite having his former highly-valued special assistant, John Harris, 
in the Home Office with him as Minister of State, he still appointed 
special advisers in 1974. One of those advisers, Matthew Oakeshott, 
felt the junior ministers could not serve the Secretary of State in the 
same way because, 'they are not on call when you want them in the way a 
special adviser is. ' Jenkins asserted that there was still a role for 
advisers to play and he showed Harris could not play the role he had 
done in the 1960s: 'apart from anything else John Harris was only 
dealing as Minister of State with about one third of Home Office 
affairs ... and obviously without upsetting the whole ministerial 
hierarchy you couldn't bring him in on that which was the business of 
the other Minister of State, or even of the Parliamentary Secretaries. ' 
Referring to these issues in his recent autobiography Jenkins observes, 
'Lester came in May, and helped to fill several gaps. John Harris was 
not lost to the Home Office, but he had been half lost to me on the 
formation of the Government' (1991, p. 375). 
Several ministers stressed that the adviser's role was of a 
different order and lower status (if not always influence) from that of 
most junior ministers. Many advisers believed, in the words of David 
Cowling, that much of their work was, 'mundane, menial stuff, ' which 
ministers would not have done. He went on to claim, in common 
especially with others who dealt with local government, that young 
researchers in party offices or people in local authorities could talk 
to him more easily and informally than they might to a junior minister. 
Not all agreed. But perhaps a more contentious issue is the provision 
of political advice, especially on departmental issues. It is here that 
the argument was most strongly put by some respondents that a minister 
should rely on his ministerial team, rather than young political 
advisers. Heseltine linked it to a discussion about prayer meetings: 
I used PPSs, and invited the Whip of the department into the 
policy driving core of the department for the morning meetings 
[of ministers] ... for me that open approach is a strengthening approach and I found it immensely valuable and 
to me removed the need for political advisers ... the best 
political advisers are in the House of Commons. They have a 
combination of talent and antennae which add up to the 
political advice you want. 
223 
It is difficult to generalize about the extent to which ministers 
who involved junior ministers in prayer meetings also appointed 
advisers. Perhaps the two best known and successful examples of 
extensive use of prayer meetings are the Walker-Heseltine tradition and 
the Treasury team under the Tories. The former have made limited use of 
political advisers; even such an influential special adviser as Tom 
Baron was not invited to the prayer meetings. The Treasury ministers 
have made greater use of advisers than any of their colleagues since 
1979 and advisers play an important role in the prayer meetings. These 
contrasting examples raise doubts about how far the role of junior 
ministers, or a particular model of their use, is a determinant of the 
role of advisers in general, beyond confirming the case developed in 
this sub-section that there can be an important place for both junior 
ministers and special advisers if the senior minister wishes. 
There is a little evidence, however, that junior ministers can 
influence the specific role of individual advisers. Some junior 
ministers encourage the adviser to provide support for them; others do 
not. Stuart Sexton's role, especially under Keith Joseph, was strongly 
influenced by junior ministers in that some, especially Rhodes Boyson 
and Robert Dunn, were keen to involve him, and others were not. 
(iv) Parliamentary Private Secretaries. 
The central finding of our analysis here is similar to that for junior 
ministers. Namely, it is evident that there is a place for advisers, 
despite the existence of PPSs, but not so clear that the latter play an 
important part, in general, in shaping the parameters of the advisers' 
role. This arises because variations in the role of advisers do not 
correlate consistently with the degree of involvement of the PPS. It 
was possible for a minister, for example Geoffrey Howe, heavily to 
involve his PPS in the political team in the department, and yet also 
make extensive use of special advisers. 
The difficulty of making generalizations about the role of PPSs was 
stressed by those who argued that not only did ministers use their PPSs 
differently but also diverse PPSs wanted to slot into a variety of 
roles. Two of Tony Benn's PPSs illustrate some of the different 
224 
approaches. Benn records in the Diary entry for 4 December 1974: 'Frank 
McElhone ... said I didn't see enough of him and I didn't care about the 
PLP. He criticised Frances Morrell for being "an intellectual 
influence"' (1989). By contrast Brian Sedgemore worked closely with the 
advisers in a way envisaged by Benn in his 1973 article quoted in 
Chapter 4 Section A. Writing of his experiences Sedgemore included as 
one of the good things, 'the enjoyment of the company of his [Benn's] 
two distinguished "political advisers"' (p. 10). 
Whether advisers occupy a unique position that is not really the 
preserve of the PPS was doubted by several interviewees. There are 
unquestionably similarities between the roles: the appointments are 
personally made by the minister; there are no formal duties; and, in 
practice, a wide variety of functions evolve. In advising businessmen 
on lobbying government, Miller (1986) frequently brackets the advisers 
and the PPSs together into one category. This is symptomatic of the way 
they are perceived. Some think there is considerable overlap between 
the job of the PPS and that of the political, if not specialist, 
adviser. Ted Short, for example, thought that the PPS's role was 
nearest to that of the adviser. 
It was more widely believed, however, that their tasks are 
distinct, if complementary. This is examined by looking first at the 
departmental role played by some PPSs and then at their more traditional 
backbench liaison role. It was claimed PPSs were not playing the 
departmental/speech writing role filled by advisers because they were 
not 'on the spot' and did not have the time. This also limited their 
ability to act as aides/confidants. Further, being outside the Official 
Secrets Act, they lacked the routine access to information that advisers 
officially enjoyed. In the Rehr Qft Committee Qf Privy Counsellors 
QII Cabinet Document Security (Cmnd. 6677,1976, para 12), for example, 
the special advisers were included as a category whom the minister could 
instruct were to receive Cabinet papers, but there was no mention of 
PPSs. 
Margaret Beckett moved almost directly from being Judith Hart's 
special adviser at ODM to becoming her PPS. Although she felt her role 
hardly changed at all, because she already knew all the people, she was 
225 
no longer in the department all the time and could not travel with Hart 
in the same way, so there was still room for a replacement adviser, Tony 
Banks, in addition to Stuart Holland continuing in post. The 
distinction between the roles was clearer to Michael Portillo who also 
moved rapidly from being adviser to backbencher to PPS - but in a 
different department. He observed: 
When you are a PPS you are not part of the department, you do 
not have access to the papers. You don't go to meetings and 
therefore you can't perform as a special adviser. You are 
not devoting one hundred per cent of your time to the job, you 
have got lots of other things to do and when the Secretary of 
State wants you to bang off a speech or give him some thoughts 
on something, you just don't have the background that the 
special adviser has because he is there full time. 
It was seen at the start of Chapter 4 that one of the original 
arguments used by ministers in favour of the development of advisers was 
that, partly because of the need to operate within the Official Secrets 
Act, they were isolated. Occasionally, though, PPSs were involved much 
more in departmental business and at their minister's behest gained 
access to some papers. Several permanent secretaries, including Ian 
Bancroft, thought PPSs had been used to a much greater extent before the 
development of special advisers. He was not sure whether the role of 
PPSs, 'got attenuated because of the presence of special advisers or 
it became attenuated and therefore special advisers came in. ' Sometimes 
ministers who had been actively used as PPSs, including Robert Carr, 
made active use of their own PPS. Carr suggested he now realized Sir 
Anthony Eden, as Foreign Secretary, appointed him to be one of his PPSs 
because Eden wanted him, 'more as a special adviser', to be somebody 
with outside industrial experience and in the 'one nation' tradition on 
social policy, rather than being somebody who would perform the 
traditional PPS role of talking in the tea rooms. Carr's PPS at the 
Home Office, Nicholas Scott, was more readily available than most to 
write speeches because he was one of the few PPS to have a room in the 
department. Coincidentally, but almost symbolically, when Roy Jenkins 
succeeded Carr, this room was occupied by Matthew Oakeshott, his special 
adviser. Despite these arguments it is clear that since the advent of 
advisers, however much ministers involve their PPSs such as Sedgemore, 
they do not see them as invalidating the need for advisers. 
226 
Shifting the focus to the primary scene of PPS activity - being the 
ministers' eyes and ears and mouth amongst parliamentary colleagues - 
reveals a different picture. Generally it emerged that ministers 
considered that the major role of representing their interests in 
Parliament should remain with PPSs. There was some backbench disquiet 
at the activities of advisers - especially in 1974 - with some MPs 
resenting the advisers' privileged access to the minister and to 
information. Furthermore, in the words of one minister, 'MPs are funny 
creatures and they deal much more readily with someone who is an MP. ' 
It is not surprising that some ministers regarded the PPS's work as 
being distinct and it was obvious to the adviser that he was not 
expected to be involved in this area. A few advisers thought that their 
minister's PPS was not very active and therefore there was a role for 
the adviser to play in liaising with Parliament and providing political 
support. Some PPSs had a positive attitude towards advisers and 
encouraged close co-operation which was seen as a way of enhancing both 
roles. In such situations the role of the adviser was occasionally 
influenced by the activity level of the PPS. One long serving adviser 
found it much easier to liaise with the most active of the minister's 
PPSs on, for example, finding out what was behind a Parliamentary 
Question, than he did with the less active PPSs, when he had to do much 
more such work directly himself. 
Certain advisers had more contact with backbenchers than most; 
usually they had developed such contacts whilst working for the party in 
Opposition. These advisers, including Ann Carlton, could work closely 
with the PPS. The above-average involvement of Ian (now Sir Ian) 
Stewart, Geoffrey Howe's PPS, in Treasury affairs, including the prayer 
meetings, demonstrates that greater than usual liaison between some 
backbenchers and advisers need not be related to any gaps appearing in 
the services that individual PPSs would be expected to provide. The 
advisers, especially Adam Ridley, worked closely with Stewart. 
Nevertheless, they felt that even with the information gained at prayer 
meetings, there were issues on which the PPS could not as easily as the 
advisers have the sustained level of debate with MPs that depended on 
intimate knowledge of what was going on in the department. Ridley also 
argued the PPS could not, 'get back to the minister in the quick way 
that we could. ' Stuart Sexton also referred to the importance of being 
227 
able to talk to MPs from a basis of knowledge, and thought he was often 
functioning almost as an additional PPS. 
These examples are consistent with the model of advisers being able 
to act as channels of information across various boundaries. Generally 
such instances strengthen the picture of complementarity between 
advisers and PPSs, with the PPS having the status in the House and the 
feel for the Commons, and the adviser possessing the information and the 
position within the department. They could work together by, for 
example, the adviser devising Parliamentary Questions to be planted and 
handing them to the PPS to pass to a suitable backbencher. When 
meetings were being arranged between a minister and backbenchers, the 
adviser, for example Denis Healey's Derek Scott, might be in a better 
position to help organize the meeting at the private office end, but the 
MPs would probably expect to be invited by the PPS. 
(v) 'ýh P Office. 
The theme of complementarity is again significant. It is easier to 
analyse this and suggest there is a place for advisers than it is to 
develop any consistent pattern of the influence exerted by chief 
information officers on their role. Some ministers used advisers to 
assist with presentation because they thought the information office in 
the department was not very satisfactory. A few information offices 
were thought by advisers to be mainly concerned with keeping their 
minister out of the news or satisfied with taking a reactive rather than 
proactive role towards publicity. A number of chief information 
officers agreed that the standard of information offices varied with 
some being poor, and agreed, when the proposition was put, that in such 
circumstances advisers could help: 
in some cases, if there was an inadequate set up in the press office a special adviser would have to carry an extra burden 
in this respect (Donald Maitland). 
It seems to me entirely plausible that, depending on just how 
good other press officers are, ministers should sometimes feel 
that their press office is not sufficiently effective and the 
political adviser, who is more of a political animal, should 
be able to do it a bit better (Hamilton Whyte, Head of Foreign 
Office News Department, 1976-9). 
228 
It is impossible to make generalized correlations between the use 
of advisers for assistance with presentation and the abilities of the 
press office. A contrast to the above scenario was the experience of 
John Harris, probably the adviser most synonymous with having made a 
positive impact on presentation on behalf of his minister. The Heads of 
News Department with whom Harris operated in the 1960s included some of 
the highest rated ones two of whom, Donald Maitland in the Foreign 
Office and Tom McCaffrey in the Home Office, went on to head the Prime 
Minister's press office. Illustrating there was room for Harris, 
McCaffrey said, 'People would try to get from John a bit more 
information than they could get from me or others - he didn't usurp my 
role, which was to explain the policy; but when you came to the 
infighting and the intrigue and the political thing he of course dealt 
with the lobby. ' 
This also illustrates that the roles can be seen as complementary 
and that whilst there might be some overlap, the advisers are generally 
thought of as making a real contribution rather than duplicating the 
press office's work. In addition to the specific tasks of information 
work including sometimes keeping ministers abreast of likely public 
reaction to policies, some press officers have become very close to 
their ministers and acted as aides/confidants, if not actual political 
advisers. However, this does not happen consistently, nor mean there is 
no place for advisers to play these roles. Indeed, some press officers 
found that the adviser's stress on the importance to the minister of 
presentation made their voice even more influential within the 
department. 
The ways in which advisers were involved in presentational work 
were discussed earlier. Often this was complementary to the work of 
press officers, sometimes on departmental issues working in the way 
described by Roy Hattersley: 
The refusal to allow an increase at the Ford Motor Company was 
a Cabinet decision on a paper from me; it was a political 
decision so you would expect Mike Garrod would be talking to 
the industrial correspondents, you would expect David Hill to 
be talking to the political correspondents; in fact both of 
them overlapping. 
229 
Not only could there be a distinction between the political and 
specialist journalists, but also, as McCaffrey showed above, the same 
correspondent might hope to go further into the party politics of an 
issue with an adviser. According to one minister: 'being a little 
freer than the chief information officer, the adviser could say to a 
journalist, "well you know [the shadow minister] made an ass of himself 
on that and the real point is this ... " whereas a chief information 
officer has to be just that much more circumscribed and mustn't get too 
political. ' 
There are other ways in which advisers can go further than 
officials. A former chief information officer claimed, 'advisers are 
useful for floating ministers' ideas and trial balloons in a way that no 
forger marks show ... in a way that you wouldn't use, if it was highly 
political, your press officer. ' The concept of advisers being freer 
than civil servants to be political fits in with the model of their 
place, as does the idea that advisers are often engaged in activities 
because their ministers are too busy to do them. The two points were 
combined by Howard Davies: 
I did have a slightly freer reign, by agreement with the 
Chancellor and with the knowledge of the press office, to do 
things like background briefing for Weekend World ... and political commentators ... the sort of thing really that very few other people can actually perform. The press officer is 
the spokesman, therefore what he says is on the record 
normally; other officials wouldn't really want to do that. The 
Chancellor could easily but he doesn't have the time'. 
Like Davies, Michael Portillo felt the press office was quite happy for 
him to play such a role. He saw the roles as not entirely overlapping 
since, 
when they were talking to the press they couldn't really get 
in to the political aspects of the policy, whereas the special 
adviser can quite happily ... in a way the special adviser gets sent on the riskier missions too, you can trail something 
in the press without dragging the press office into 
difficulties ... I was really struck by how willing the press 
officers were to work with the special advisers rather than to 
see him as a threat .. or being in conflict. 
230 
The potential complementarity in the roles is demonstrated by the 
number of advisers who felt the press officers were quite happy to have 
others performing the more political tasks. There was a proviso, though 
this strengthens the notion that the roles were complementary: as far 
as possible the adviser should tell the press officer when he had talked 
to a journalist. Michael Dobbs worked closely with the press office and 
regarded himself as the 'political press officer'. He was succeeded at 
Employment by Richard Ehrman who felt the department in general, 
including the press office, 'was well used to dealing with special 
advisers and had them fitted in to its way of doing things. ' At the 
Foreign Office John Houston thought the News Department was, 'extremely 
good'. However, when they were, for example, rehearsing the type of 
questions likely to be raised in a television interview, his role, 
unlike that of the News Department, included considering, 'how is this 
going to effect Geofffrey Howe as a politician? ' 
Some press officers expressed support for the presentational work 
of advisers. Hamilton Whyte, commented that David Lipsey and David 
Stephen, 'were both helpful and valuable in that area ... they were 
allies. ' At MAFF the press officer, Terry Dawes, and the adviser, Ann 
Carlton, had adjoining rooms and would knock on the wall if they wanted 
to contact one another. They often discussed draft press notices and 
she would add political elements to statements the minister was going to 
make in the House. Dawes was, 'glad to have her political reaction' and 
felt 'she had a lot to do with political correspondents as well as 
getting to know senior agricultural ones. ' She always told him of 
conversations with agricultural correspondents when they contacted her 
and, 'that was one of the reasons why we got on so well. ' Similarly 
Carlton believed that Dawes was delighted she was there and stated, 
'quite often I briefed the press, but the press officer and I at MAFF 
worked very well together, he never compromised his civil service 
impartiality. ' 
One indication why some press officers may welcome the activities 
of certain advisers, and believe there is a place for them in 
presentational work, can be seen in the concern expressed about the 
position of civil service press officers in recent Treasury and Civil 
Service Committee reports (1986, and 1990). The 1986 report proposed 
231 
that, 'ministers who require their press officers to do more than 
present and describe their policies should make political appointments' 
(Vol. 1, pars 5.20). In its 1986 response, the Government asserted that 
press officers could go further than presenting and describing - 
provided it was Government, and not party, policies: 
Civil service departmental press officers are in exactly the 
same position as any other civil servants: they may properly 
be called upon to present and describe the policies of the 
Minister, and to put forward the Minister's justification and 
defence of these. They may not properly be called upon to 
justify or defend those policies in party political terms, or 
expressly to advocate policies as those of a particular 
political party. Ministers who wish to present their policies 
in a party political dimension have other means and channels 
available to them for doing so (Cmnd. 9841, para. 29). 
Advisers, by being in practice one of 'the other means and channels' 
might well be seen as not only occupying a separate space in the system, 
but also helping to maintain the position of the civil service press 
officers. Dawes, for example, claimed that the presence of the special 
advisers meant he, 'could stand back from any politically sensitive 
issue and say, "that is Ann's job not mine. "' In general he believed 
that advisers helped civil servants maintain their neutrality by 
'providing the service the particular minister wants. ' This theme will 
be developed at greater length in the final chapter, but for some, the 
combination of special advisers and civil service press officers was 
much preferable to a politically appointed press officer, although there 
have been some very good ones introduced, for example by Barbara Castle. 
Not all however, see it this way. Some press officers believed 
that the advisers were interfering with their work and at times there 
was anger at serious mistakes made and failures to tell the press office 
about contacts with journalists. Furthermore, although advisers' 
discussions with journalists were, on average, more extensive than with 
any other group outside the department, only just over a third had such 
contact more frequently than weekly. Some advisers kept well away from 
journalists. Clearly the bulk of a department's contact with the press 
was maintained by the press office, even where the adviser was also 
active in this field. 
232 
(vi) P=y Officials 
Traditionally, there was thought to be some decline in the role of party 
officials when a party changed from Opposition to Government. The 
development of special advisers has both accentuated this and alleviated 
the consequent difficulties. Writing about the CRD in The im on 15 
October 1987, Ronald Butt commented, 'Its young officials have less 
contact with ministers than their predecessors because ministers' 
special advisers are always at hand to write the speeches that once came 
from the Research Department. ' This suggests advisers are partially 
occupying a space previously occupied by CRD officials. A similar 
comment came from Brendon Sewill, former Director of the CRD, but he 
also showed one reason why advisers were thought to be in a stronger 
position: 'I felt a bit sorry that we were taking ministers' time that 
otherwise would have been spent with the CRD officers, but we were 
inside the Official Secrets Act. ' Quotations earlier from Douglas Hurd 
and William Waldegrave (in Chapter 3 Section C) illustrate that the 
difficulties of being outside the Official Secrets Act were one of the 
factors encouraging party researchers to press for advisory positions to 
be established. Many respondents, for example Nicholas True, referred 
to this as a reason why party officials could not fulfil the role of 
advisers. 
The official sanction given by Sir Robin Butler to advisers' 
involvement in the controversial area of asking civil servants to cost 
Opposition policies, has been reported in Chapter 6 Section A. Butler 
referred to advisers assisting ministers on, 'identifying the text of 
commitments together with any further interpretations and assumptions 
necessary to allow the commitments to be costed. ' (Treasury and Civil 
Service Committee, 1990, p. 30). True suggested that as an adviser 
examining the Opposition's policies, 'having the ability to have these 
costed and checked, and knowing what is going on in policy in the 
department, you are able to see what is significant rather faster than 
somebody who just came in as a researcher. ' 
Other advisers who had worked in their party offices and felt that 
these were not able to fulfil the same role, included Ann Carlton, Lynda 
Rouse, and John Whittingdale. Rouse suggested, 'they are complementary 
233 
roles and certainly fully understanding and explaining the Government's 
policy is jolly difficult if you are not seeing the papers. ' She added 
another dimension to the discussion by stressing that ministers, 'set 
store by the personal relationship with their own person in the 
department. ' This meant, however, that although Michael Portillo, 
adviser in the Energy Department when she was the corresponding CRD desk 
officer, was, 'very good', he concentrated his efforts primarily on the 
Secretary of State. Therefore, although the junior ministers sometimes 
used him, they also turned to her for assistance. The valuable 
flexibility inherent in the place of advisers is seen in many activities 
where the advisers were believed to be in a position to be helpful. One 
example was the earlier comments from Andrew Semple concerning the 
adviser being in a better position than central offices to help plan 
ministers' visits. 
Whatever resentment there may have been about advisers gaining 
greater access to ministers, those who remained on, or newly joined, 
their party's staff soon realized the adviser had a different status and 
could thus be useful to them. Many saw the roles as complementary and 
although party officials perhaps rarely influenced the advisers' role, 
they welcomed being kept in the picture by them and found some to be 
very useful contact points in a department. Sometimes when advisers 
were on holiday, party officials were asked to provide some of the 
political support that ministers had come to rely on from the advisers. 
SECTION D,. ADVISERS' EXERCISE QE DISCRETION. 
This fourth influence on the functions performed by an adviser is of a 
different kind from the previous three which all imply to varying 
degrees that the adviser's work is determined by factors beyond his 
control. The position occupied by a special adviser has been described 
as being a perch on which he sits and carves out a role, rather than a 
niche in to which he is slotted. Whilst it is true that there are no 
tightly defined niches for advisers, the extent to which an adviser's 
role is carved out for him by the forces described above varies 
enormously. One of those influences was, of course, the adviser's own 
capabilities, but the question here is: given the adviser has certain 
abilities, how far is he free to define his own role? The most capable 
234 
advisers were perhaps more likely, as was David Young, to be in a 
position to exercise discretion. Similarly Maurice Peston claimed, 'I 
was a bit of a free wheeler in the sense that I did what interested me 
and on the whole if some things didn't interest me, I managed to neglect 
them ... 
indeed it's hard to see my role as formal in any sense. ' 
Generally the degree of discretion is a product of the interaction 
between the adviser's capabilities and wishes, and the other influences 
examined. Smith's comments that ministers' advisers in Australia often 
influence their own roles, were noted earlier. Walter believes that, 
'the absence of job descriptions and the centrality of personal 
relationships mean that, in the first instance, adviser roles are open 
to negotiation, and to the adviser's own decisions (drawing on 
established skills and preferences)' (1980, p. 142). Even Meltsner, who 
thought there were a number of factors influencing the role, suggests, 
'the bureaucratic context has sufficient discretion or slack to allow 
the mutual expectation of both client and analyst to operate' (1986, 
p. 12). He also states, however, that, 'the bureaucratic context does 
not allow the analyst to act like other intellectuals' (p. 8). 
When academic researchers become special advisers there can be 
difficulties over the degree of discretion they expect to enjoy. Denis 
Healey felt that Nicholas Kaldor was an outstanding economist but, 
having appointed him, he soon realized Kaldor was, 'basically an 
academic economist who treated government as a laboratory to carry out 
his experiments. ' Healey records in his autobiography: 'in the end I 
did not discourage him from going back to academic life' (p. 391). Some 
of the greatest difficulties with advisers come when they have somewhat 
different ideological preferences and agendas from those of their 
minister and are determined to pursue them. A small number of advisers 
had sufficient discretion to perform tasks their ministers did not wish 
them to do and fail to carry out some duties the minister had expected 
them to do. 
For many advisers there was a degree of discretion but this 
entailed working close to, and in the interests of, their minister. 
This was well captured by Butler: 
235 
When I was appointed special adviser in the Welsh Office the 
civil servants were particularly wary of me because they did 
not know what I was going to do: but, neither did I. What 
happens in practice is that special advisers carve out a niche 
around their ministers once they have come to know them and 
their individual requirements (p. 17). 
He felt there was considerable 'self starting' and particularly in 
relation to party liaison he would often 'pick up the ball and run with 
it'. Tim Boswell thought that as an adviser, 'basically you are your 
own man, ' and that just by being around things tended to start flowing. 
A private secretary drew several of these themes together in his comment 
on advisers: 
You have to prove yourself, you have to earn the respect of 
other people on every transaction for a long time before they 
automatically seek your advice ... no amount of rules will help you round it; you do it by making yourself useful, 
making yourself accessible and he did that. They can have as 
large a role as they are prepared to take on, and the 
minister and the department are prepared to let them have. 
Some advisers considered that they had rather more discretion over 
particular subjects on which to get involved and, for example, brief the 
minister on a submission, than they possessed when it came to deciding 
the type of activities in which to engage. Care is needed to avoid a 
dichotomy between the concept of an adviser assisting the minister in 
dealing with overload - and therefore not being an extra burden whose 
work needs supervising - and being 'on tap' to meet the minister's 
needs. 
Advisers who volunteered their services tended to be more free to 
take initiatives to develop their role. Miles Hudson emphasized that as 
a political secretary he did not have any constitutional duties to 
perform and Sir Alec Douglas Home did not expect him to perform any 
specific duties. 
There are indications that certain advisers have had only a limited 
degree of discretion. Some were overwhelmed with work and found it 
difficult to establish clear areas on which they could concentrate their 
effort. Others remained marginal and lacked discretion to move into 
activities that were more important. In general advisers found pressure 
of events forced them to be less proactive and more reactive than even 
236 
some senior figures had originally envisaged. 
Some advisers referred to having many tasks that their Secretary 
of State soon established as functions which were the adviser's 
responsibility, for example, speeches, letters, and party liaison. 
Where the adviser had perhaps more discretion was in agreeing, or 
refusing, to perform functions at the request of junior ministers or 
civil servants. One adviser felt there was a quid pro quo by which in 
return for the drudgery of speech writing and party liaison he was 
allowed some involvement in policy work. 
The role of special advisers in briefing ministers for Cabinet is a 
useful example to use when analysing the interaction of many of the 
points raised in the four sections of this chapter. In line with 
Hennessy, the Treasury and Civil Service Committee concluded that this 
was, 'arguably the function that ministers perform least well. ' (1986, 
Vol. 1, para. 5.23). There is insufficient space to analyse the full 
range of theories and discussions about the nature of Cabinet 
Government, and how far ministers are permitted and wish to become 
involved in issues outside their departmental concerns. (See, for 
example, Hennessy, 1986; and Burch, 1988). For the present study the 
important consideration is the lack of consensus about these points and 
the corresponding inconsistency in the extent to which ministers 
originally appointed advisers to perform this function. Furthermore, 
some ministers who had not originally perceived it as being a reason 
came to see it as being useful. It was an extremely difficult task 
and advisers with the ability to do it satisfactorily were more likely 
to be requested to do it again. 
Generally ministers felt it was not an area in which they were well 
served by officials. This was partly because often the department did 
not attempt to perform the function - limiting themselves, where 
relevant, to a comment of 'no departmental interest'. Furthermore, even 
when officials attempted to do it, albeit reluctantly in the case of one 
permanent secretary described by Bruce Headey (p. 118), ministers have 
not always been happy with the results. Sometimes it is suggested that 
it could be performed by civil servants if more manpower was devoted to 
it. Ted Heath suggested to the Treasury and Civil Service Committee 
237 
that a private office should contain civil servants to advise on non- 
departmental cabinet items (1986, Vol. 2, p. 118). Commenting on this, 
Douglas Hurd told the 1986 RIPA conference, 'I doubt somehow whether 
this would in practice work very well' (p. 12). Hurd not only felt this 
was something his adviser, Edward Bickham, could be more effective at 
doing because he would be more prepared than civil servants to chance 
his arm and he would be able to contact counterparts in other 
departments, but Hurd also believed there was a gap created by the 
demise of the CPRS. Heclo and Wildavsky claim that, 'Politicians' 
collective deliberations on allocating public money are rarely serviced 
by their department's officials' (p. 141). 
When considering whether there is a gap for special advisers to 
fill, several features of our model again appear appropriate. The 
permanent secretary at the Foreign Office, Sir Michael Palliser, thought 
that there were economically literate officials in the Foreign Office 
who could have provided the type of briefing on economic matters for 
David Owen that his adviser, Michael Stewart, supplied, but, 
it wouldn't have been seen as an appropriate function for a 
Foreign Service officer and it would have caused problems in 
Whitehall because it would have become known Mr X was advising 
the Foreign Secretary on the Chancellor of the Exchequer's 
paper ... it would have 
been seen as wholly inappropriate to 
second a Treasury principal to the Foreign Service to advise 
the Foreign Secretary so that he could criticize the 
Chancellor of the Exchequer in Cabinet - in that sense you 
needed Michael Stewart to do it. 
The theme of the advisers being better placed than officials to do 
this briefing because of their flexible, independent status was also 
thought to be important by advisers at the DHSS including Brian Abel- 
Smith and Mike Hartley-Brewer. The latter thought that even if 
officials had the combination of intellectual ability and political 
sensitivity and antennae to do it, there is no way, 'to insulate them 
enough to make them independent. ' Officials providing such briefing 
would be answerable to the permanent secretary, who in turn would be 
likely to adhere to the line agreed amongst the permanent secretaries. 
238 
One more way in which officials might influence the role of 
advisers in this field was suggested by one adviser who commented that 
briefing as a result of contacting other advisers through the network, 
'is the thing the civil servants will always try to get a special 
adviser in to do because it is a wonderful way of neutralizing him if 
they want to do that. ' This is a minority opinion. 
How far advisers have discretion in performing this role can be 
examined at several levels. First, the choice of topic is sometimes 
left to the adviser. Second, for some of the general political advisers 
it seemed to be something they did if they had time. Despite strong 
contrary opinions it is often seen as something advisers ought to do. 
In interview John Hunt felt this was a role for advisers to play and as 
far back as 1977, he had told the Expenditure Committee: 
Most Cabinet Ministers have now got one or two political 
advisers. This is very much one of the functions they are 
supposed to be there for ... departmental Ministers seem to have more and more pushed on to their shoulders ... discharging their collective responsibility and getting advice 
on their colleagues' policies is a very real problem but this 
is something where I think the introduction of political 
advisers ought to have helped (1977, Vol. 2 (2), p. 758). 
Many official reports and commentators also see this as a major role for 
advisers. (See, for example, Klein and Lewis, 1977; Mitchell, 1978; 
Shepherd, 1983; and all the proposals outlined in Chapter 10, Table 8). 
How far advisers are expected to perform this, and other functions, 
leads to the question of whether there has been any formalization of the 
role of special advisers. 
SECTION 
, 
EVOLUTION AM FORMALIZATION. 
There is a dichotomy between the concept of the gradual evolution of the 
role of the special adviser into a fixed pattern which amounts to 
formalization, and the idea of continued evolution of the role which is 
inherent in the model of the adviser as an independent individual whose 
informality and flexibility are important. This section concentrates on 
how far the role has been formalized. There are several levels at which 
this could occur: the individual adviser; advisers in a particular 
department; and the system of special advisers. Any formalization must 
be largely a result of evolution because it has been demonstrated that 
239 
the introduction of advisers was not well planned in 1970,1974 or 1979. 
The role of individual advisers frequently evolved. But it may 
reach a stage where a minister and his department have a clear picture 
of the adviser's main duties even though he retains greater flexibility 
in his role than exists for most permanent officials. Several private 
secretaries, including Norman Warner, who were appointed after certain 
advisers had been in post for a while referred to the role of those 
advisers as being clearly established. To some extent they had to 
accommodate to it. 
At the departmental level reference was made earlier to how several 
advisers in departments, including the DHSS, the DoE, the Foreign 
Office, and the Department of Employment, suggested that their task was 
made easier because the ground had already been broken for them by their 
predecessors. Despite some attempts, however, it was often difficult 
for an incoming adviser to gain much benefit from discussing the role 
with his predecessor - especially if he was attempting to establish 
himself in a new department. Where an adviser helped in recruiting the 
new adviser, and explaining the role, this was naturally more feasible; 
and in several of these cases, including David Cowling and John 
Whittingdale, incoming advisers felt their predecessors had broken the 
ground. David Cowling commented: 'I had the great benefit of following 
not only Jack Straw but also David Lipsey and both of them are 
formidable men who had carved out a relationship with the department and 
who gained respect in the department. I was very conscious that I was 
inheriting the good will that they had created. ' Cowling, who seemed to 
retain this goodwill, illustrated how this would help in practice: 'the 
principle had been accepted to copy quite a few things to me, not 
because I was David Cowling, but the special adviser. ' 
At the DTI Whittingdale thought his 'predecessors had been good and 
had got on well with officials. ' The adviser, Michael Dobbs, who 
proposed him to the minister, and who in fact continued to advise part 
time, also provides an example of how goodwill can be passed on in a 
department through a series of advisers. Dobbs's successor in his first 
advisory position at the Department of Employment was Richard Ehrman 
whose comments about the department being used to accommodating the 
240 
advisers were reported earlier. Dobbs took over from Rob Shepherd about 
whom he said, 'Rob had broken a lot of the ground, so I felt no 
resistance at all in the department. ' 
Another circumstance which gives an adviser the opportunity to 
benefit from examining the role of his predecessor, occurs when the 
incoming adviser had been the relevant central office link with the 
adviser. Lynda Rouse stated that at the CRD she 'had always worked with 
the political adviser, making sure the message went to the backbenchers 
and party publications. ' She agreed that the relationship between the 
minister and adviser was important in helping to determine the reactions 
of officials, but, continued, 'I didn't know Nigel Lawson when I joined 
and they [civil servants] were helpful and friendly right from the 
start. I think I was much more helped by the bridges that Michael 
Portillo had built up. ' 
Where there were teams of advisers, especially at the DHSS and the 
Treasury, there was a somewhat greater need to attempt to establish 
formally each individual's responsibilities and when newcomers joined 
the team, others could help orientate them. Many of the DHSS advisers 
paid tribute to Brian Abel-Smith's role in establishing both a 
substantial place for advisers and a pattern of good working 
relationships with officials. Paul Chapman referred to Abel-Smith's 
position amongst the advisers as being pivotal and commented: 'I always 
felt he got on with the permanent staff extremely well and made a point 
of doing that. ' In the Treasury since 1979 there have consistently been 
three advisers despite nine changes in personnel up to the election of 
1987. Immediately it was known that a vacancy was going to arise steps 
were taken to fill it and maintain the team at full strength. Within 
this framework, however, there was some flexibility with the major 
topics on which each would concentrate being partially reallocated 
depending on the strengths of the new recruit. This flexibility was 
illustrated when Howard Davies completed his 15 months secondment; he 
was replaced by another special adviser and eventually a departmental 
speech writer. 
241 
Some advisers, including David Stephen, made an important 
distinction between conditions of work and precise role. They thought 
ground rules had been established in the department in terms of access 
to papers and treatment to expect from officials. However, the role 
their minister wished them to play was not necessarily the same as that 
performed for his predecessor. Sometimes incoming advisers deliberately 
wished to establish a different pattern of working from that of their 
predecessors. The role that David Hill had pre-determined with Roy 
Hattersley meant that Hill wanted to be much more involved in discussing 
and examining the policies of the DPCP than his predecessor in the 
political adviser's slot, John Lyttle. Hill believed, however, that, 
'after the initial period of fencing and working out everyone's 
position, my role in the department was properly understood and worked 
pretty well. ' The functions performed for Ted Short by Vicky Kidd did 
not really relate to his role as Leader of the House but were associated 
with his responsibilities as Lord President of the Council. When 
Michael Foot succeeded, much of Elizabeth Thomas's work for him was 
linked, by contrast, with the duties of Leader of the House. 
Many departments operated for a while without advisers, and some of 
those who came in after a break reported that ground gained by previous 
advisers had been lost. Despite there being a succession of special 
advisers to foreign secretaries in the 1970s, Lord Carrington did not 
appoint one and Colin Moynihan only briefly assisted Francis (now Lord) 
Pym, in a very part time capacity and was not formally a special 
adviser. Appointed to serve Geoffrey Howe in 1983, John Houston felt he 
was breaking new territory: 'there weren't any tracks there when I 
arrived. ' He suggested it was amazing how many officials, 'cooperated 
to a reasonable extent, given that no one in any serious way attempted 
to organize them to cooperate ... Nothing is ever done officially to 
slot the special adviser into the system. ' A principal private 
secretary who served a minister who had an adviser and his successor who 
did not, thought being a special adviser was, 'like rowing a boat 
through weeds; the moment you stop rowing, the boat stops. You have to 
make all the rowing yourself. ' A contrast emerges between the sometimes 
ephemeral nature of the advisory role and the great continuity and 
momentum of the department. Whilst officials in many departments found 
advisers useful, this did not mean that the role had become such an 
242 
integral part of the department that advisers were particularly missed 
when new ministers came in without them, especially in 1979. There 
were, however, exceptions. In the DHSS, for instance, advisers had 
perhaps consolidated their position to a greater extent. Roger Dyson 
agreed that officials had their perception of the role and coming in 
part time he could not be, 'an academic adviser in the Abel-Smith 
model. ' The Chairman of the Supplementary Benefits Commission, David 
Donnison, writing about his first meeting with the new minister, Patrick 
Jenkin, said, 
I also intended to press gently for the appointment of special 
advisers to replace those we had just lost. Tony Lynes, David 
Metcalf and Malcolm Dean of the Guardian (along with Brian 
Abel-Smith ... ) had together been one of the best teams of 
advisers assembled to advise any Minister. For the future I 
had my eye on two excellent people who had been working on 
social policies in the Conservative Central Office, and was 
pleased to find that both permanent secretaries seemed to 
support the idea (p. 163). 
Although Dyson's successor at the DHSS, Nicholas True, was full time 
even he felt that working on his own it was hard to meet all the 
expectations that some civil servants had about special advisers 
providing political inputs to policy developments and forward-looking 
strategic analysis, in addition to performing the presentation and 
political liaison roles. 
The reduced role of advisers in 1979 is also relevant when 
examining the degree of formalization in the system. It inevitably 
interrupted the process of formalization because Mrs Thatcher, and some 
colleagues, deliberately wanted to make a break with what they saw as 
excessive use of political appointees under Labour. By the late 1970s 
it had seemed as if the system was becoming widely accepted and some 
ministers, including Bill Rodgers, believed that development and 
formalization would continue to a greater extent than has occurred. The 
current of opinion at that time is captured in the following quotations: 
We believe that the installation of special advisers should 
become an accepted feature of administration. Only with the 
assistance of such advisers can Ministers maintain a level of 
political control over an increasing Civil Service 
(Expenditure Committee, 1977, Vol. 1, pars 148). 
243 
There is now little doubt that special advisers are here to 
stay. They have proved to be a lasting feature of successive 
administrations, a real assistance to many cabinet ministers, 
and broadly acceptable to the career Civil Service. 
Nevertheless, the special adviser system is still evolving and 
its potential has not yet been fully developed (Roger 
Darlington, The Times 18 July 1978). 
this system has gained widespread acceptance (Brown and 
Steel, 1979, p. 330 - see also their comment quoted in Chapter 3, Section D). 
Following the partial hiatus in 1979, however, and increasingly in 
recent years, the system has become formalized in a number of ways. 
First, there is a greater degree of similarity, although by no means 
uniformity, in terms of the advisers' age and functions. Second, there 
are advisers in more departments than ever before and it is very much 
regarded as standard practice for a minister to have one. In 1987 
political advisers arrived for the first time in the Scottish Office 
and, if Peter Levene's six month spell as personal adviser is 
discounted, the Defence Department. The position has now been reached 
where several publications (see, for example Miller, 1987; and Vacher's, 
February, 1987) state that in some departments in which there is no 
special adviser, the post is 'vacant'. Third, the current advisers have 
been specifically selected to fill a slot, as opposed to being people 
taken in almost automatically by an incoming government in the manner 
analysed earlier. Fourth, new ministers have increasingly had 
experience of serving as junior ministers in departments with advisers 
and so know what to expect from them. Similarly many civil servants 
have now had considerable experience of working with special advisers 
and have developed expectations of what the role entails. A permanent 
secretary today would not have the same excuse for misunderstanding the 
nature of the role as did the permanent secretary at the DoE in 1974 who 
thought David Lipsey should be placed in the department's Central 
Planning Unit. 
The evidence from David Howell is very important in the discussion 
about the evolution of the role and the diverse forces at work. He was 
keen on the development of advisers in the 1970-74 Government but by the 
mid 1970s was aware of a contrary feeling: 
244 
which perhaps explained why I didn't have a candidate lined up 
in '79, and that was that we shouldn't go too much overboard 
on political advisers. The best personal advisers to senior 
ministers were junior ministers and PPSs in Parliament and 
there was a mythology that Ted Heath had fallen because he had 
got out of touch with the Parliamentary party and had relied 
too much on special advisers and civil servants and so on; and 
therefore ministers should be careful to make sure that their 
first line of personal advice was people rooted in the 
Parliamentary party. 
In 1979 he was appointed as Secretary of State for a department, Energy, 
which he had not been shadowing and therefore, as we have seen, despite 
his sceptism about the need for an adviser he accepted the offer of the 
service of Michael Portillo, the CRD desk officer on Energy, who had 
originally been destined for the Policy Unit. Howell felt that Mrs 
Thatcher's attitude towards advisers changed: 'She started very much 
with a view that advisers were supernumerary but obviously with the 
growth of the Policy Unit she began to realize that they had their 
uses. ' He had a similar change of opinion: 'We came in thinking there 
wasn't a role for advisers and then we found there was, and they 
helped'. Furthermore, he is now one of the former ministers who, 
reflecting on the work of advisers, are able to specify the role and 
assess how well their own performed the various tasks. He thought that 
in addition to playing the aide/confidant or 'soulmate' role, and being 
proactive in some policy formulation, Portillo, 
performed the modern roles of research adviser excellently: he 
wrote speeches for me; he liaised with the party, the party 
machine, and the research department; he kept me in touch with 
the bush gossip and messages of Whitehall and Westminster; he 
knew what was going on from his talks with other personal 
advisers around Whitehall; he knew what was going on in the 
department. Altogether he performed admirably. 
The reduction in numbers in 1979 did not prevent observers from 
continuing to think of the system as established. In 1981 Heclo and 
Wildavsky wrote, 'By now the system of special advisers has probably 
become a permanent feature of British government. ' (p. xlix). Since 
then, the developments mentioned above justify the references, for 
example, by Rose (1986, p. 50) and Drewry and Butcher (1988, p. 50), to 
acceptance of the system. Butler (1986, p. 20) observed that, 'an 
individual special adviser's position may be tenuous, but the future for 
special advisers as a species is assured, under any government. Indeed, 
245 
the immediate prospect is for their number to grow gradually, and with 
it for their role to develop'. In keeping with this, the Treasury and 
Civil Service Committee reported: 'none of our witnesses was against 
Ministers having their own advisers around them. ' (1986, Vol. 1, para. 
5.21). Widespread, though not universal, agreement with this was 
revealed by the present study. As the Committee also emphasized, there 
is support for a further expansion of the system. Before scrutinizing 
plans for reform, the effectiveness of the current system must be 
examined. 
246 
CHAPTER EIGHT: ASPECTS OF EFFECTIVENESS AND LIMITATIONS. 
A major problem facing special advisers is the lack of a 
defined role. Without such a description it is hard to 
measure your achievement or to know what is expected of you 
(Butler, p. 17). 
Assessing the effectiveness of ministerial advisers is not 
easy. No straightforward measures of effectiveness exist ... As experienced administrators and politicians know, 
practically anything can, after a fashion, be made to work. 
Preferences for one set of arrangements rather than another 
cannot, however, be grounded easily in an understanding of 
what is better and what is worse. In the case of ministerial 
staff this is made more difficult by the diversity of their 
work (R. Smith, 1977, p. 133 and 154-5). 
Given the great difficulty in measuring effectiveness, it is appropriate 
to examine separately a range of specific contributory items. This is 
attempted in Chapters 8-9, a final assessment being left to the last 
chapter. In making judgments it will be necessary to rely mostly on 
opinions, in particular, those of ministers, advisers and officials. 
Some outside commentators also have valid views and there are several 
more independent indicators, including how far ministers who used an 
adviser subsequently appointed another. Probably the opinions of the 
ministers are the most important because arguably the major aspect of 
effectiveness is how far advisers satisfactorily perform what the 
ministers wished them to do. This is an important question in several 
of the substantive areas to be considered in this chapter: 
A) Activities in which advisers were effective overall 
B) Effectiveness of the network 
C) Limitations experienced by advisers 
D) Ambivalent attitudes adopted towards advisers by politicians 
and consequent difficulties 
E) Response of the civil service 
F) Ambiguities in the role 
247 
SECTION j ACTIVITIES I WHICH ADVISERS EFFECTIVE 
OVERALL. 
Generalizations are difficult because ministers and departments varied 
in their requirements and advisers in their abilities. Evidence from 
question 17) of the questionnaire is set out as Table 5 showing 
advisers' opinions as to the extent to which their contribution was 
effective in various aspects of their work. Despite additional 
evidence being available from interviews, interpretation of the figures 
is particularly awkward for various reasons. Fewest advisers answered 
this and they regarded it as the hardest to answer. Generally the 
answers mirror those given to questions about time spent on various 
functions. Some advisers specifically gave this as the answer to the 
question. This means, of course, that where an activity was an 
insignificant part of an adviser's activities, the answers somewhat 
misleadingly suggest he was ineffective in this field. Nevertheless, 
ministers and civil servants broadly agreed with the pattern of 
effectiveness suggested by the table. On some questions no further 
discussion has been added to the evidence from the table, especially 
where the answers are very much in line with the time spent on the 
activity. 
Examining submissions Od commenting. Answers to question 17a) showed 
the most significant differences between time spent and effectiveness. 
This probably partly reflects the nature of the 'sieve' role in which 
advisers had to read a great deal of material but only a small 
proportion contained anything on which they would want to brief the 
minister. Reference has been made to the way in which many ministers 
greatly appreciated having a politically committed and aware loyalist to 
check through submissions, even if they found nothing on which to 
comment. A few officials, especially in departments dealing with local 
politicians, suggested that they were relieved to know that their 
material was passing through the hands of a politically astute adviser. 
The difference between advisers' perceptions of time spent, and of 
degree of effectiveness, possibly also reflects the time advisers needed 
to spend on reading submissions in order to carry out other functions 
including speech writing, discussing issues with the minister, attending 
meetings, and helping with presentation. 
248 
TABLE 5: Questionnaire Findings on Effectiveness - Percentage 
Response. 
17) To what extent was your contribution effective in the following 
aspects of your job: 
Substan Consider Modere Slightly Insignif 
tially ably tely icantly 
a) Examining papers on 
departmental matters 22 23 30 11 14 
going to ministers and 
briefing ministers on them. 
b) Preparing reports on policy 
on departmental matters. 13 23 22 22 20 
c) Chasing up the progress on 
implementing the minister's 5 18 12 27 38 
wishes. 
d) Preparing briefs on non- 
departmental agenda items 6 21 19 22 32 
for cabinet and cabinet 
committees. 
e) Attending meetings of 
all the politicians 13 25 29 14 19 
within the department. 
f) Corresponding with 
party MPs, officials etc. 
/attending party meetings/ 8 25 19 19 29 
receiving party deputations 
on behalf of the minister. 
g) Speech writing. 34 24 20 10 12 
h) Discussing issues with the 
minister. 32 36 19 85 
i) Attending meetings, visits, 
receiving deputations - 
other than party ones - 13 19 20 14 34 
with the minister on 
departmental business. 
j) Attending departmental 
meetings and receiving 
deputations - other than 86 23 18 45 
party ones - on behalf of 
the minister. 
k) Advising the minister on 
(and involvement with) the 
presentation of depart- 29 27 23 7 14 
mental policy end the 
minister's general views. 
Cabinet Briefing. The responses to question 17d), briefing on non- 
departmental issues for Cabinet, are difficult to analyse. We saw 
earlier the very strong variations in the extent to which respondents 
felt that advisers should brief ministers on non-departmental Cabinet 
agenda items. They were mirrored in equally strong divergences of 
opinion (among ministers, officials, and advisers) about how far 
advisers effectively performed this function. Some, but not all, 
members of Labour's Cabinet who were interviewed agreed with Bernard 
Donoughue's assessment that: 
The introduction in 1974 of special advisers working to most 
Cabinet Ministers was another factor which improved the 
quality of Cabinet debate at that time. It meant that, 
ideally, Ministers received high-level briefing on fields of 
policy outside those for which they were departmentally 
responsible. This was especially important during the IMF 
crisis, when it was striking how wide a range of Ministers 
contributed to the discussions. This applied to the younger 
ones in particular - Hattersley, Owen, Rodgers and Williams - but included more senior spokesmen such as Lever, Shore, Benn, 
and of course the Prime Minister, all of whom were assisted by 
qualified economists as special advisers. By contrast, the 
majority of Ministers who were often silent - including Peart, 
Mason and Mellish - had in general chosen not to employ 
special advisers. Indeed, the regular civil servants in the 
Private Office often mentioned to me that the introduction of 
a system of special advisers had altered the way in which 
Cabinet worked by producing much wider debate.... Having 
economics policy analysts as special advisers certainly 
enabled non-economist Ministers to participate intelligently 
in Cabinet economic discussions (1987, pp. 36-7). 
Several interviewees thought the crucial factor was the propensity 
of ministers to participate in Cabinet discussions, and that those who 
were most likely to want to contribute were often also, therefore, the 
ministers who could see the desirability of appointing advisers. This 
highlights the difficulty of isolating particular factors. Whilst 
believing his own adviser had been of assistance, as had several other 
special advisers who were economists, one minister suggested that some 
of his colleagues could have been given Keynes as adviser and still not 
had anything useful to say. Peter Shore commented, 'I do think the 
economic background ministerial experience is crucial if you are going 
to have any influence in Cabinet and that to have your background topped 
up by independent economic advice, by good people drawn in from academia 
249 
or elsewhere, was also very helpful. ' 
In general, just as briefing for Cabinet was a more important 
reason for the appointment of Labour advisers than Tories, and occupied 
more of their time, so too were 1974-9 advisers somewhat more likely to 
think they were effective in the role. Overall, however, the patterns 
of ratings for effectiveness were similar to those for time spent, but 
rather lower. Various civil servants questioned the value of the 
advisers' activities in this field. Most advisers who were performing 
the role as one of many activities, felt limitations on time precluded 
them from providing the service they would have wished. Furthermore, 
they were frequently trying to comment on issues about which they did 
not necessarily know a great deal. 
Ministers often seemed pleased with the briefings from advisers. 
David Ennals, for example, found it 'very valuable'. One of his 
advisers, Mike Hartley-Brewer, knew that Ennals was using his briefs as 
the basis of his contributions, because they were the ones that bore 
Ennals's annotations. Even where advisers had not been recruited with 
this function primarily in mind, ministers were often pleased with the 
assistance they received. Where it had been a major reason ministers 
were usually very satisfied with the services provided by the likes of 
Michael Ards, Francis Cripps, Roger Liddle, Vicky Kidd, David Metcalf, 
Maurice Peston, Adam Ridley and Michael Stewart. The flavour of the 
argument is well captured by David Owen's comment, in his recent 
autobiography, on the activities of Michael Stewart: 'As a result I felt 
more confident participating in domestic Cabinet economic discussions 
and in the mysteries of international economics. His expertise was also 
very helpful when the Prime Minister invited me to the seminars he 
chaired on monetary and exchange rate policy' (1991, p. 263). Stan Orme 
thought Metcalf was 'invaluable' and said, without him he 'wouldn't have 
been so well briefed for Cabinet. ' He felt that 'initially the Civil 
Service didn't like him because it was an extra political animal as they 
saw it; not a Brian Abel-Smith, but somebody who was coming in to brief 
me about other aspects of Government. ' Eventually they acquiesced and 
Orme was convinced that Metcalf, with his Labour Party background, could 
provide the briefing he wanted in a way officials could not. On 
various issues Orme was thought to have made an impact in Cabinet 
discussions (see, for example, Barnett, 1982). Likewise, Peter Shore 
250 
commented: 
Civil servants don't find it all that easy to contribute 
independently on issues before Cabinet which are not the 
issues of the department. It doesn't mean to say you won't 
get a departmental brief on a submission from another 
department but it tends to be one that has been cleared with 
that minister's office - unless there is a real dispute and 
they are on one side of it and you are on the other. So I 
think the independent economic adviser is a very valuable 
person to have ... [As departmental economic adviser] we had Professor Peacock, and I had no difficulties with him in 
personal relationships and he wrote some very good pieces, but 
in no way was he in tune with my priorities and thinking. 
Similar points were made by other ministers, including Tony Benn at 
the Department of Industry and Roy Hattersley at DPCP. This illustrates 
two themes. First, the interest shown by ministers from economic 
departments in having their own adviser to brief on economic issues 
wider than their departmental concerns is compatible with Burch's 
concept of there being domains of interest in matters reaching Cabinet. 
Rather than dividing issues into departmental and non-departmental, 
Burch (1988) thought it more appropriate to stress that there were areas 
of interest and ministers might contribute particularly in an area such 
as economic policy. Second, and broadening the argument, some advisers, 
such as Roger Liddle, were able to provide a generalist briefing 
because, according to Bill Rodgers, they could cross boundaries and 
discuss issues more widely. 
Ministers often valued the assistance they received from advisers. 
They did so even if, like Bill Rodgers, they would have welcomed more, 
and despite evidence that many advisers were aware of the limitations of 
such a service and officials sometimes doubted its efficacy. Both of 
Edward Bickham's ministers for instance, Jim Prior and Douglas Hurd, 
valued the help provided by advisers and Bickham believed he could 
perform the function in 'a more structured and political way' than 
officials, even though he was acutely aware of the limitations imposed 
by often receiving papers from other departments which were not only 
late but also lacking in detailed information. The views of several 
advisers are well illustrated by the opinion of Lynda Rouse that Nigel 
Lawson valued her contribution, relative to that of the officials, more 
highly in this field than he did on most departmental policy matters. 
251 
An analysis of the role of ministers in Cabinet helps explain their 
positive attitude. In Cabinet, ministers are expected, often briefly, to 
look at issues from a wider political perspective. Here somebody who 
has a political background and shares their values, has an independent 
status, is 'in the know', and has some time available, can be invaluable 
in pointing out to ministers factors they may wish to consider and 
raise. Shirley Williams used both her advisers, John Lyttle and Joan 
Mitchell, at DPCP for this. She told the RIPA (1980, p. 100) it was, 
'one of the important functions of political advisers' and in answer to 
a question about having advice direct from the department concerned, she 
demonstrated the minister's role: 
no, I would very much not want to have that. You may say, 
because you'd rather live in a state where ignorance is bliss; 
I don't think so. I think in many ways one of the most 
effective roles of Cabinet is in a sense to put the detail of 
knowledge and understanding and commitment of a Minister to 
his department and his department's brief to the test; you 
cannot easily put it to the test if you yourself are no longer 
expressing the common reaction of other people in Parliament, 
or of the public, but are beginning to be coloured by the 
department's own set of attitudes (1980, p. 100). 
In explaining why he originally appointed Adam Ridley, Lord Gowrie 
stated that one reason was, 
I wanted to talk over the policy aspects I was unhappy about 
because I wanted to argue my case well in cabinet when need 
be ... as I was 
in Cabinet without portfolio I could take a 
fairly wide ranging position on things. I wasn't shooting the 
department's line ... It was 
better to have had Adam because 
I don't think a Treasury civil servant, other than on 
financial aspects, would have been so happy advising me on 
things outside my responsibility. 
Furthermore, although Gowrie was also pleased to discuss Cabinet issues 
with his private office, they clearly could not devote the time to it 
that an adviser could. Therefore, he believed, Ridley, 'saved an awful 
lot of time of my sweating up the stuff I didn't know; I knew it from 
the papers and ordinary political discussion like anybody would, but he 
gave me insights that would have taken me days to cover. It was like 
having a very clued-up person helping you with your homework, and that 
was a great help. ' 
252 
The DHSS under Labour stands out as the department where ministers 
and advisers alike referred to the importance of assistance provided by 
advisers both during the public expenditure round, and when the 
department's own papers were being prepared for Cabinet. There was felt 
to be some civil service unease at the attention paid to the advisers' 
briefings. Norman Warner, however, acknowledged they were, 
'particularly effective at public expenditure time' because, for 
instance, they appreciated the need to be brief and to add the political 
dimension - such as lists of new hospitals to be built in Cabinet 
ministers' constituencies, which would be threatened by DHSS cuts. 
Barbara Castle wrote in her jimmy entry for 9 January 1975, 'one more 
victory to make the department wonder how I get away with it. (In fact, 
I do it by very careful preparation and very well-prepared arguments. 
This is where people like Brian A-S, and Tony Lynes are so valuable)' 
(1980). Perhaps even more revealing is the entry for 4 March 1976 which 
describes a Cabinet discussion on a non-departmental paper she had not 
had time to read and on which, because Jack Straw was indisposed, she 
had no briefing: 'This, as Norman [Warner] agreed, was just another 
example of how indispensable political advisers are. Jack would have 
read it all and alerted me to any dangers' (1980). 
Prayer meetings. For question 17e), the slightly higher figures for 
effectiveness than time spent reflect the consideration that advisers 
are often actively involved in meetings of all politicians in the 
department, but they do not occupy much time. The importance of these 
meetings in the Treasury, and the advisers' role in them, was stressed 
by Campbell (1983) but rather dismissed by Bruce-Gardyne (1986). 
Several other Treasury ministers thought the meetings, and the advisers' 
role, were valuable. Describing these meetings in the , Chancellor 
programme, Peter Cropper said: 
it was helpful for the Chancellor, who, after all, had known 
us as people for about five years, to have around him some 
people who had grown into his way of looking at things, who 
had shared common past experiences, who could share a few in- 
jokes ... It was really all a matter of the Chancellor being able to try out an idea or a reaction on us, and being either 
encouraged or discouraged if we came out with the same answer 
as he did (Young and Sloman, 1984, p. 38). 
253 
Given the determination of the Chancellor not to have civil servants 
present, the involvement of advisers was important in allowing the meetings 
to be serviced. Several advisers recognized there was some civil service 
fretting about this but, according to David Willetts, the attendance of 
advisers and not officials gave the former, 'extra authority' and meant 
officials needed to contact them: 
Part of this operating in Whitehall is being able to trade 
information and influence, and if you know things that, maybe, 
would be useful to other people, it puts you in a much 
stronger position for getting information out of them ... because special advisers had been present at these discussions 
and had known what had gone on, and the minutes were quite 
rightly brief to the point of being elliptical ... they had information that might be of help to officials in preparing 
their advice. 
Ply liaison. The higher figures for effectiveness on party liaison 
than for time spent, question 17f), reflect an opinion shared by 
ministers and officials. A range of points were made in this 
connection. Ministers who played an active role in party affairs much 
appreciated having somebody near to them who was both more 
knowledgeable, and less restricted, than civil servants could be in 
this field. The role of advisers on Labour's NEC committees and sub- 
committees was particularly valued, as shown by the action that was 
taken to allow this activity to continue when it was felt to be under 
threat of a ban from Harold Wilson. Barbara Castle wrote to him 
pleading that they be allowed to continue attending. Liaison with the 
party machine was valued by ministers active within the NEC and some, 
including Bill Rodgers, who were not. Rodgers said of Roger Liddle's 
role: 'I was detached from the NEC Transport group and he helped in this 
field which I would have neglected. He encouraged me to write reports 
and he represented me at meetings of the NEC group. He did the party 
briefing on the White Paper. ' 
A number of Tory ministers equally valued the party liaison role 
played by advisers - especially those who had come from the CRD. Again 
good examples come from ministers concerned with local government, with 
Patrick Jenkin saying of Christopher Mockler: 'he was able to be a very 
useful channel for Conservative groups in Labour held councils who felt 
254 
that they could have a direct ear to the Secretary of State by ringing 
up Christopher and saying, "look, Patrick might like to know what is 
happening here. "' Similarly William Waldegrave thought that Peter Davis 
was a highly effective source of political intelligence: 
he was a provider of material of a tough, political kind that 
the civil service can't gather and won't gather ... not policy advice as such but saying, 'this is what is actually happening 
out here, this is what the Labour Party are going to do and 
this is their weak-spot, and this is what is worrying our 
councillors'. And he did that extremely well. 
Some ministers thought that officials valued the advisers' liaison 
work and certain civil servants emphasized this as the prime role of the 
advisers. 
5gCCQh writing. The even higher figures for effectiveness, than for 
time spent, on speech writing, question 17g), reflect the widespread 
feeling of ministers, officials, and advisers, that speech writing is 
something that many civil servants are not particularly good at, and/or 
are pleased to leave to advisers where possible. The difference between 
the parties when examining time spent is accentuated when analysing 
effectiveness. Of the 1979-87 Tory advisers 55 per cent believed their 
contribution as speech writers to be substantially effective - five 
times the Labour number. Many of the younger Tory political advisers 
were valued as effective speech writers by ministers and officials. 
They included: Edward Bickham, Richard Ehrman, Robin Harris, Michael 
Portillo, Rob Shepherd, Stephen Sherbourne, Andrew Tyrie, Nicholas True, 
and John Whittingdale. The importance of speech writing in the work of 
Home Office advisers has been highlighted and Brian Cubbon thought that 
most officials in the department would identify it as an area where they 
valued the role of advisers. 
Examples from the DHSS demonstrate why advisers were often thought 
to be effective in this field in ways officials sometimes found 
difficult to match. Mike Hartley-Brewer was thought by advisers, 
ministers, and officials alike, to have a dynamic writing style. Malcolm 
Dean illustrated the point by saying that Hartley-Brewer would be very 
good at putting lines into a parliamentary statement to get cheers from 
the backbenches and thus bolster the minister. In addition to being 
255 
more free to draft party speeches and the political elements of other 
speeches, some advisers recognized the potential significance of speech 
writing. Whilst, according to one private secretary, civil servants 
often viewed speech writing as, 'a bit naff, advisers saw the possible 
importance of speeches in setting the agenda in certain fields. Brian 
Abel-Smith's role has been described and the DHSS permanent secretary, 
Patrick Nairne, provided the example of a major speech made by Barbara 
Castle at Oxford. For its drafting, 'instead of turning to boring old 
civil servants, she had Abel-Smith and he was able to do it from a much 
richer vein of knowledge and understanding, plus, of course, his 
political sympathies with the Labour Party. ' Depending on the nature of 
the speech, Nairne was often keen for it to be drafted by Abel-Smith or 
Jack Straw. Abel-Smith himself commented, 'the outside academic may 
well find he has a skill in drafting which is of more use to the 
politician than that of the average civil servant' (, 27 June 1980). 
Lord Home described various aspects of the value of Miles Hudson's 
role in this field. Civil servants were glad that usually for speeches 
with political content, 'they could shift quite a lot of the 
responsibility for the speech on to him. ' In particular, for 
parliamentary speeches on Rhodesia, 'he was quite good at spotting 
points that might be made or points that might be omitted'. Home faced 
the same, potentially explosive, issue at party conferences and Hudson 
was, 'a useful fellow in those circumstances'. 
There are, naturally, exceptions both ways. Some advisers were not 
as effective at speech writing as the minister had hoped; and a former 
civil servant, Howard Davies, became a special adviser and was most 
adept at speech writing. Furthermore, there were occasions when 
officials felt advisers had made mistakes by interfering and trying to 
alter policy through the content of speeches. 
Discussing issues. This was the activity in which, overall, advisers 
considered their contribution to be most effective. Strikingly few of 
the advisers (10 per cent) answering this question thought they were 
only slightly or insignificantly effective. The various circumstances 
already identified when ministers particularly valued the presence of 
advisers to discuss things, included: travelling and/or breaks in 
256 
negotiations abroad; making decisions following meetings with officials; 
and reviewing or previewing the events of the day. Often, though not 
always, this involved playing an aide/confidant role. Various features 
of the model of advisers help explain their effectiveness in this. 
These include: being inside the Official Secrets Act, available, and the 
minister's 'own person'; and often possessing political knowledge and 
sympathy and/or subject expertise. Thus in the words of Keith Joseph, 
David Young was a 'friend and confidant and a sharer of perceptions' who 
was highly effective in two ways: 'one, he was a strong ally in 
private discussion on policy. ' A similar picture often emerges in Tony 
Benn's Diaries. Stan Orme explained that as somebody who left school at 
14, without therefore an academic background, he valued Metcalf 's 
ability to clarify issues on paper. In addition, Orme, who was widely 
admired by advisers and officials, shrewdly observed, 'I am the sort of 
person who really needed oral briefings and we would sit down in the 
evenings and have a think and go through it. ' 
Despite these and other important examples described earlier, 
doubts remain about how far ministers overall saw this as the area in 
which advisers' contributions were most effective. It is easier to 
accept that it seemed to advisers to be of greatest significance than 
that most ministers thought this. In at least one case a junior 
minister thought the Secretary of State used the adviser as a punch bag, 
and yet that adviser had thought his effectiveness in discussing issues 
was considerable. A partial explanation of the general discrepancy 
perhaps comes in the comment of another adviser, Brendon Sewill: 
it was more a question of him finding our discussions of value 
when he was making a decision rather than him taking notice of 
what I said. A senor minister is in a lonely position: he 
cannot try out his ideas or his arguments on his officials, 
for fear of ridicule if they are not well founded. So he 
needs an intelligent and well informed, but loyal and 
discreet, sparring partner. 
Depart, mental mrAjUL The lower ratings for effectiveness than time 
spent on attending departmental meetings and visits with the minister, 
question 17i), has several probable causes. First, the frequency with 
which many advisers found themselves attending meetings on issues with 
which they had little previous involvement, and the concern expressed by 
several not to lose credibility by commenting in areas where they lacked 
257 
knowledge. Second, the extent to which their presence at such meetings 
was related to performing other functions. Third, the comparatively low 
status special advisers often felt they had when attending meetings 
between the minister and senior officials, and the varying degrees to 
which advisers felt comfortable about participating in such meetings. 
Tony Lynes recalled he was not good at large meetings when the Secretary 
of State turned to him and said: '"Tony, what do you think? " That is not 
the way I find it possible to give useful advice. I want to go away and 
think about it and preferably put it on paper; so that wasn't a role 
that I found I was really good at, whereas Brian Abel-Smith, for 
example, was superb at it. ' 
Activities Q It minister's behalf. The low figures for effectiveness 
again reflects the belief that much of the liaison between officials 
and advisers is conducted informally, and not specifically on behalf of 
ministers. The effectiveness of some advisers at doing this was 
demonstrated by the way this function became increasingly important. 
This supports the comments from William Plowden: 
The major contributions of policy advisers, specialist or 
political, are that they help ministers to feel less isolated 
in the face of their departments; and that they can greatly 
extend the number and range of the minister's effective 
contacts with his department. They thus improve 
communication in both directions and, I believe, ministerial 
effectiveness (1985, p. 534). 
The effectiveness of some advisers in liaising on behalf of their 
minister with outside groups was also analysed earlier. Although 
advisers could be very effective at this it was an activity engaged in 
regularly by only a minority. Some ministers appreciated the ability of 
advisers sometimes to cross boundaries in ways that would be difficult 
for others. On one occasion a minister was able to use an adviser to 
arrange pressure from a union against a project which he no longer 
wished to go ahead with on a matter of principle. There were demands 
from other departments to proceed with the project; he wanted to be able 
to say to ministers that they could not because of the union reaction. 
He felt he could not have arranged the union pressure himself or asked 
junior ministers or civil servants to do it. The importance attached by 
Jim Prior to receiving advice from a range of people, not only on 
industrial relations but the economy and industry generally, has been 
258 
noted and, without advisers, he, 'certainly wouldn't have been able to 
keep as close a contact with outsiders. ' According to William 
Waldegrave one of an adviser's most important functions is to act as a 
representative, 'who can go and talk to the pressure groups and the 
outside policy groups and who can be trusted as your eyes and ears ... 
David [Coleman] was good at going out and you could send him off to 
places and people would take him seriously because he was a heavy weight 
character. ' Both Prior and Waldegrave suggested that it would have been 
difficult to have used officials in the way they used special advisers 
as secretaries to their informal advisory groups. 
Presentation. The answers to question 17k) correlate well with the high 
level of effectiveness at speech writing and the extent to which 
presentational work was an important use of advisers' time and a major 
reason for appointment. The Tory advisers were even more inclined to 
believe their contribution was effective. Whereas a quarter of Labour 
advisers answering this question felt their contribution had been 
insignificantly effective (and only eight per cent said it had taken an 
insignificant amount of time), none of the Tory advisers gave this 
reply. Tory ministers, for example Norman Fowler, often felt the 
adviser's contributions had been very effective and in Fowler's 
autobiography (1991) most of the references to his adviser's role 
concern speech writing or other aspects of presentation. His adviser 
for many years, Nicholas True, observed: 'one of my long running efforts 
that did eventually prove successful was to create a new information 
system on the hospital building programme whereby politically useful 
information was brought up to ministers in advance on a regular basis. ' 
Some doubts were expressed by officials about the degree of involvement 
and/or the effectiveness of advisers in press activities. Illustrating 
the latter point an official from a different department alleged that 
advisers, 'talked to the press incessantly, much too much, and gave away 
a lot of stuff - some of it intentional, some of it unintentional. ' 
General. The effectiveness of advisers in these various activities 
partially depends upon the ability of ministers firstly to decide the 
functions they wish to be carried out by advisers, and second, to select 
an adviser capable of performing those functions. A few advisers were 
critical of the minister's ability to use them properly. 
259 
SECTION $1 EFFECTIVENESS DE ADVISERS' NETWORK. 
The development of an effective network amongst political secretaries is 
a key feature of the Finnish equivalent to the UK system of special 
advisers. This is demonstrated in the title of Westerlund's book 
describing their role: Political Secretaries in Finnish Departments: J 
Informal Coordination Mechanism gf ft Cabinet (1990). The UK, however, 
did not see the emergence of a network as effective as some people in 
both parties had hoped. Analysis of the interviews reveals fewer than a 
third of advisers thought that overall the network was effective, but it 
is difficult to be precise because the diverse aspects of the network 
were variously viewed. Generally, bilateral contact, or (especially in 
the case of Labour) small group meetings, were seen as more effective 
than meetings of all advisers. 
Attempts were made to organize a network of advisers in each of the 
three periods since 1970, but the regular meetings of Tory advisers in 
the early 1970s only began as the crisis winter of 1973-4 developed: 'As 
things became desperate, the newcomers began to join the veterans in 
occasional meetings in my office at Number Ten. It would be absurd to 
claim that we made much difference, though we would have made much more 
difference if as a team we had come in to being earlier' (Hurd, 1979, 
p. 38). 
There were only infrequent meetings of all Labour advisers. Most 
of the early meetings were on salaries and conditions of employment and 
according to Darlington: 
those on policy have been comparatively rare. So far, policy 
meetings have been confined in the main to economic policy 
(and especially public expenditure) although there have been a 
number of other meetings on such subjects as devolution and 
human rights ... On the one occasion when advisers as a group 
were invited to an outside meeting Harold Wilson vetoed the 
proposal. It was in October 1975 when Geoff Bish tried to 
convene a meeting of Political Advisers and Transport House 
researchers to discuss economic strategy (1976, p. 52). 
Monthly lunchtime meetings for Tory advisers and the CRD were 
organized by the Director of the CRD but they petered out. Stuart 
260 
Sexton started organizing monthly/six-weekly lunches for advisers at his 
large office at the DES. Through their common background in the CRD 
many Tory advisers already knew one another, and the Sexton lunches 
proved to be a good opportunity to meet others thereby facilitating 
future bilateral contacts. Advisers without a CRD background recruited 
to play a political adviser's role, including David Coleman, found this 
particularly valuable. However, the lunches were generally not felt to 
be very useful in terms of discussing policy. There were grumblings 
that the meetings tended to be dominated by Treasury advisers. Later 
there was an attempt by Stephen Sherbourne to organize weekly meetings 
at Number Ten but it was impossible to find a time when everybody could 
be sure of turning up and they fizzled out. After Stuart Sexton's 
departure meetings were organized by Robin Harris, Director of the CRD, 
but they too petered out. 
There continued to be a network, however, with Christopher Monckton 
(1988) referring to a 'spider's web of young special advisers'. 
Monckton was an adviser at the Policy Unit, the staff of which were very 
much part of the network, as was the political secretary at Number Ten. 
Indeed Bernard Donoughue and Stephen Sherbourne were at different times 
seen as being at the network's centre. 
Several functions could, with varying degrees of effectiveness, be 
performed through the meetings and/or bilateral contacts. It was rare 
for an agreed policy, or strategy line, to be hammered out at meetings 
of advisers, other than occasionally on issues of pay and conditions. 
Nevertheless, particularly for advisers working alone in a 
department, it could be valuable to share experiences. The cohesion and 
effectiveness of the network tended to improve in the run-up to 
elections; the role of advisers in assisting with manifesto preparation 
was described earlier. The network could be effective in connection 
with the advisers' role in drafting political speeches to party 
audiences. Advisers to ministers who wanted help in pushing a 
particular policy could ask colleagues to include suitable paragraphs in 
their drafts. Alternatively, when they were composing a wide ranging 
political speech, or if the minister wanted to cover a particular topic, 
an adviser could check the details with his counterpart in the relevant 
261 
department. Sometimes advisers could use the net when there were 
bilateral negotiations between their departments and ministers. To do 
this effectively required advisers to be both skilful and trusted, but 
it is now recognized as part of their role, and in at least some 
departments civil servants are recommended to contact advisers if it is 
felt that they could usefully take informal soundings of other 
departments' views. This was appreciated by advisers such as Tim 
Boswell who claimed, 'the existence of a separate special advisers' net 
comparable to the private secretaries' net can again be useful to the 
department in removing or smoothing occasional roadblocks without loss 
of face. ' 
The network could be important for advisers engaged in briefing on 
non-departmental Cabinet items. Some thought it worthwhile to contact 
their colleague in the 'lead' department to get a feel for the reasons 
behind a recommended course and the drawbacks behind alternative 
options. Whilst some advisers considered it was also valuable to 
telephone colleagues occasionally to 'plug' the line of their 
department, at least one Tory adviser claimed not to pass such 
information on to his minister. Nevertheless, some ministers, 
especially groups of Labour ones, undoubtedly valued the ability of 
their advisers to keep in touch - particularly over issues coming up in 
Cabinet. According to Roy Hattersley, David Hill would tell him that 
David Lipsey, '"wants you to know that Tony doesn't agree with this and 
he will have to tell you he disagrees with it in Cabinet", or "Tony 
wants you to know he is pushing this, can you support him? " That sort 
of thing would certainly happen. ' 
One of the contentious issues over which the political advisers' 
network was mobilized was the choice in the mid 1970s of which type of 
nuclear reactor to order. The role of Benn's advisers in helping to 
produce the Department of Energy's papers for meetings of Cabinet and 
its committees, was referred to in Chapter 6 Section A. The CPRS became 
involved in the issue on the side of the Prime Minister and the 
Department of Energy's officials and, 'engaged in extensive lobbying 
throughout Whitehall', to such an extent that James Callaghan later told 
Blackstone and Plowden it, 'had gone rather beyond its proper role' 
(p. 81). Commenting on the support received from other ministers for 
262 
Benn's position in this intense conflict Sedgemore wrote: 'This may be 
due to the fact that Tony's political advisers had spoken to the 
political advisers of the various ministers before the meeting. They 
really are doing an excellent job' (p. 116). 
It was not only in contentious issues that advisers could attempt 
to use the network. Lord Gowrie thought that Adam Ridley, who was 
'built into, and knew, the network so well, ' was a great help in getting 
tax changes on charitable giving accepted by other ministers through 
contacting their advisers. 
Notwithstanding these and other examples, most advisers were not 
entirely happy with the effectiveness of the network. Various problems 
were identified including its incompleteness. Several Labour advisers, 
for example, would have valued having a colleague at the Department of 
Employment, and it was noted earlier that Bernard Donoughue was keen for 
there to be advisers in all departments. However, the major reason for 
the chronic weakness of the network lies in the nature of the adviser's 
role. The adviser is primarily the minister's 'own person'. His first 
loyalty should be to his minister. Networking effectively assumes, 
therefore, according to Bill Rodgers, a 'commonality of views on all the 
issues and a single destiny of purpose. ' Many advisers felt that such a 
situation did not exist, but, although there were difficulties, Adam 
Ridley commented, 'in general we had enough common interest for the 
system to work. ' 
Despite the undoubted departmental tribalism of civil servants, 
which modifies the constitutional notion of the unity of government (and 
there are even divided loyalties within a department), there is probably 
greater cohesion amongst the bureaucracy than exists between 
politicians. Heclo and Wildavsky (1981) have also demonstrated the 
existence of considerable loyalty to the Treasury throughout Whitehall. 
The policy and personality differences between ministers, and their 
conflicting career aspirations, restrict the degree to which advisers 
could have a loyalty to the collective entity. Furthermore, some 
advisers recognized that ministers, and others, might think advisers 
were getting above themselves if they became too organized. In the 
words of one adviser, they tended to act like 'squirrels' with their 
263 
hoards of information. Speaking about their rather unsuccessful 
attempts to organize meetings of advisers, Sherbourne referred to the 
unwillingness of people to talk and their lack of clarity about what 
they should do collectively, and Harris observed: 'by the nature of the 
way they are chosen and by their contract, they are bound to a 
particular minister, they are not bound to the Government ... currently 
all the forces are decentralist. ' 
Jack Straw believed the network of Labour advisers provided an 
additional channel and was certainly useful, particularly where 
ministers were trying to follow a certain line in relation to the Common 
Market, economic policy or other internally controversial issues. 
However, it was not as useful as he would have liked: 'I sometimes used 
to think there ought to be more cooperation between us, but the truth 
was there could be no more cooperation between us as advisers, than 
there was between the ministers we worked for, because our only loyalty 
really was to our minister. ' 
It is significant that the run-up to elections was the time of 
greatest effectiveness for the network, because these were the periods 
when the common interest was prominent. Several former advisers and 
reformers hoped that the network could be improved in future 
governments. Straw believed that the network developed between research 
assistants to the Shadow Cabinet in the 1980s was more cohesive than 
that of the 1970s advisers and he hoped that under a future Labour 
Government the network would be better. 
SECTION C;, LIMITATIONS AS EXPERIENCED X ADVISERS. 
Overall it is perhaps a little surprising that the special advisers 
thought their effectiveness was limited to such a small extent by the 
various factors included in question 18) of the questionnaire. The 
findings from this question form Table 6 and very little was written 
into the 'other' limitations row included as question 18k). The results 
from questions 18 a-d) reflect well upon: the willingness of the civil 
service to make the system work; the importance attached by many 
ministers to ensuring that their advisers were accepted; and the 
abilities of the advisers. There is some interview evidence that 
264 
TABLE 6: Questionnaire Findings on Limitations on Effectiveness 
- Percentage Response. 
18) To what extent was your effectiveness limited by the following: 
Substan Consider Moderat Slightly Insig 
tially ably ely nifie 
antly 
a) Inadequate access to the 
minister. 134 17 75 
b) Inadequate access to 
official information. 248 26 60 
c) Inadequate active support 
from the private office. 139 23 64 
d) Inadequate active support 
from the rest of the 65 12 28 49 
civil service. 
e) Inadequate experience of 
the way the department(s) 29 24 29 36 
operated. 
f) The tack of a proper 
position within the 
administrative chain 53 22 19 51 
of command. 
g) Difficult relations with 
junior ministers in the 014 12 83 
department. 
h) Inadequate knowledge of 
the policy issues. 3 10 14 17 56 
i) Inadequate time to carry 
out all the tasks. 20 20 22 14 24 
j) Absence of research 
staff. 17 16 13 9 45 
certain officials felt they could, when necessary, by-pass or neutralize 
advisers. However, with over 90 per cent of advisers reporting that 
their effectiveness was only slightly or insignificantly limited by 
inadequate access to the minister, question 18a), a somewhat different 
picture emerges than that sometimes associated with advisers as 
portrayed by Frank Weisel in 1 Minister (Lynn and Jay, 1984). A few 
part time advisers found difficulties in always getting access on the 
day(s) they were in; the problem for Gwilym Prys-Davies was exacerbated 
by his working in the Welsh Office at Cardiff whilst the Welsh Secretary 
was in London for most of the week. 
Whilst advisers generally thought that inadequate access to 
information, question 18b), was not a great problem, a number made the 
point that if papers were not being shown to them, they might well not 
know of their existence. One adviser claimed, in answer to a question 
about the types of information to which he was not allowed access: 'What 
the department, or individuals within it, did not want me to see. 
Reasons were thought up later'. He felt he risked being overloaded with 
useless bumph and deprived of interesting material but his minister was 
able up to a point to stop this happening by, among other things, 
insisting on consultation with the adviser before a decision was taken. 
Several advisers made a guarantee of good access to the minister, and to 
information, a condition before they agreed to accept the position. 
There were a number of initial disputes over access to information; 
sometimes the minister had to make it clear that advisers were to 
receive virtually all information going to the minister, apart from that 
of the highest security classifications, commercial information about 
individual companies, and matters related to civil servants personally. 
Several more junior advisers within teams experienced some difficulties 
when material was copied only to the senior adviser. In their accounts 
of their experiences both Butler and Cardona regretted, as have some 
other advisers, that they received copies only at the end of the 
process, when papers were submitted to ministers. They would have 
preferred to have been involved at an earlier stage. Sometimes this 
was, in fact, officially encouraged but advisers could run the risk of 
getting overloaded with preliminary papers and deliberations. 
265 
Advisers often relied on private secretaries to copy key papers to 
them if their name had been left off the list. This underlines the 
picture portrayed in answers to question 18c). It correlates with the 
earlier discussion about the generally good relations advisers believed 
existed with private offices, and how most recognized the importance of 
good relations because private secretaries could have made their lives 
more difficult (Chapter 7 Section B (i)). Private secretaries often, 
but not always, took their cue from the minister and were usually, 
therefore, positive about advisers, even if, privately, some wished they 
were not there. However, they would block access if they considered the 
minister did not want it. Occasionally, even where the minister backed 
the adviser, the private office was unhelpful. One adviser felt the 
private office initially regarded him as an alien intruder to be 
frustrated: 'an attempt was made to freeze me out. ' 
Generally advisers were slightly more limited by a lack of active 
support from the rest of the civil service, question 18d). Here, as 
with several other limitations, the post 1979 Tories felt the limitation 
to be marginally greater than did Labour advisers. This is perhaps 
surprising given the reputation of some Labour advisers, and the belief 
that there had been a growing formalization and acceptance of the 
system. It is possible that expectations had risen and/or that the more 
recent the experience, the more vivid the memory of any difficulties. 
More important, however, is that over three quarters of advisers 
considered this to be only slightly or insignificantly a limitation. 
Advisers sometimes found particular officials or parts of the 
department, less cooperative than the rest. Several advisers felt, 
perhaps naturally, that it was generally the most capable officials who 
could take advisers in their stride. 
Several of the most effective, heavyweight, advisers with strong 
ministerial backing experienced some difficulties with officials, 
especially when they proposed radical changes. Tom Baron considered 
resigning because he thought he could not get his ideas through. 
Various people, including the private secretary and a colleague in the 
building industry, helped persuade him to stay and he had successes and 
developed a relationship of mutual respect with officials. Anthony 
266 
Lester thought there were considerable problems with some civil 
servants, especially in the period up to the October 1974 election, 
after which the situation eased as it became clear the Labour Government 
would remain in power. Evidence was given by Home Office officials to 
the Select Committees established in both Houses to consider the Anti- 
Discrimination Bills in 1971-3 (see, for example, Special Report from 
the House of Commons Select Committee on the Anti-Discrimination (No. 2) 
Bill, Session 1972-73, Vol. 1, pp. 15-25). Such evidence lends credence 
to Lester's comments that officials: 
didn't really like the policy and they were minimalists and I 
was a maximalist on the policy and so we had that argument. 
They were not sufficiently self-confident to play it with all 
cards on the table. So they manipulated, unsuccessfully. 
That is where being able to work to the Home Secretary in the 
end was decisive ... The 
deviousness of behaviour was no more 
than you find in any large organization, it seems to me. The 
politics of the bureaucracy is not confined to the civil 
service. 
A minority of other advisers were never able to tackle the 
obstacles placed in their way or overcome the lack of positive help from 
officials. This was sometimes linked to one of the comparatively more 
serious limitations - inadequate experience of the way departments 
operated, question 18e). The longer an adviser stayed, the less of a 
problem this became. 
Lack of a proper position, question 18i), was only slightly or 
insignificantly a limitation according to 70 per cent of advisers. This 
raises doubts about the argument that the position or status of advisers 
within the department needs to be enhanced, perhaps by putting them in 
to the private office. Some advisers specifically commented that it was 
an advantage not to have an official status which might tie them too 
rigidly to, and in, the hierarchy. There were undoubtedly some who 
believed their effectiveness was limited because, in the words of Robbie 
Gilbert, 'You are a transplanted organ and the body is constantly 
trying to reject it - it is not conscious, it is an unconscious thing 
because you are not part of it ... I don't think there was any 
deliberate hostility - it's just that you're not part of the machine and 
you tend to get ignored. ' 
267 
PAGE 
MISSING 
IN 
ORIGINAL 
themselves as political advisers were not expected to be contributing 
policy expertise. Lack of time, question 18i), was considered to be the 
most significant limitation. Although perhaps it was the easiest to 
state as being a limitation because it implies criticism of nobody, it 
does correlate well with the answers to the question about hours worked. 
About 40 per cent of the full time advisers worked 60 hours or more a 
week and some of the 'part time' advisers worked 40 hours. This raises 
interesting questions about the position of special advisers. They 
might have been under particularly strong time pressures because, almost 
to the same extent as ministers, they were at the point where the 
political and administrative systems met and often had to produce 
comments rapidly on an issue that was new to them. Although, 
conversely, a few advisers suggested that unlike the civil servants they 
did not have a responsibility to 'spark' on every issue that came before 
them, those who played a sieve role often had to spend a considerable 
time perusing submissions. Tony Lynes describes the role well by 
suggesting there was 'an irreducible minimum of perfectly useless paper' 
you had to wade through to ensure it was useless. It was difficult to 
ignore any paper and say: 
'well, I don't think that is important enough for me to bother 
about', or, 'I don't think that is something I know enough 
about to make any useful input' ... because you felt it was 
actually your job if ministers were being asked to make a 
decision within your field of competence, then you must try 
and read all the papers. 
How far the adviser felt time to be a major limitation was 
partially linked to the type of role adopted. Where an adviser had wide 
ranging roles, such as the adviser whose diary of a month's work was 
reproduced earlier (Chapter 6 Section A), the adviser might be more 
likely to comment, 'I have this self-pitying feeling of being grossly 
overworked most of the time. ' If an advisory role was seen as full time 
it proved a limitation to perform it on a part time basis. When Maurice 
Peston changed from full time to part time, he felt this diminished the 
effectiveness of the role he could play, a view shared by Roy 
Hattersley: 'I think you need him to be always there... looking at 
things on his own initiative, turning things over himself. ' Roger Dyson 
explained he could not meet the civil servants' expectations of the role 
as it had been performed by Brian Abel-Smith: 
269 
a senior adviser who is full time and who works with officials 
becomes a sort of deputy secretary in all but name ... a part timer cannot fit in to the civil service deputy secretary 
model because a part timer isn't there when he is wanted, 
isn't in the room when he can be called to a meeting and 
therefore his contacts with civil servants become 
formalized ... doing one 
day a week officially, you can't work 
in the civil service mould. 
Sometimes advisers, including David Metcalf, started on a full time 
basis, and when they became part time they felt they had developed 
sufficient knowledge and contacts to ensure that by establishing 
priorities they could still cover the important tasks. Such an approach 
endorses the advice contained in the Fabian evidence to the Fulton 
Committee: 'Experience suggests that the irregular in an administrative 
post or in a "research" or "policy planning" job is wise to begin his 
period of work on a full time basis' (1968, Vol. 5 (2), p. 562). Two 
Labour Secretaries of State for Trade, Peter Shore and John Smith, and 
their advisers, Michael Artis, Vincent Cable and Michael Stewart, 
believed that performing the advisory role on a part time basis was a 
limitation. After serving in a part time capacity for several years, 
Michael Dobbs argued for John Whittingdale to be brought in, 'to broaden 
the scope of the operation. ' Dobbs commented: 'Part time is not 
satisfactory; it is not something that I would particularly recommend 
because being a political adviser is not an easy job anyway. ' 
Some full time advisers who worked alone in a department opined that 
the time pressures on a single adviser were too great. Darlington 
wrote: 'The volume of work and the pace of events is such that one 
Adviser can only provide a limited service based on a narrow selection 
of the most politically important departmental and non-departmental 
issues. ' (1976, p. 51). However, perhaps the key factor in determining 
how far time pressures were regarded as a limitation was the extent of 
the role that the adviser was expected, or wanted, to play. The 
advisers who thought inadequate time was a substantial limitation were 
almost equally divided between working alone, and having at least one 
colleague. 
The largest responses to question 18j) were at the two extremes, 
reflecting a marked divergence of opinion about the potential value to 
270 
advisers of research assistance. Discussion in the interviews broadened 
into a general assessment of how far the help provided for advisers 
matched their requirements. Several advisers were severely limited by 
having no secretarial provision or having to rely on private office 
staff or a general typing pool. Many advisers were satisfied with their 
secretaries, even if, as in some cases, it took a while to secure them. 
Sometimes there were problems with the work they could perform, with 
disputes, for example, over whether it extended to filing in addition to 
typing. A few advisers were provided with assistants or private 
secretaries. Describing a period some time after he became a special 
adviser, David Young writes, 'By now I was spending so much time with 
ministers that I was given new quarters. Now I had a ministerial suite 
on the seventh floor, a large room with windows on three sides, and next 
door I now had my own private office. My first Private Secretary came 
from Treasury' (p. 53). 
The pattern was retained at the DTI of having somebody to link 
between the advisers and the department, and 'flag' papers on which the 
advisers might wish to comment. In the Foreign Office, Michael Stewart 
initially thought not having an assistant was a limitation and after a 
while, with the support of David Owen, an assistant joined Stewart from 
the economic section. 
Generally, advisers who felt that the lack of an equivalent person 
in their department was a limitation, would have preferred an assistant 
to a researcher, and would have favoured a civil servant - perhaps at 
executive officer level - rather than the arrangement at the DHSS where 
Brian Abel-Smith had another adviser working to him. It was felt that 
although a civil servant would be restricted from performing overtly 
political tasks, this would be outweighed by their knowledge of, and 
acceptability to, the department. Others felt it was advantageous not 
to have an assistant because they would not have wanted to have spent 
time organizing such a person's work. 
One reason why, as with their pay, there were limitations on the 
resources that could be devoted to advisers was the constant danger that 
there would be complaints, especially from MPs, about the favourable 
treatment afforded them. On 29 July 1974, for example, a Government 
271 
backbencher, John Prescott, complained to the Leader of the House about 
the secretarial allowances and facilities for MPs in the following 
ironic terms: 'does he agree that this also means that political 
advisers, who get more for their secretaries and their facilities than a 
Member of Parliament, contribute more than we do to the political 
system? '(Official $, Vol. 878, col. 34). 
Several advisers thought it was a limitation their office was not 
nearer to that of their minister, so that they would be immediately 
available and more aware of comings and goings. Others, believing it 
would be a limitation not to be near the minister, successfully fought 
battles to secure an appropriate office. One adviser was installed on 
the morning of his arrival in an office next door to the minister and 
the private office. After lunch, the permanent secretary came in to 
apologize for a 'very embarrassing' mistake. He then conducted the 
adviser to an enormous office one floor down; the adviser wistfully 
commented, 'I remained there, under protest after the implications 
became clear. ' For a few advisers the problems over an office were an 
aspect of the limitations of being part time. Michael Artis thought 
that, 'the system wasn't set up to provide for this requirement of 
having a room near the minister once a week, not always on the same 
day. ' 
A few advisers, including John Cope and Miles Hudson, thought it an 
advantage to be inside the private office but Tom McNally saw it, on 
balance, as a limitation and moved out. Brendon Sewill also moved out 
of the private office, but into a room close to Tony Barber who had a 
buzzer on his desk with which he frequently summoned his adviser. Most 
advisers expressed a preference for their own room as close as possible 
to the minister's. Since 1974, over two-thirds of advisers have had an 
office on the same floor as the minister, with about a third of those 
being opposite or adjacent to him. 
The debate about the importance of the position of the office is 
sometimes conducted in terms of Yz fir. George Cardona's 
reference to his mistakenly expecting to be obstructed on becoming a 
Treasury adviser was quoted earlier. In his article in MM Times on 11 
November 1981 he continued: 
272 
I soon realized that the Treasury civil servants had also 
absorbed the 'Yes Minister' myth that officials obstruct 
ministers and advisers. An important part of the myth is that 
an adviser must be given an office near the minister, and that 
the Civil Service will do its best to prevent this happening. 
I realized how powerful the myth was on my first contact with 
the Treasury. I was telephoned by the Establishment Officer 
who said: 'A room is ready for you. It is very near the 
Chancellor. ' The security guard who met me at the door, and 
the messenger who took me to my room, expressed their delight 
that I had been given an office near the Chancellor. So did 
the woman who brought me tea several times a day. 
By contrast Ann Carlton had two very different experiences of 
rooms. She was happy with the 'strategically placed' room at MAFF on 
which she had insisted, but had been dissatisfied at having inherited a 
room at the DoE several floors below the minister and had 'camped out' 
in the private office for much of the time. In Tribune on 19 December 
1986 she wrote: 
In Dorothy, the Prime Minister's adviser, the script writers 
of the BBC Television programme, Y-ca Pie Minister, have 
created a character whose tactics aspirant advisers to the 
next Labour government would do well to study. The first 
thing to learn from Dorothy is that the location of the 
advisers' rooms is very important. It is essential that they 
are very near their Ministers so that the advisers know what 
is going on all the time. The civil service will want them as 
far away from Ministers as possible. 
A few other limitations were caused by particular circumstances of 
the department or the adviser. Some advisers, including Roger 
Darlington, felt that their age was a disadvantage. Although academics 
possibly found it easier than some others to spend a few years as 
advisers - full time or part time - some encountered difficulties and 
Blackstone (1980) analyses various reasons why United States 
administrations recruit so many more academics than those in the UK. 
Finally the particular limitations of being an adviser in the Welsh 
Office are described by Thomas (1987): 
an adviser in the Welsh Office is likely to be frustrated if 
the ministry's own civil servants are not themselves 
sufficiently involved in the early stages of policy 
formulation. The breadth of functions in the Welsh Office 
will also be a problem ... An adviser (like a minister) who 
wanted distinctive Welsh initiatives would threaten to upset a 
273 
Whitehall consensus as well as creating additional work 
(p. 173-4). 
It is evident from this section, and earlier chapters, that the 
attitude adopted towards advisers by politicians and bureaucrats varies 
enormously. Some of these diverse views, and the impact they have on 
advisers, are now examined in detail. 
SECTION DI THE AMBIVALENT ATTITUDE ADOPTED TOWARDS 
ADVISERS BY POLITICIANS AND CONSEQUENT DIFFICULTIES. 
Ministers. 
Some ministers were not keen on appointing advisers and yet were 
prevailed upon to do so. Where this reluctance continued, or when, as 
happened in a few cases, the minister became disillusioned with the 
adviser, it was soon detected by officials and the adviser was 
marginalised. According to one permanent secretary some of his 
colleagues reported that their ministers regarded advisers as 'monkeys 
on their back'. Another permanent secretary suggested that some 
ministers were always suspicious that it was another minister's adviser 
who was responsible for leaks. However, he stated, 'I don't think it 
was that source'. Sometimes when advisers became involved in issues 
involving other departments, ministers in those departments disliked the 
advisers' activity. One adviser reported that a Minister of State in a 
different department unsuccessfully asked his Secretary of State to 
dismiss him over some dispute. 
An adviser whose activities were strongly criticized by other 
ministers was the 'precursor' of the advisers, John Harris. According 
to Roy Jenkins's biographer, John Campbell, in the mid-sixties Harris, 
'was assiduous and extraordinarily skilful in promoting Jenkins in the 
press as Labour's one successful Minister in a general picture of 
incompetence and economic failure. His activity was not unnaturally 
resented by Jenkins' senior colleagues' (1983, p. 99). The diarists 
Richard Crossman, Barbara Castle, and, according to his wife's 
biography, Tony Crosland, all recorded critical comments about Harris's 
role. On 22 November 1968, Crossman, for example, reported on a Cabinet 
meeting: 'on the whole there was a universal conviction in that room 
274 
that John Harris had become Roy's evil genius and that Roy was sitting 
in an ivory tower with John Harris and David Dowler, cut off from the 
rest of the world, planning Roy's political future' (1977, p. 269). 
Harris argued that although he retained his lobby card and talked to his 
friends in the lobby, he did not get in the way of the department's 
'very good' information officer, Tom McCaffrey, and that, 'if Roy 
Jenkins got a good press, it was because he was a damn good minister. 
Harris also stressed that his role was much wider than just being the 
public relations officer his critics liked to portray. 
There is an important reason for this reference to Harris's perhaps 
exceptional role. It highlights the difficulty of generalizing from the 
statement that 'advisers are appreciated by the minister receiving the 
services they can successfully supply', to the proposition that, 'they 
are appreciated throughout the system of government for the 
strengthening they provide to the effectiveness of the Government as a 
whole. ' Nevertheless, in some cases ministers who did not appoint 
advisers accepted that others might find them useful. 
Parliament. 
Backbench MPs have at times been highly critical of special advisers, 
with a number of Tories, along with some newspapers, running what 
amounted to a campaign against the newly appointed Labour advisers in 
the mid 1970s. As seen in Chapter 2, Ian Gow asked a series of 
Parliamentary Questions on the subject. Tories were concerned about 
both the cost (in particular the use of public funds to provide 
political advice) and the Government's refusal to provide either 
information on individual adviser's salaries or a copy of official 
guidance given to ministers on the use of advisers. Furthermore, on 21 
June 1976, Gow, as part of a question, asked Charles Morris, 'whether he 
is satisfied that none of the leaks to which my hon. Friend has referred 
came from those special advisers? ' Included in his reply Morris said: 
275 
The hon. Gentleman has tabled over 30 Questions on special 
advisers in recent months. In addition he has asked a host of 
supplementary questions, and on 23rd March we had an 
Adjournment debate initiated by the same hon. Gentleman in 
respect of special advisers. With the greatest of respect I 
appeal to the hon. Gentleman, without infringing any of his 
parliamentary rights and responsibilities, to bring this 
squalid campaign against special advisers to an end so that 
they can get on with the job (Official Report. Vol. 913, 
col. 1091). 
Unease about the role of advisers was not, however, confined to the 
Opposition benches. According to Margaret Beckett, some in the 
Parliamentary Labour Party were strongly against advisers because they 
believed backbenchers were left out anyway, and this would make it 
worse. Opinions were divided and support for advisers came, for 
example, in the 1977 report from the Expenditure Committee which, as 
noted previously, called for the expansion and acceptance of the system. 
Nevertheless, the generally hostile atmosphere that prevailed at times 
in Parliament probably contributed to the restricted development of the 
system after an explosion in numbers following the election of the 1974 
Labour Government. Indeed Knight (1990, p. 105) even claims that, 'The 
Callaghan Government (1976-9), as a result of fierce Tory opposition, 
reduced the number of these political apparatchiks from 29 to 24. ' 
During Business Questions in the House of Commons on 27 June 1974 the 
Leader of the Opposition, Edward Heath, requested a parliamentary debate 
before the rules were altered to allow special advisers paid from public 
funds to stand as candidates for Parliament or local authorities. Ted 
Short replied: 
the Government intend tomorrow to table an amendment to the 
Servants of the Crown Order to the Privy Council. This is an 
amendment to the 1960 Order, which is a prerogative order, and 
no parliamentary action is required. Out of courtesy to the 
Opposition, I told the right hon. Gentleman about this 
amendment ... We take the view that as these advisers are political, it is ridiculous to try to prevent their having 
normal political rights (Official Rem. Vol. 875, cols 1728- 
9). 
His refusal to allow debate before the amendment was put caused a 
storm of protest from all sides of the House. Subsequently, Heath 
intervened yet again: 
276 
The right hon. Gentleman is therefore overriding the views of 
the Leader of the Opposition and his colleagues and the 
Opposition as a whole. He is now overriding the views that 
are expressed by some of his hon. Friends. I must again ask 
him to postpone the order tomorrow and to let the House debate 
the Order first ... it affects a group who are at a high level in the Civil Service and in the closest contact with 
Ministers. This breaks the whole tradition of the Civil 
Service (Official Report. Vol. 875, col. 1734). 
The criticisms continued, with Members reluctant to let colleagues 
move on to other subjects; but it was only after Heath moved an 
emergency debate under Standing Order No. 9 that Short backed down, and 
agreed to defer laying the order for a month to allow the opportunity to 
find time to debate the issue. Short described these events as the 
'biggest row I'd been involved in. ' The matter was dropped by the 
Government, but has been a source of continued irritation to Tory and 
Labour advisers, although some ministers would not have wanted their 
advisers to have been distracted by nursing a constituency. 
Whilst the attitude of Parliament has probably contributed to the 
curtailment of the system's development, William Waldegrave astutely put 
the issue in a general organizational context. He observed that 
backbenchers and sometimes junior ministers resented non-elected young 
people getting more access and information than they had, 'but it was 
the perennial complaint of junior members of an organization against the 
staff officers. ' In Australia, Smith reports, 'some Labor backbenchers 
thought the experiment was a failure, for reasons similar to those 
advanced by backbenchers in Britain. Ministerial acceptance had to be 
balanced against an amount of backbench discontent. ' (1977, p. 155). 
Policy analysts and advisers in America are, often characterized as, 
'something almost illegitimate, as grey eminences, working in shadow 
governments, or as bureaucratic mandarins usurping the rightful 
functions of clients' (Meltsner, 1986, p. 300). 
277 
The Prime Minister. 
The hostility liable to flare up in Parliament against advisers partly 
explains the ambivalence of various prime ministers towards advisers. 
This is because it was sometimes the premier who had to face critical 
questioning about them. Tom McNally said of Jim Callaghan: 'like Mr 
Wilson he was cautious about the system getting out of hand, sensitive 
to questioning about how much special advisers were paid, how much it 
costs the taxpayer. ' 
According to John Hunt, 'Prime Ministers, again of both parties, 
have always severely limited their role. ' (1987, p. 67). Perhaps the 
ambivalence of Labour Prime Ministers is illustrated by the lack of 
consensus among Labour advisers as to the attitude, if any, Number Ten 
adopted towards them. Bernard Donoughue's role from the Number Ten 
Policy Unit, in encouraging and assisting ministers to appoint advisers, 
was described earlier. Even as late as 1979, Vincent Cable thought that 
Number Ten welcomed his appointment to a department that had not had an 
adviser for several years: 'John Smith had regularized the position by 
bringing one in; I think that was how they saw it. ' Many believed, 
though, that prime ministers wanted to restrict development of the 
system despite Harold Wilson's initiative in establishing it. Perhaps 
the major reason for this came as an inevitable consequence of the role 
of advisers as loyal servants of departmental ministers. The resentment 
generated by Harris's activities on behalf of Jenkins in the 1960s led 
to jealousy that was, in the Prime Minister's case, according to 
Campbell, 'verging almost on paranoia' (p. 99). In the 1970s Tony Benn 
felt the Prime Minister had some doubts because a minister with a team 
of advisers might be a potential centre of opposition to policies, if 
the minister opposed the Prime Minister. The major area of prime 
ministerial concern was often thought to be the role of advisers in 
briefing ministers for Cabinet. There was both agreement and 
disagreement with Suzanne Reeve's assessment at the May 1986 Re-skilling 
Government Seminar that one of the two great sources of opposition to 
Barbara Castle's team of advisers was, 'the Prime Minister himself, 
partly because her executive office actually struck at his political 
power base as well as at his management of government business. He did 
278 
not want a Chinese warlord who was actually pointing out where he was 
going astray and stopping him from doing what he wanted' (IOD, 1986, 
p. 39). 
Mrs Thatcher's more fundamental reservations about the desirability 
of putting advisers on the public payroll resulted in a contraction of 
the system in 1979. How far her subsequent attitude changed was 
discussed earlier but Butler argues that advisers have been called 
'Maggie's Moles. ' (p. 14). He goes on to suggest that, 'since they are 
personally known to her, gave her a good service in the 1983 Election, 
are "Keepers of the Ark", and are generally discreet, she relaxes in 
their presence and calls them "her boys"'. (p. 16). Most interviewees 
did not believe Thatcher had generally encouraged the expansion of the 
system since 1979, and they did not see the majority of advisers as 
'Maggie's Moles' or 'Mrs Thatcher's boys'. One adviser highlighted the 
central issue by stating, 'the only advisers who can be described as Mrs 
Thatcher's boys were those who were working for Ministers who were Mrs 
Thatcher's men. ' If advisers became seen as agents of the Prime 
Minister it might reduce some of the limitations that currently exist 
because of the unwillingness of prime ministers to see the system 
develop rapidly; but it would change the whole concept of the special 
adviser and give rise to new limitations. As was argued at the start of 
this sub-section, if a minister is seen to be unenthusiastic about his 
adviser, the latter's position soon becomes untenable. 
SECTION ;. RESPONSE QE CIVIL SERVICE. 
Although questionnaire evidence suggested many advisers did not think 
their effectiveness was limited by civil service attitudes, there were 
considerable variations in the opinions expressed by officials about the 
system. It is difficult to categorize these, given that each official 
might, have different views about: the various advisers with whom he 
comes into contact; the several types of advisers; and the diverse 
activities in which they are involved. Furthermore, a growing 
acceptance may be detected, and certain ranks of civil servants are 
sometimes thought more likely to adopt a favourable attitude. This is 
an issue on which, despite Whitehall's reputation for uniformity of 
outlook, views differ widely and no consensus emerges. 
279 
Generally, the more hostile the civil service, the more likely this 
is to impose limitations on the effectiveness of advisers. However, 
there is insidious danger that the impact of an adviser could also be 
blunted by incorporation and the 'bureaucratic embrace': 'the normal 
Foreign Office tendency will be to embrace newcomers rather than to 
reject them, a bear-hug that may nevertheless be suffocating for the 
newcomer' (Henderson, 1984, p. 121). 
Categories 4f Responses from Ciyil Servants. 
This sub-section attempts to categorize the range of civil service 
responses to the development of special advisers and record the 
approximate strength of four types of reaction. 
(i) Some officials adopted an attitude of outright hostility and saw no 
room or role for advisers, arguing that the civil servants possessed all 
the expertise required, and politicians who became ministers should not 
need political advice. This is now a minority, if strongly held, view. 
However, Heclo and Wildavsky, based on research they first reported in 
1974, claimed that such an attitude was prevalent: 
Ask any minister about his experience with outside advisers, 
and you are likely to hear a biological analogy in which a 
self-contained system rejects foreign elements. 'Alien 
bodies', 'expelled like white corpuscles', 'considered bulls 
in the civil service's china shop', 'they castrate you,, - 
these are the expressions used by four ministers. Tensions 
and rivalries are inevitable at this level. Even the most 
successful outside advisers can be expected to survive little 
more than two years before being enveloped, rejected, or worn 
down by the established Civil Service (p. 378). 
Their evidence was collected prior to the expansion of advisers in 
1974, and although some respondents agreed there were inevitable 
frictions with the advisers introduced from 1964 onwards, the general 
impression from the interviews is that the reaction was not as extreme 
as it was portrayed above. Nevertheless, the widespread scepticism 
about the desirability of introducing outside advisers was reflected in 
the comments Lord Roll reported he was able to make once he had left the 
civil service: 'I expressed considerable doubt about the value of a 
major extension of, and reliance on, this method of bridging the gap 
280 
between politics and administration' (Roll, 1985, p. 188). 
Even according to some officials who held advisers like Brian 
Abel-Smith and Jack Straw in the highest regard, the expansion of 
numbers in 1974 had a 'shock effect'. One thought, 'this sudden influx 
of people worried civil servants quite a bit. ' Resistance to change was 
probably inevitable, especially when it threatened the existing power 
structures, and seemed, as it did to some, to challenge the underlying 
values of a politically impartial civil service which thought itself 
capable of meeting the needs of all politicians. This issue was 
discussed in Chapter 3 and the view of some officials is illustrated in 
the words of a principal private secretary at the time of the change in 
Government in 1974: 'A lot of senior civil servants saw this as an 
intrusion in to the system, and a very difficult one to handle because 
they had been used to being regarded, and accepted, as politically 
neutral in their advice; and here was something suggesting that they 
weren't. ' 
Young and Sloman claim, 'Whitehall, of course, saw no need for 
these politically motivated invaders' (1982, p. 89). They suggest that 
the value sets motivating advisers and officials are very different. 
Advisers, 'were an affront to everything the civil service stands for: 
committed, loyal to a party, prejudiced in favour of Yes not No to what 
the minister wants ... At first Whitehall saw this experiment as a 
threat, and therefore froze it out' (pp. 89-90). The political commitment 
of advisers makes them a slightly different case from some of the 
earlier specialists, but parallels can be drawn in the way officials 
reacted. In the words of Joan Mitchell, the special adviser who had 
earlier written a history of British economic planning: 
It was not unknown, after all, for the same sort of hostility 
(though greatly magnified) to be shown to statisticians, 
economists and similar interlopers coming in during the Second 
World War, and towards the scientists and operational 
researchers, then or later. The special advisers probably 
represent far less of a revolution in government 
administration than the economists and scientists coming in 
(p. 97-8). 
Even some who thought the attitude of the civil service had been 
very negative believed there was some softening in attitude. Following 
their comments just quoted above Young and Sloman added, 'But later 
281 
Whitehall got wiser and even began to find merit, of a strictly 
peripheral kind, in special advisers' (p. 90). Perhaps one reason for 
the initial disquiet, and for its subsequent diminution, lay in the 
fear, so far groundless, that the introduction of advisers was only the 
forerunner for more radical changes. Antony Part stated: 
Once one starts talking about special advisers, of course, the 
spectre of French type cabinets is raised; and there were 
certainly a number of civil servants who felt, well we don't 
want to get on a slippery slope about this - once we start on 
special advisers, where will it end? So should we start at 
all? 
Whilst the general attitude in the civil service towards advisers 
has mellowed as part of a growing acceptance of their role within the 
system, there are still critics. Hostility ranges from officials who 
dismiss advisers as being unnecessary and having nothing to contribute, 
to those who still see advisers as a potential and undesirable threat. 
One official claimed: 
The appointment of special advisers is an unsatisfactory and 
unsuccessful attempt to overcome the difficulties faced by 
ministers when they get into some of the awkward and often 
technical details of policy which, when processed by their 
officials, tend to influence the kind of policy advice they 
get ... the solution, that 
is special advisers, to the genuine 
problems of time and legislation, has been worse than the 
disease and created new problems. 
Sometimes officials took the opportunity of a change of minister to 
suggest to the incoming one that he did not need an adviser. One 
instance of this, alluded to earlier, occurred when Keith Joseph entered 
the DES and is described by his biographer: 
The Joseph regime got off to a curious start which did nothing 
to offset the Secretary of State's reputation for being a soft 
touch for civil service mandarins. When he arrived, the 
suggestion apparently came from the officials that Sexton had 
served his purpose and could be dispensed with. The new 
Secretary of State did not demur, indicating that he was in 
favour of saving on the salary bill (Halcrow, 1989, p. 172). 
Linking the officials' reactions to either the conflict or 
partnership models examined in Chapter 3 is complex, but overseas 
examples demonstrate that a permanent bureaucracy is likely to be 
282 
somewhat antagonistic towards the introduction of advisers. Commenting 
on the Australian equivalents to advisers in the UK, Walter observes, 
'as a group they are disliked by the public service' (p. 132). 
Nevertheless, the Australian advisers' views on their working 
relationship with the public service mirror those of their British 
counterparts, with almost 90 per cent thinking it was good, very good or 
excellent (p. 136). Evidence from the survey conducted for the Royal 
Commission on Australian Government Administration suggested that 
officials adopted a similar range of opinions about advisers to those of 
the British civil service (1976, Appendix Vol. 1). In Canada the 
equivalents to advisers are called executive assistants. Recent 
research on the relationship between Canadian ministers and their 
permanent secretaries (called deputy ministers) cites evidence which, 
'puts at 30 percent the proportion of cases where, "the assistant has 
created enormous problems and greatly harmed the relations between the 
Minister and Deputy Minister"' (Bourgault and Dion, 1990, p. 169). 
(ii) Quite a few officials were prepared either to accept, perhaps 
sometimes grudgingly, or at least not oppose, the idea that there was a 
place for advisers. However, even within this second category there was 
a broad range of views. Generally, the acceptance was provided, first, 
the role was limited to servicing the minister (especially in party 
political and speech writing activities) and/or second, it was tightly 
restricted. There is some overlap here with the earlier discussion 
about officials being more likely to welcome activities in the political 
field than the policy arena. One private secretary, for example, 
suggested that civil servants could accommodate irritations when they 
were to a purpose and although he could not see the purpose with some of 
them, he accepted that a minister might need someone who was partisan to 
be a bridge to the political world. Antony Part commented: 
In theory a department is there to serve the minister, it's 
there to serve the Government of the Day, and it's there to 
help ministers move in the direction in which they were 
elected to move ... 
I rather doubt if the civil service would 
ever positively suggest that there should be special advisers, 
because in some ways they would think that if they were doing 
their job properly they would be able to do the whole thing 
themselves. They can appreciate that if the Secretary of 
State thinks there is a gap then there is no particular reason 
why they should oppose any such appointment. Civil Servants 
would accept special advisers as a fact of life and would try 
to weld them in to the team as far as possible of course 
283 
they didn't always wanted to be welded into the team. 
Part's notion of welding the advisers into the team was not 
entirely shared by all in this category. Some emphasized the concept of 
an adviser as somebody working primarily with his minister rather than 
the rest of the department. Thus a permanent secretary described the 
usefulness of the adviser to the minister as a political leg-man or in 
direct talks with his minister, but stressed that the adviser would not 
be advising the department directly. He also suggested that the 
attitude other permanent secretaries recommended adopting in 1974 
towards the influx of Labour advisers was one of 'benevolent 
neutrality'. Another agreed that, 'benevolent neutrality' was a fair 
indication of the general attitude, although initially some worried 
about the numbers. In 1976 Douglas Allen told a seminar at the LSE that 
'the presence of special advisers in departments has not created the 
kind of internal strife which many people tend to assume must have 
occurred' (1977, p. 144). Yet another permanent secretary in 1974 thought 
that a certain amount of outside input was a good thing but he believed 
that if one wanted new ideas brought into the civil service it was 
better to have someone brought in to the established structure. He 
stressed that the advisers, 'were very much helping the minister to do 
his job. ' Clive Booth felt that advisers are, 'never going to be taken 
into the bosom of the civil service', but nevertheless commented, 'I 
don't know any reason to say they haven't been a generally helpful part 
of the system ... in their present rather muted form I think they have 
probably got a role to play. ' This belief, held by many officials, that 
advisers can play a helpful role, links into the next category. 
(iii) The third type of civil service reaction was to consider that 
special advisers played a useful role for their ministers both in their 
party political and departmental activities. These officials 
appreciated that it could be useful for the department to have a special 
adviser, but they did not necessarily miss them when they were not there 
nor advocate that a minister should have one. When asked whether he 
felt officials found it of value to have advisers in the department, 
Kenneth Clucas replied, 
284 
Yes, we found it was useful to have the advisers we had under 
the Labour Government between '74 and '79. Did I miss them 
from '79 onwards? The answer is no, because things were done 
in a different way ... they can make a useful contribution, but if a minister doesn't see a need for them, then you don't 
miss them, provided he is communicative, has other ways of 
handling the sort of things that political advisers might do. 
Pragmatism is often seen as a feature of the British civil service, 
and some officials shared the view of one who worked with Jim Prior's 
advisers at the Department of Employment that the advisers were, 'an 
extra resource - it would have been silly not to have used it. ' A 
similar argument, and one that was referred to with the previous 
category, is that a major part of the ethos of the civil service is that 
they loyally serve the Government of the Day. Therefore, if ministers 
wish to have advisers, it is up to officials to make the system work. 
In the words of Thomas Brimelow, 'if this is what ministers want, we 
are here to serve ministers; OK, in they come, we get on with them and 
help them to do their job. ' 
Addressing an LSE audience in 1988 the former Head of the Home 
Civil Service, Lord Armstrong, said: 'That ministers should have access 
to political as well as administrative advice and opinion is 
incontestable, and I have never seen any objection to the appointment of 
what we have come to call special advisers; indeed I have welcomed it 
and regard it as a useful development in government. ' 
There are various ways in which officials believe, if advisers are 
appointed, they can be of value to private secretaries and other civil 
servants. Some of these were described earlier, and many of the views, 
perhaps in an even stronger form, are shared by those in the fourth 
category. 
(iv) Some officials positively welcomed the appointments and/or 
advocate that ministers should have an adviser. The welcome given in 
the Department of Industry to David Young and Jeffrey Sterling has been 
referred to, as has Ian Bancroft's opinion that certain large 
departments should have a special adviser to ensure that the Secretary 
285 
of State was properly serviced. A later permanent secretary in the DoE, 
George Moseley, similarly commented: 
Given the right sort of person is chosen, I think it is 
entirely to the advantage of the permanent staff that there 
should be these people available, in some circumstances to 
provide lines of communication in depth that perhaps don't 
always emerge in the busy day to day business. It is so 
useful for civil servants on a policy desk to be able to take 
soundings of the political implications from somebody that 
they know is well regarded by the minister, trusted by him and 
is like a sounding board. 
The DHSS has also been identified as a department where the 
advisers' role was appreciated. Roger Dyson's statement that, coming in 
as a part timer in 1979 he was unable to meet the expectations of the 
officials, has been noted. On the social security side, where there was 
not even a part time adviser appointed by the Tories, the second 
permanent secretary, Geoffrey Otton, said, 'it is a pity they didn't 
continue with it ... there were some strong doctrinaire strands of 
policy which were quite difficult for departments to come to terms with 
and I think might have been eased if there had been that kind of 
lubricant in the system. ' Patrick Jenkin also opined that the permanent 
secretary, Patrick Nairne, 'thought it was a pity' he did not have a 
political adviser. These comments support the view noted earlier from 
David Donnison. Furthermore, both Nairne and Otton believed that most 
other officials were not opposed to advisers. In response to the 
question about his attitude towards advisers Otton said, 'this is the 
boring consensus that you are probably encountering, but on the whole, 
it worked rather well. ' He was aware of a danger of portraying an 
unrealistic picture of harmony with the advisers between 1974 and 1979, 
but thought that was the position: 'It's all made to sound a bit too 
cosy, isn't it? But actually it seems to me, in my experience, that it 
added a dimension to the good functioning of the top levels of the 
department, and there wasn't any unease, but I bet there was in other 
places. ' 
Foreign Office officials too, have sometimes welcomed advisers. 
David Owen felt that Michael Palliser, the permanent secretary, was in 
favour of his having a political adviser and encouraged it. With his 
wide range of experience, Donald Maitland considered that whatever the 
286 
given relationship within a department between the minister and his 
officials, the situation could never be made less satisfactory with an 
adviser than it would be without. He stated: 
I am absolutely in favour of special advisers, whether their 
role is a major or minor one; ... the bottom line will show that the effectiveness of the department, and the minister's 
performance, is better if he has a special adviser, regardless 
of the other circumstances, than if he doesn't. Does anybody 
disagree with that? 
From his wide perspective as former Cabinet Secretary John Hunt 
also stated: 
Compared to ministers anywhere else in the world our ministers 
are thoroughly overworked and try to do too much ... anything 
which can be done to improve the service to them, and give 
them the opportunity to think must be a plus; no doubt about 
that. Then I accept that any large bureaucratic institution 
has an inbuilt inertia, inbuilt conventional view more than 
inertia, that certain things will work and certain things 
won't work and it is helpful to ministers to have a few people 
who they can really call their own, who owe their loyalty only 
to the minister, not to the civil service at large ... I don't think you can expect this suddenly to solve all our problems 
and transform government but I think it is desirable. It 
would be a great pity if it was dropped altogether. 
Advisers as Allies. Qf Officials. 
In addition to believing advisers could be useful in performing tasks 
such as speech writing, political liaison, and the provision of 
specialist knowledge and contacts, advisers were sometimes thought to be 
of assistance to officials in more subtle ways. Reference was made in 
Chapter 7, Section C, to Klein and Lewis's view that advisers could be 
both allies and adversaries of officials on policy matters. It is 
probably relevant to consider this within the framework described in 
Chapter 3 of both the partnership model between ministers and officials, 
and the place of advisers as the ministers' trusted confidants. Based 
on his experience of how policy analysts can operate in the United 
States, Walter Williams thought that in the UK, 'in small quantities 
competent policy advisers may even be considered valuable by civil 
servants in helping ministers to rid themselves of nonsense and to 
understand the framework and arguments used by the civil servants' 
(p. 173). He felt that the notion of confidence was very important and 
287 
was always double-edged. Therefore, as somebody loyal to the minister, 
and trusted by him, the expert special adviser could sometimes ensure 
the minister was made aware of the right information; but, on other 
occasions could say to the minister, that the officials had not looked 
in sufficient depth at a certain alternative. Similarly, in Australia, 
Smith included as one of the advantages for departments of the work of 
policy orientated ministerial staff, their ability to, 'translate 
departments' problems in to forms that ministers would appreciate' 
(1977, p. 152). 
Whilst such ideas were not widely held in the UK, where they did 
exist they were most likely to be associated with the third and fourth 
types of civil service response. Dyson thought that one of Brian Abel- 
Smith's roles at the DHSS, 'was to concentrate the Minister's mind, when 
it needed to be concentrated, to do something that the civil service 
felt needed to be done. ' David Metcalf believed that the permanent 
secretary, Patrick Nairne, occasionally hoped he could use the adviser 
to assist the minister to take on board particular points - perhaps from 
a civil service perspective. Nairne thought his weekly meetings with 
advisers, especially, under Barbara Castle, with Abel-Smith and Jack 
Straw, were useful in this regard. He explained that as well as being, 
'a very helpful additional way in which the political emphases, 
anxieties, and nuances would be conveyed to us officials, ' the meetings 
might also give him opportunity to appeal to the advisers to, 'try to 
get her off this one. ' To play this delicate role effectively required 
a skilled adviser to have a good relationship with both minister and 
officials. Geoffrey Otton believed he could be quite uninhibited with 
the advisers in saying to them that he felt the minister was mistaken 
about something. He commented, 
I don't think any of the people I dealt with would have gone 
running off to the Secretary of State saying, 'that man Otton 
is still being awkward'. I think they would have gone back 
saying, if they said anything, 'the department is still 
wondering whether this is the right thing to do and I can see 
their point', or, 'perhaps we ought to have another meeting'. 
It would all have been quite constructive. 
Perceptive ministers, too, could acknowledge that this was a role 
for advisers to perform. David Owen suggested that the Foreign Office 
officials all recognized that working with David Stephen, 'was a good 
288 
way of getting the Foreign Secretary to be more amenable. ' 
Interestingly, Owen also claims in his autobiography that had the very 
experienced political journalist Peter Jenkins been able to agree to 
become his political adviser in his first year the Foreign Secretary 
might have been less brash and abrasive: 'Peter would have been tough 
enough to stand up to me where it was needed, particularly within the 
Private Office, and I would have been a better Foreign Secretary for 
having him near at hand, giving me a broader base with his experience' 
(1991, p. 265). 
The permanent secretary at the Foreign Office, Michael Palliser saw 
the liaison role of advisers as very much a two way process: 
They provided a channel of access to the Secretary of State 
when I didn't want to bother him. I would talk to the 
advisers confident that I would get a pretty faithful 
expression of the Secretary of State's thinking and that my 
ideas would be fed by them through to him against the 
background of their own experience and knowledge and 
relationship with him. It didn't prevent one talking to him: 
I talked to Secretaries of State almost every day while I was 
permanent under secretary. It meant that officials had an 
additional point of entry, line of communication, and that 
being so, I found the system extremely helpful. 
Maurice Peston felt that, 'the role of an adviser is sometimes to 
help ministers face reality when they were hoping for something a lot 
better. ' He believed that officials recognized that influencing an 
adviser could be a useful path to persuading the minister to accept 
their argument. He gave the example of demographic projections which 
showed the number of school pupils was going to be less than the Labour 
Party had thought in Opposition, and that, therefore, the number of 
teachers required would be fewer than they had predicted. According to 
Peston, 'The officials couldn't persuade the minister of that, but I 
was able to because the officials talked me through the material, and 
once I said, "this is not an attempt by civil servants to undermine a 
Labour Party commitment, it is just one of the facts of life", then the 
minister would accept that. ' 
The analysis here supports that of Heclo and Wildavsky who, as was 
noted, referred to the 'nagging doubt' possessed by even those ministers 
who are favourably disposed towards officials. They argued that if 
289 
others were around the minister it would help the civil servants, 
because ministers could take a, 'more objective view of the uses and 
abuses of civil servants if they were not required to depend on them so 
completely' (p. 376). In similar vein, Adam Ridley observed that, 'if a 
minister is told one of his policies is unworkable, it helps him to be 
reassured of this, if the special adviser examines it and agrees. ' The 
permanent secretary at the Treasury, Douglas Wass, echoed this by 
stating: 
It was useful if one could persuade the special adviser that 
some particular party preference wasn't on, say for 
administrative reasons ... then he was a very useful ally when the minister had also to be convinced that the policy was not 
administratively on. If the special adviser could say, 'well, 
look I've been involved with this for some time and what the 
department says is absolutely correct, I'm afraid ... ', it was very useful in helping to persuade the minister. 
Klein and Lewis speculated whether the willingness of Labour 
advisers to rub the noses of ministers in unpleasant truths partly 
reflected the fact that they, 'saw themselves as having an expertise 
independent of their political role' (p. 17). This theme will be 
elaborated in the section identifying categories of effective advisers. 
The Diverse and Changing $ýsjm from Officials. 
We can now explore several further aspects of the response to advisers 
from officials. The claims that the role has become more accepted and 
formalized were examined in general. With regard specifically to 
officials, there has been some drift in attitude from the more 
dismissive views in the 1960s and 1974 to greater acceptance in recent 
years. John Hunt claimed that in the late 1960s and early 1970s, 'a lot 
of civil servants were probably doubtful of the value of this. O. K., 
ministers wanted this, but having it, we doubted the value. ' By 1977, 
however, he was able to tell the Expenditure Committee: 
I think that there has been something like a sea change of 
attitudes since political advisers first started coming M. 
There has been both a recognition by the Civil Service, which 
the Civil Service ought to have recognised a long time ago, 
that these people have something genuinely to contribute in 
terms of political input, political minefields, what their 
chief is thinking, and so on, and the political advisers, I 
290 
think, have seen that the machine has something to contribute. 
I have got no worries about this at all (Vol. 2 (2), pp. 758-9). 
In interview, he made a comparison with the attitude of officials 
towards the CPRS, which had been regarded with suspicion when it was 
established. At its demise most officials were sorry, and, he felt, if 
the system of advisers, 'were to be abandoned completely, most civil 
servants would think it rather a pity. ' 
Brian Abel-Smith felt that although the role he played in the late 
1960s was similar to that in the 1970s, he was somewhat more integrated 
into the structure of government in the latter period and experienced 
less opposition. Although many officials agree there was a move away 
from the initial suspicion, it has not been an undisturbed trend towards 
greater acceptance. In the 1960s, for example, there was thought to 
have been a hardening of attitudes after the Labour Party gave its 
evidence to the Fulton Committee and called for an expansion in the 
system. Similarly, the influx of advisers in 1974 caused considerable 
dismay to some officials, partly because it was seen as part of a trend 
of criticism against the civil service. 
Generalizations about growing acceptance are also difficult to make. 
The response varied depending upon individuals, the roles they played, 
their qualities, and the extent to which attitudes had hardened in a 
department which had been without advisers for a while. Some Tory advisers 
in the 1980s reported more hostility from the bureaucracy than most Labour 
advisers claimed to have encountered. Furthermore, several officials were 
less impressed with the contribution, and attitude, of advisers in the 
1980s than they had been in the 1970s. 
The attitude of the civil servants was sometimes difficult for 
advisers to judge because of the pragmatism noted above. Roger Dyson 
thought the typical reaction towards him was, 'he is there, a) how can 
you neutralize him; b) what value can you make of it. ' Dyson was also 
one of several advisers who felt that within the department some 
divisions were more cooperative and favourably disposed than others. 
Stuart Sexton reported that his relations with different officials 
varied, but with some there was, 'some pretty rough talking ... and 
291 
sometimes a bitter complaint to the Secretary of State that, "Sexton is 
exceeding his authority. "' 
Some people suggested that the reaction towards advisers varied 
between different levels of the departmental hierarchy. There was some 
feeling that certain permanent secretaries were more favourably disposed 
towards advisers than officials lower in the department. Many parts of 
a department may have had virtually no contact with an adviser and there 
was inevitably some suspicion when such officials learnt that 'the 
special adviser' was coming to one of their meetings. Again the picture 
is complicated by the frequently good relationship already referred to 
between advisers and the assistant secretary or principal heading the 
private office, and by the role of some advisers in acting as a channel 
of communication between assistant secretaries and the minister. In 
such circumstances, the more effective political advisers were often 
thought to be compatible with bright young officials of their own 
generation. A few permanent secretaries, however, felt that such 
officials, outside the private office, might resent the advisers' 
privileged access to ministers. 
One official was particularly scathing about the attitude of 
permanent secretaries who had come to regard advisers as a convenience 
and towards whom the advisers were often deferential. He claimed that 
permanent secretaries frequently saw advisers as, 'just another pawn in 
the great game of keeping the minister contented. They largely 
persuaded themselves that special advisers can be put to many good 
purposes, and they couldn't now do without them, and they can't 
understand how they ever managed without them. Go lower down in the 
hierarchy, I think you may find increasing scepticism. ' 
It was clear, however, that some ministers expected their permanent 
secretary to smooth relations between the adviser and the department. 
Questioned about whether there was any resentment towards his specialist 
advisers, Michael Heseltine replied, 'the permanent secretaries who were 
involved gave me exemplary support; they would sort out the problems. ' 
One further dimension that is difficult to unravel is the 
considerable correlation between officials who thought highly of 
292 
advisers, and advisers who were generally regarded as effective. Whilst 
civil servants would inevitably tend to have a higher regard for 
effective advisers, it could be argued that one factor in increasing 
their effectiveness, was operating in a receptive environment. However, 
certain officials who valued advisers' work thought some were much 
better than others, which suggests that it is the quality of the adviser 
that is the most important factor. Nevertheless, even the most talented 
advisers would find it difficult to work in a department where most 
officials adopted the attitudes outlined in category (i). 
SECTION E AMBIGUITIES 21 JU ROLE. 
A possible limitation in the role of advisers, illustrated in some of 
the above comments from politicians and bureaucrats, lies in the 
inherent ambiguity in their position. As we saw in Chapter 2 they are 
politically appointed to play a political role, and, in most cases, are 
in the same position as ministers in that they may not see the papers 
presented to ministers of a previous administration. And yet, they are 
civil servants and bound, in theory, by most of the restrictions on 
political activities imposed on civil servants, even though the position 
has eased a little. Several people referred to advisers as being 
'hybrids' and others suggested they were, 'neither fish nor fowl'. We 
have already seen (Chapter 3 Section C) that the position of advisers 
could be regarded as being anomalous in the British and similar systems. 
Doubt about the legitimacy of their role helps explain the hostility or 
reservations of some civil servants and of politicians who take the 
'traditional' view that in the system of government there should be only 
elected politicians and permanent 'non-political' officials, and that 
the special advisers are neither and so have no place in the system. 
This view is now, ironically, somewhat shared by Tony Benn: 
there should really only be two ways of getting to the top in 
political power. One is by career and the other is by 
election, and the thing about advisers is that, although I had 
excellent ones who did a first rate job and were people of 
total integrity, if it's possible for people to creep to the 
top by patronage, even ministerial patronage, there is a 
danger in that; and therefore much better to bring in elected MPs 
and use them for the collective control of a department. 
293 
Various advisers thought this ambiguity created difficulties and 
reduced their effectiveness. The point was developed at length by 
Darlington (1976). He cites a letter of his to the New Statesman 
shortly after the appointment of Labour advisers: 
It is important that the civil service code is not forced upon 
political advisers, since persons appointed because of their 
partisan commitment lose some of their value if they are 
compelled to abandon much of the party political activity that 
demonstrates that commitment. If this process is allowed to 
continue, there will be a tendency to treat us as a special 
breed of civil servant, which we are not. This political 
castration should be opposed now, before it becomes the 
established norm (17 May 1974). 
The letter, he comments, 'led to a rebuke from Number Ten which rather 
makes the point' (p. 55). He also claims that during the 1975 referendum 
campaign, political advisers who wished to work for the campaign by 
anti-market ministers were supposed to resign, but those assisting pro- 
market ministers were not expected to do so. In practice, no advisers 
were forced to resign, but Tony Banks illustrated the problems that 
could arise. He recalled that he and Jack Straw helped organize a press 
conference for Ministers again ft M; they had been asked 
questions and were reported in the papers. The permanent secretary 
called Banks in and sought to establish the basis of his appointment. 
An associated difficulty noted by several advisers was also 
described by Brown and Steel: 'Their position is inevitably a rather 
vulnerable one' (p. 331). Such advisers believed their position, and 
that of their colleagues, was entirely dependent on support from the 
minister. They recognized that however strong their place appeared, 
there was no guarantee it would survive a change of minister. Margaret 
Beckett felt she enjoyed Judith Hart's confidence, and enjoyed working 
with her and respected her, but she came to realize it was 'a vulnerable 
position'. Her clout depended totally on her relationship with Hart. 
It would have been difficult had the relationship weakened or Hart begun 
to rely less on her advice: 'It was a strange position, you had no 
political base of your own, you operated only through your relationship 
with the minister. ' 
294 
A related problem mentioned by certain advisers was the unease felt 
by some about their pay and conditions and a general feeling that, 
according to Chris Butler, 
the rules of work are not adapted to us as special advisers, 
nor is there the correct degree of openness that you might 
expect. I am not saying there is open hostility, there isn't, 
but there are all sorts of ways, subtle and unsubtle, of 
making you feel different and apart from the rest of the flow. 
Whatever the difficulties of integrating into the bureaucracy, 
advisers have to adapt to the civil service codes to some extent, and 
therefore inevitably become somewhat removed from their party 
background. Being, Butler observed, 'in a sense in purgatory between 
your party and the Civil Service means that the perquisites of either 
will be denied to you. ' (1986, p. 18). The ambiguity also helps explain 
the lack of clarity in the functions of some advisers. 
To be effective, and overcome the ambiguity, many respondents 
thought advisers must have the ability to work with the civil service, 
but not be absorbed by it. Lord Gowrie observed that to be successful 
in a department an adviser had to, 'work simultaneously with, and 
against, the grain of the culture. ' One official believed, however, 
that to be closely integrated, but not fully absorbed, into a department 
involved, 'a contradiction which is insuperable. That is the objection 
to having them. ' Because advisers could not act as either officials or 
ministers, he believed that the role required extraordinary qualities if 
it was to be performed properly; so few advisers possess these 
abilities that the role should be discontinued. 
Starting from a similar position, that of regarding advisers as 
operating at the point where the administrative and political systems 
meet, it is possible to develop the argument in different directions. 
First, some believe there will inevitably be tension. Successful 
advisers often had to fight to achieve things, including access to 
certain papers. The tension need not necessarily be destructive. 
Gwilym Prys-Davies was one of several advisers who thought it could be 
creative. He wished to see the Welsh Office play more of an 
anticipatory role even if, as we noted earlier, this could lead to 
295 
conflict. He believed that although the civil service thought he was 
sometimes too critical of their papers, he had to be frank with them. 
Some ministers who were generally favourably disposed towards the civil 
service, nevertheless wanted advisers who would combine their expertise 
with the independence of the advisory position to stimulate new thinking 
in the department and develop radical policies. Roy Jenkins, for 
example, said that Anthony Lester's, 'role was to be a slight irritant 
to the department ... [But] He was very good at getting on with the 
department and certainly wasn't such an irritant as to be 
counterproductive from his own point of view. ' 
There was a degree of ambiguity in Lester's position. Jenkins was 
known to favour advisers who argued, in the words of Lester, 'to 
solutions and not to dogmatic conclusions', but he was determined that 
the legislation on sex and race discrimination should be introduced. It 
has been noted how Lester was concerned to adopt the civil service ethos 
and he believed as far as possible the civil service should do the type 
of thing he was doing because it would be destructive of moral and 
career structure to have too many outsiders coming in. Despite that, 
Lester recognized that Jenkins considered that to achieve the desired 
changes, it would be helpful to have somebody in the ambiguous position 
of being in 'creative tension with the department'. Notwithstanding his 
previous comments Lester claimed, 
it is very hard for insiders to perform the role I was 
performing. It requires not only a commitment but also an 
obsessional commitment, working extraordinarily hard to get a 
point of view across and battle in Whitehall ... it also 
requires a breadth of vision for somebody who is inside the 
system to take on board values from outside. 
From this perspective it could be argued that it is the peculiar 
position occupied by the adviser that, whatever the difficulties, is 
crucial in enabling him to make a unique contribution. 
Interviewees also sometimes commented on the ambiguity in terms of 
the freewheeling nature of the role. Many advisers and some others felt 
that this was an advantage, especially when compared with the 
difficulties that might arise if advisers were tied in more tightly to 
the structure of the department: 
296 
The special adviser must exploit his inherent ambiguity ... I worked around, and in close conjunction with, the private 
office; but if ever I sensed woodenness or obstruction, I 
could simply go elsewhere without breaching formal procedures 
or appearing disloyal. The great strength of special advisers 
in policy making is that they can chance their arm, or on 
occasions float a kite for civil servants, without everyone 
being solemnly committed in advance. This gives considerable 
flexibility (Tim Boswell). 
A lot of our value and power is derived from the ability to 
'float like a butterfly and sting like a bee', and to go in at 
whatever point we like within the system ... our power was derived from the minister, rather than from a particular point 
within the structure of the ministry (Chris Butler). 
In doing one's job it is a great help not to have a formal 
place in the civil service hierarchy, because if one had such 
a formal place one would often have been dealing with people 
who had higher status and that would have been an inhibition 
on speaking strongly and bluntly and being irritating, as on 
occasion one has to be in a polite way (David Coleman). 
I did talk to anyone and went to any meeting that sounded 
interesting and reported back very freely to any of the 
ministers and I thought that was valuable. I thought the lack 
of position within the administrative chain of command was a 
huge advantage (Stella Greenall). 
The special adviser's power base is the minister, first and 
last, and that is all he needs ... It is a great mistake to 
set up a spirit of antagonism with the civil servants but 
nevertheless one does need to be independent. There would be 
the danger if one were more firmly part of the machine that 
you'd get the private secretary or permanent secretary leaning 
on you (Rodney Lord). 
The arguments are complex because the ambiguity has different 
aspects. Many advisers, including some of those quoted above, would 
have liked the terms and conditions applied to the system of advisers to 
have been clarified and some of the discontinuities removed. Boswell, 
for example, referred to anomalies between the treatment of different 
individuals in a variety of areas including access to secretaries. 
Butler has been quoted on both sides of this discussion and was one of 
several who thought that although some of the terms and conditions 
should be clarified, officially raising some of the points about the 
precise role of advisers could cause problems and might be best left 
alone. As Ted Short discovered, attempts to regulate specifically for 
advisers can lead to trouble. Similarly, in Australia, Smith comments, 
297 
'One suggestion, persistently made, was that the roles of advisers 
should have been more rigidly defined. As should by now be clear, 
trying to write detailed job descriptions would have created more 
trouble and anomalies than it was worth' (1977 p. 156). 
Whilst a freewheeling role is perhaps inevitably part of the model 
of the place of special advisers, and might perhaps be appealing to some 
advisers, it has been argued that it might limit their ability to tackle 
some of the root causes of problems faced by ministers. Edwin Plowden 
is quoted by Hennessy (1989, p. 21 1) as telling Ted Heath in relation to 
Conservative plans in the 1960s for the introduction of businessmen, 
'One thing I do know about Whitehall is, if you have people floating 
about in it, they will do no good and probably do harm. ' Unlike the 
businessmen, the advisers have had some anchorage by being attached to 
ministers. It was claimed that the cabinet proposal had been welcomed 
by organizations representing senior civil servants in part because it 
helped to put the role of political appointments and established 
officials on a clearer footing (IOD, 1986a). In interview John Hoskyns 
argued there was a need for a group of advisers and if they were going 
to play a think tank role within departments they needed to be in a 
team, not freewheeling individuals. How far advisers have played the 
role of a policy initiator or analyst has varied greatly, but examples 
of advisers influencing policies can be identified, and will be 
discussed in the next chapter. 
298 
CHAPTER NINE: EXAMPLES AM CHARACTERISTICS 
QE EFFECTIVENESS. 
SECTION A IMPACT QN POLICIES. 
Policy formulation was seen in Chapter 3 to be an extremely complex 
process and new policies are usually the product of the interaction of 
many forces. Isolating the impact made by any individual on policies is 
very difficult and often controversial. In Australia, Walter commented, 
although advisers can identify cases where they had direct influence, 
' most of their work is far more indeterminate in its effects ... seeking 
to trace the influence of individuals is a somewhat artificial quest' 
(p. 159-60). Nevertheless, because the analysis by Hall rA Al, (1975) 
suggested that there were many variations in the pattern of influences 
on policy making in the UK, it was claimed earlier that room could be 
left for advisers sometimes to play a part. Although the analysis below 
concentrates on discussing how advisers could influence policy, the 
majority of advisers believed they had not made a significant 
contribution to policy development, and many instances were cited where 
advisers made policy suggestions which were not adopted. 
The diversity of advisers' involvement, in ways that officials 
cannot always match, again underlines their potential effectiveness in 
bringing flexibility to the system of government. Advisers can 
contribute one or more of the following attributes: political 
commitment; a background of having worked on party policies; committed 
expertise; practical experience; links with outside groups; independence 
from the department. In some of the roles it is difficult to 
distinguish between an adviser making an independent contribution or 
acting on behalf of his minister. For most advisers involvement in 
policy consideration was usually in the reactive mode, but the 
circumstances in which a more proactive role could be adopted include: 
- having a continuing impact on policies which the adviser had helped to 
formulate in Opposition; 
- acting as catalyst, promoter, or sponsor of a policy; 
- working within a framework set by the minister to develop policies to 
achieve his objectives, perhaps in conjunction with officials; 
- helping to develop new policy themes through discussing issues with 
299 
the minister; 
- helping the minister and officials devise a strategy or policy 
framework for the department; 
- originating new policies as a result of using specialist knowledge 
and/or ideological commitment to analyse a problem, perhaps in 
conjunction with officials; 
- being a conduit for, and analyst of, policy ideas generated by policy 
research centres; 
- opening up issues by analysing submissions from officials and possibly 
proposing alternative options; 
- discussing, even negotiating, with pressure groups and bringing their 
concerns to the department and/or generating support from them for 
policy options; 
- discussing issues with the minister when he is making his decision; 
- developing policies to go in the party manifesto; 
- using the advisory position in an adventitious way to take an interest 
in particular issues which were not related to the reasons for 
appointment. 
Advisers often participated in several of these activities, 
sometimes on the same issue. Generally their role could be that of 
either protagonists or analysts. A complex and lengthy analysis would 
be required to match examples of advisers' involvement in specific 
policies, with each of these activities. It is possibly clearer in the 
first instance, where the advisers (for example, Brian Abel-Smith on 
pensions and health policy, Stuart Holland on industrial policy, and 
Arthur Cockfield on tax reforms) had participated in creating policies in 
Opposition. Even here, however, tracing their precise role through each 
of the possible later stages would be complicated. 
Instead, several examples will be provided of advisers who were 
widely thought to be influential on policy, sometimes in particular ways 
that illustrate general points. In his November 1974 Budget, Denis 
Healey introduced tax relief on companies' stock appreciation. Healey, 
in his autobiography, claims that, 'this tax relief was Nicky Kaldor's 
invention, and his most valuable contribution to my work at the 
Treasury' (p. 393). Others were calling for some type of stock relief 
(see, for example, MacDougall's account of his role at the Confederation 
300 
of British Industry, 1987, p. 213). Nevertheless, in interview, Healey 
saw the tax relief as his adviser's initiative and, whilst Kaldor worked 
closely with the Inland Revenue, 'without him the stock relief would 
never have taken place. ' Similarly Kaldor's biographer, Thirwall, 
suggests, 'one major success, which inside the Treasury was entirely 
Kaldor's invention, was the introduction of stock appreciation tax 
relief for companies' (1987, p. 254). This is a good illustration of the 
argument referred to in Chapter 3 that demonstrating an adviser had an 
impact on specific policies did not necessarily show the individual (let 
alone all advisers) to be generally, influential on policy. Overall 
from 1974-6 Kaldor's 'influence on the Chancellor was minimal' 
(Thirwall, p. 250) and less than in the 1964-7 period. 
In addition to helping Geoffrey Howe carry into Government various 
policies developed in Opposition, Adam Ridley was responsible, according 
to the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Arts, 
Lord Gowrie, for the 'lion's share of the work' on developing the 
proposals for tax relief on charitable giving. 
We have seen how Michael Heseltine recruited Tom Baron in 1979 to 
help find solutions to various problems that had been identified by the 
incoming minister. Baron's influence was not limited to the months in 
which he was in the department. He changed attitudes in the department 
and therefore helped influence policies even after he had left. He had 
an impact on policies and/or helped draft Circulars on housing and 
planning matters, including land availability and building regulations. 
Furthermore, he assisted in urban renewal policies, devising some 
schemes and encouraging other volume builders to participate in 
activities, including the docklands redevelopment. 
In his long spell as adviser at the Department of Industry (later 
DTI), Jeffrey Sterling was involved with many issues. The minister who 
first appointed him, Patrick Jenkin, believed that it would have been 
impossible to have moved so quickly into the new policy of privatizing 
British Telecom (BT) without Sterling's, 'expertise, range of contacts, 
immediate, quick, grasp of exactly what it was we were needing to do, 
and how we were going to do it. ' One of the key things Sterling could 
do, and that Jenkin felt nobody in the department could have done, was 
301 
to liaise with the City and check whether what was then the new concept 
of privatization, with proper regulation of prices, would be saleable. 
Jenkin also used Sterling's services to ensure BT's System X was sorted 
out: 'Jeffrey put that together in six weeks... going round and round, 
getting to know the people - he knew quite a lot of them already - but 
gradually actually putting the thing together and seeing the way 
through; nobody in Whitehall could have done that; they tell me they 
couldn't. ' According to a Sunday Times profile, Sir Jeffrey, 'is asked 
to do sensitive work because he is thought to do it better than a bright 
civil servant. His triumph over System X, ... 
is a case in point' (8 
May 1988). Similarly, Fryer (1989) reports that when the computer chip 
company, Inmos, was sold off to Thorn EMI, 'Sir Jeffrey did more than 
advise, he actually took part in the negotiations. ' 
On becoming Home Secretary in 1983, Leon Brittan worked out a 
complete strategy for the department and claimed it would have been 
difficult, 'to have worked out a coherent strategy which made political 
sense without the assistance of a special adviser. ' The contribution of 
the adviser, Robin Harris, was particularly important in planning the 
strategy for the Criminal Justice system. Having described the problem 
of the tyranny of case work and short term crisis management in the Home 
Office, Hennessy (1989, p. 459) observes that, 'Leon Brittan managed to 
offend the hard and soft elements in society during his ill-starred Home 
Secretaryship in the mid-1980s, but in attempting to solve this 
perpetual problem he excelled and his efforts have been recognised by 
knowledgeable outsiders. ' 
During his time as an adviser in two departments, Maurice Peston 
illustrated how an adviser could contribute to a range of policies in a 
variety of ways. Peston influenced the education section of the October 
1974 Labour election manifesto. His minister at the DES, Reg Prentice, 
described Peston's general role to Knight: 'I appointed Maurice Peston 
as my Special Adviser. We had to create Labour's education policy as 
far as it went ... The Party's schools policy was devised 
by myself and 
Peston, Ernie Armstrong [Minister of State] and William Pile [permanent 
secretary]' (1990, p. 88). One field in which Peston subsequently had an 
impact was the Adult Literacy Scheme. He thought he was more of a 
catalyst or sponsor than an originator of the proposals, being in a 
302 
position to help canalize the energies of Christopher Price, a powerful 
backbencher. He was instrumental in seeing some funding was obtained 
for the scheme and worked constructively with the Minister of State, 
Gerry Fowler. 
Roy Hattersley, Peston's minister at the DPCP, referred to several 
ways in which advisers could influence policy but found it difficult to 
remember exactly how new ideas started because they would generally 
emerge from the evening discussions he quite often held with a group 
including his advisers, private secretaries, Gavyn Davies from the 
Number Ten Policy Unit, and Lord Williams, Chairman of the Price 
Commission. In relation to one of the policies, the converting of 
prices policies into an efficiency and competition policy, Peston did 
not think he was the originator, but was one of the key people who 
developed the view that policy should move in that direction. A further 
way in which Peston could influence policy, according to Hattersley, was 
that when submissions came to him, 'Peston and John Burgh were two 
deputy secretaries who would have the two final notes, so that I would 
be getting the departmental policy just slightly pushed in my 
direction. ' 
A more detailed assessment of the contribution of advisers will be 
made for two contrasting policy issues - the Sex Discrimination Act, 
1975, and the Assisted Places Scheme. In each case I have drawn upon 
previous detailed research. 
Comments from other such authors, however, illustrate some of the 
complexities when making a thorough analysis of the role of an adviser 
in policy making. Two books on sex discrimination law written by 
lawyers stress the importance of Anthony Lester's role. Beloff (1976, 
p. iv) refers to Lester as the 1975 Act's 'onlie begetter', and Pannick 
(1985, preface) describes Lester as being, 'the father and mother of sex 
discrimination law in the United Kingdom. ' Other researchers 
(Callender, 1979; Meehan, 1985), whilst acknowledging Lester's role, 
stress the wider economic, social and political factors that led to the 
legislation. They do identify, however, Lester's earlier part in the 
movement for anti-discrimination legislation. He had already worked 
with Roy Jenkins on race relations legislation in the 1960s and was a 
303 
member of a Labour Party Study Group on Discrimination Against Women 
which produced a final report in 1972 entitled Discrimination Against 
Women. The findings of that study group formed part of the evidence 
before a House of Lords Select Committee on the Anti-Discrimination 
Bill (Meehans, p. 214). 
It has already been noted how Lester was recruited primarily to, in 
Jenkins's words, 'deal specifically with sex discrimination, race 
relations, and racial equality. ' Jenkins was seen as being personally 
committed to the introduction of legislation in these fields. When 
asked whether Lester's role was to fill in the details within the 
framework set by the minister, Jenkins replied, 'Yes, but he was also to 
some extent an initiator as well, he kept me firmly in those directions. 
He worked out the details, and he had a very high class legal mind and 
was extremely good on the issues. ' Lester's detailed drafting work on 
the White Paper, Equalfty f Women (Cmnd. 5724), and later on 
instructions for the drafting of the Bill have also been referred to 
earlier. 
Lester had a particularly influential role not only because of his 
committed expertise in this field, but also because Jenkins was, in his 
own words, 'a fairly detached Home Secretary. ' Wider issues such as the 
debate about British membership of the EEC were of greater concern to 
him than disputes about the details of the Sex Discrimination Bill. It 
could be argued that the Secretary of State should have devoted more 
time to motivating the civil servants to produce the legislation he 
desired. In the context of the debate about the role of advisers, 
however, it might be thought it was sensible for a senior minister to 
recruit an expert who shared his values to advance a major reform, thus 
leaving the minister greater opportunity to engage in perhaps the more 
important political debate of the time. Furthermore, as Jenkins 
explains in his autobiography, whereas in his first term as Home 
Secretary his emphasis had been on promoting liberal laws, in his second 
period, 1974-6, he saw his primary task as, 'the maintenance of the 
proper authority of the state' (p. 376). Therefore, in the 1970s, his 
human rights instincts, 'required a little stimulation' and, he 
comments, 
304 
given the change in my order of priorities, it was both 
desirable and necessary to have Lester there to keep me up to 
the mark. 
Together we had produced by the end of that summer of 1974 a 
Sex Discrimination White Paper, which was both a sensible and 
a popular addition to the Government's manifesto for the 
October election, and which was turned into legislation in the 
1974-5 session. 'Together' was the right word, for although 
Lester wrote the White Paper almost single-handed he required 
a good deal of Secretary of State support, for there was more 
departmental opposition at upper-middle level than I had ever 
previously encountered (p. 376). 
Lester's workload was so great he arranged for the appointment of 
Angela Byre to assist him. According to Jenkins, 'she did that job very 
well. ' She felt that in the area of employment law and tribunals, where 
she had specialist knowledge, she was able to influence the legislation, 
'to a small extent'. She argued that the minister was sold on the 
legislation, 'but Anthony Lester substantially influenced the way it 
emerged in a tangible form - he knew how race relations provisions could 
work and understood the technical ways of producing legislation. ' She 
suspected that without the advisers the policy would not have been 
turned so quickly from a vague commitment into a piece of legislation. 
The advisers, she thought, strengthened the minister's position when 
some civil servants and other ministers questioned the proposals: 
in breaking new ground you have got to have strong arguments 
for doing it in a particular way because people are naturally 
cautious and conservative about doing it and, therefore, if 
you have good technical expertise at your elbow that can 
explain how to do it, and give you a good means of doing it, 
you are likely to carry much more clout. 
Both advisers agreed that Lester did not get his own way all the 
time. Lester explained that given the aim was to eliminate unfair 
discrimination, the means for doing so was a matter of argument: 'I 
was, in effect, in the lead on the formulation of policy with other full 
time permanent officials expressing opinions about that, and the 
Secretary of State, as it were, having to form a view sometimes when 
there were disagreements between us. ' 
The disputes were generally about the nature of the legislation, 
not over whether there should be legislation at all, but, according to 
Rendel (1978, p. 900), 'considerable resistance from within the civil 
305 
service had to be overcome. ' Nevertheless Lester felt that he worked 
pretty well with officials, especially after the position of the Labour 
Government had been strengthened by the October 1974 election, and some 
of the officials dealing with the legislation had been changed. He 
described the role of the specialist adviser as being, 'brokering 
business, getting the policy through, winning arguments. ' He visited 
the United States with Roy Jenkins and learnt important lessons about 
anti-discrimination legislation there. 
The importance of Lester's role is widely accepted; Brian Cubbon 
agreed he did the detailed work on the White Paper and described his 
position on the discrimination issue as 'dominant'. Cubbon felt that, 
'it was more inertia than obstruction', that Lester faced. There is 
also some way of reconciling some of the apparently contrasting views 
about the influences on the Act set out at the start of this exposition. 
Thus, whatever the strength and nature of the various forces that 
created the situation in which it was thought appropriate to introduce 
sex discrimination legislation, Lester clearly did influence its precise 
content. Callender, however, also examined the role of various women's 
groups and, using the framework provided by Hall gi al., claimed that 
their, 'numerous and varied activities provided the legitimacy, 
feasibility and support necessary for legislation. ' This claim is 
perhaps most contestable in relation to the feasibility argument. Byre 
argued that although she and Lester were pushing the proposals further 
(and the civil servants were saying they had gone far enough), they were 
not doing so because of what pressure groups were saying. However, she 
continued: 
We were helped by the fact that pressure groups made a very 
powerful case which we could argue ... it was very useful to be able to channel the arguments that you probably thought 
were correct anyway, ... 'it has been made very forcefully to 
us', whereas some of the time it is the argument you would 
have been putting. 
Meehans shows how the women's groups were active in canvassing 
Jenkins and the relevant Parliamentary Under Secretary of State, Dr 
Shirley Summerskill, and she examines the response of the Inter- 
Organisational Committee, the umbrella organisation for women's groups, 
to the publication of the Sex Discrimination Bill in March 1975. The 
306 
committee produced a long document: 
in which it was stated that many of their original points had 
been met. They particularly welcomed the inclusion of the 
idea of indirect discrimination stemming from acts not 
necessarily intended to be discriminatory. According to a 
participant, however, this was not included as a result of 
British women's groups but on American advice (p. 53). 
Once again Lester's role, in travelling to America with Jenkins, was 
influential. In general it may be concluded that although there would 
have been a Sex Discrimination Act had Lester not been appointed, he did 
influence its final shape. 
It is widely agreed that Stuart Sexton exerted a considerable 
influence on the Assisted Places Scheme introduced in Section 17 of the 
1980 Education Act. About 5,000 means-tested places were to be made 
available each year to academically able children whose parents could 
not afford the full fees at independent schools. The state was to 
reimburse the schools for fees remitted for the selected pupils. It is 
a controversial measure: 'From the outset, it was defended and attacked 
with a fervour quite disproportionate to its modest scale' (Edwards, 
&1., 1989, p. 1). Their research shows doubts exist about how far 
Sexton was the originator of the scheme, because, 'the proposals taken 
up by the Conservative Party in 1976 had been devised and actively 
promoted by heads of direct-grant schools' (p. 35). Furthermore, Sexton 
wanted much higher targets for numbers of places than others advocated. 
But, 'while these are reasons for doubting claims that he is the 
"acknowledged architect" of the Assisted Places Scheme, his importance 
as its "intellectual broker" is certainly evident' (p. 36). Similarly, 
Salter and tapper (1985, p. 198) say of Sexton: 'Although the eventual 
scheme cannot be said to be his personal product he undoubtedly left his 
mark. His role is best described as that of the intellectual broker, 
although ideas do not originate with him he has the vital function of 
transforming them into an acceptable political form'. 
Knight (1990, p. 8) refers to Sexton as, 'instrumental in 
formulating much of Tory education policy for the 1979 General election, 
including the Assisted Places Scheme', and Edwards ra al. (1989, p. 36) 
demonstrate that enthusiasm for it even amongst Conservative politicians 
307 
was limited, and, 
there was no discernible contribution to its making from the 
many other policy advisers (formal and informal) who had been 
engaged in preparing their Party for office. Even St. John 
Stevas and his shadow successor, Mark Carlisle, ... showed only intermittent interest in it and Sexton's own consistent 
enthusiasm was therefore invaluable in enlisting political 
support for the Scheme. 
Edwards C1 al., describe some of the steps taken by Sexton, both to 
ensure that the scheme became official Conservative policy, and to 
devise the plans in great detail. His activities included promoting the 
scheme within the private sector and identifying schools likely to offer 
places and the terms on which they would be willing to do so. He was, 
'determined to establish, by the time the Conservatives returned to 
office, that there were enough schools willing to enter into a 
contract' (p. 31). 
Sexton's role could be described as developing the feasibility of 
the scheme, although he was also concerned to increase and demonstrate 
its support and legitimacy. As with the discussion of Lester's role, 
the account of the part played by Sexton builds on comments made already 
in various sections of this book. The role that Sexton had played in 
general in helping to develop policy in Opposition, and particularly his 
work on the Assisted Places Scheme, led to his being one of the 
comparatively few advisers appointed in 1979. In interview, Carlisle 
stated that the Assisted Places Scheme, 
was going to require a good deal of push to get it through, 
firstly, because it was not a policy that was particularly 
popular with the department, there were a fair number of 
critics in the area; also it needed a great deal of work and 
he'd been heavily involved in it in advance and knew the 
people and schools who would like to take part, and was very 
important and relevant in that area. 
Given, however, that the scheme was a manifesto commitment, once 
the party had been elected, and the incoming minister confirmed his 
support, it has been argued in interview by an official that the adviser 
need not have influenced the policy any more because the civil service 
would ensure its implementation. This proposition can be examined by 
considering the progress of the proposals. As always at a change of 
308 
Government, the civil servants presented the new minister with their 
assessment of how to implement the manifesto proposals. According to 
Edwards ti L Sexton's detailed plan was larger in scope than this, but, 
'was certainly not ready-made for implementation' (p. 37). Carlisle 
reported that he instructed officials that Sexton was to be involved, 
with Lady Young, the Minister of State, in developing the scheme. It 
could be argued that the differences between Sexton's plan and that 
drawn up initially by officials suggest that without Sexton's input, 
the final scheme would have been more restricted; but the differences 
between Sexton's blueprint and the final Act, as implemented, imply 
there were limitations on his influence. 
Before considering some of the details of Sexton's role, we can 
consider several general assessments. Edwards gl g1. (1989, p. 35-6) 
refer to, 'the crucial role in the development of the Scheme', played by 
Sexton, 'both as a "broker" mediating between the pressure group and the 
relevant civil servants and as a direct influence on the decisions which 
were being made by ministers. ' They identified several factors which, 
together, 'all enabled him to influence the details of the eventual 
scheme as no minister would have been able or would have wanted to do. ' 
These factors included: his long experience in Opposition as a political 
adviser; his regular presence in the DES; his commitment to assisted 
places and his relative freedom from other responsibilities; and his 
many contacts in the private sector. In terms of the distinction used 
earlier, Sexton was a protagonist not an analyst. In reviewing the 
evaluation by Edwards 1 al., one of the junior ministers of the period, 
Rhodes Boyson, said of the scheme that, 'it was really the child of 
Stuart Sexton - the indefatigable political adviser' (, 18 May 
1990). 
Salter and Tapper (1985) suggest that when the Assisted Places 
legislation was framed, the traditionally important role of DES 
officials (as described in their earlier, 1981, study) was eroded by the 
degree of detailed preparation which Sexton had deliberately engaged in 
to avoid the scheme being emasculated by the caution of officials or a 
ministerial change of priorities. Knight also states, based on 
information from Mark Carlisle, that, 'in 1979 the APS was opposed by 
most Conservatives involved in Education, and was not popular at the 
309 
DES' (pp. 147-8). 
In an interesting analysis Edwards gl al. (1989, p. 36-7) describe 
the influence of the independent schools' representatives, and of career 
civil servants, as well as that of Sexton on the contents of the scheme. 
Although the leading figures in the independent schools' campaign had 
come to value Sexton's, 'promotional skills and his energy', when the 
details had to be worked out, they 'welcomed the clarity which civil 
servants brought to early discussions about the terms of the Scheme and 
their relative wariness about how dependent on assisted places any 
independent school could afford to become. ' Having referred to the, 
'interaction between commitment and practicality' in the final shaping 
of the scheme, the authors state: 
we found no evidence that the civil servants responsible for 
constructing a workable Assisted Places Scheme were either 
dilatory, or obstructive, or uneasy about the close 
cooperation with the private sector which it involved ... The 
civil servants had to consider (as Sexton did not) the 
possible impact of the scheme on the public sector, and the 
consequent need to initiate at least nominal consultation with 
local authorities and teacher unions ... There was a more 
general contrast too, noted in an internal DES memorandum, 
between Sexton's dedication to the detailed application of 
'his' particular scheme, and the obligation of civil servants 
to assess the merits of various alternatives. 
Many of these points reflect the discussion in Chapter 3 with the 
officials being seen to have values, such as equity, which mean that, 
whilst they will implement manifesto proposals, they are concerned about 
the long term maintenance of the system as a whole. As we saw, public 
administrators conform to public organization norms and, 'are concerned 
with establishing an equitable and accountable system in which the work 
of the schools can take place. ' (Kogan and Van Der Eyken, 1973 p. 65). 
Carlisle stated in interview that they were under pressure not to 
go ahead with the scheme, but Sexton was very supportive. He thought it 
would be, 'slightly overstating it' to say it would not have gone ahead 
without him, but 'his presence there helped. ' Salter and Tapper (1985, 
p. 204) claim that, 
310 
Although the preparation for the necessary legislation was 
proceeding very smoothly in a technical sense, the scheme was 
running into rough political waters. In a memo to the 
Secretary of State Sexton ... clearly suspected a perfidious DES: 'It is infuriating to read so many inaccurate 
"authoritative" accounts of the Assisted Places Scheme ... At the approrpiate time I would ask that I be allowed to write a 
short, concise, accurate summary of the Scheme, to be made 
public as a press release, and I would rather I write it and 
you checked it. Rather than the Press Office or anyone else 
in the DES'. 
Edwards gl al. (1989, p. 40) also describe Sexton's various activities 
aimed at ensuring continued ministerial support when the scheme faced 
hostility. He drafted a statement, which Carlisle incorporated almost 
unchanged into a speech, giving the clearest commitment to the scheme. 
He also wrote several memoranda to Carlisle, including one expressing 
alarm at rumours that the scheme might 'be dropped altogether' and 
referring to a manifesto commitment that, 'could not have been clearer. ' 
Here Sexton was acting as 'Keeper of the Ark of the Manifesto' -a role 
we saw earlier (Chapter 4 Section B) that he accepted. 
The greatest threat to the scheme came from the controversy 
surrounding the increase in public expenditure from a measure to support 
independent schools, at a time of proposed cuts in public expenditure 
elsewhere. Sexton was anxious for the scheme to be introduced as 
rapidly as possible so that it could involve a large number of pupils, 
and be confirmed a success, before the next election, thus making it 
difficult to dismantle even if Labour won. The decision was finally 
made to go ahead with the scheme, but on a smaller scale than originally 
intended, rather than postpone it. In discussing whether the decision 
represented a victory or defeat, Edwards g1 I. (1989, p. 41) conclude: 
'in view of Carlisle's reputation for weakness in defending educational 
expenditure, and the undoubted Treasury and other pressures to abandon 
the Scheme altogether, its retention in reduced form could be regarded 
as a considerable victory for the political skills of Sexton and the 
independent school lobby. ' 
In September 1979 Sexton addressed a meeting of the Head Masters' 
Conference. Opposition to the motion supporting the scheme, albeit from 
a small minority, generated some publicity, which in turn, 'caused 
problems for Sexton, who had outlined the Scheme to Conference members 
311 
with his usual fervour and was subsequently warned by Saville [the civil 
servant who was Registrar for Independent Schools] that he risked 
intensifying the opposition to it by exaggerating its scope. ' (Edwards, 
gl al., 1989, p. 41). Their evaluation study also provides details of 
Sexton's role in attending meetings between officials and ministers; 
internal meetings of officials; and departmental meetings with 
outsiders, some of whom were surprised to find an adviser present. This 
role continued after the legislation had been passed and it had to be 
implemented. Sexton's views continued to be accepted at times, and 
rejected at others. On the number of schools to be included, Sexton's 
initial plans went far wider than just the former direct - grant grammar 
schools that had been included in the DES's first response. Sexton 
initially got his way and the letter asking for offers of places went to 
all independent schools providing secondary education; the former direct 
grant schools constituted about half the total number finally involved. 
Edwards ( g]. (1989, p. 45) observe: 'Throughout the process of 
recruiting suitable schools, Sexton was more quantitatively ambitious 
and less discriminating than were the civil servants ... Sexton's 
advocacy of more liberal entry conditions had only a marginal effect on 
the final list. ' 
Whatever the limitations on Sexton's influence, Carlisle agreed 
that it was probably greater than that exerted by most special advisers 
and he believed, 'it was invaluable to have him - especially with the 
implementation of the Assisted Places Scheme. ' 
In Chapter 7 it was suggested that the type of policy, and the 
degree of knowledge surrounding it, and political consensus supporting 
it, may require advisers to use different skills and do different work. 
The two policies just considered in detail were very different. The Sex 
Discrimination Act was much larger in scope than the Assisted Places 
Scheme; it covered the concerns of other departments and in many aspects 
raised issues about which the department had limited knowledge. 
Nevertheless, there was a wide political consensus that some such 
measure should be introduced. There was no equivalent consensus 
surrounding the Assisted Places Scheme. To this extent, Sexton, unlike 
Lester, had to engage in activities aimed at ensuring the measure was 
introduced at all. Whilst Sexton's knowledge of which schools might be 
312 
interested in participating was valuable in demonstrating the 
feasibility of the Assisted Places Scheme, the scheme did not require 
the introduction of new legal principles such as Lester was advocating. 
There were some similarities between the policy areas, for example, 
in both cases there was a political imperative for speedy action and in 
neither case was there a clearly established policy community. The 
political consensus surrounding the sex discrimination legislation did 
not, as we have seen, extend to the officials as would have been 
necessary for a policy community to have developed, and the Assisted 
Places Scheme did not fall with the central concerns of the education 
policy community. In these circumstances there was perhaps more room 
than usual for an individual campaigner to become a special adviser and 
engage in whatever activities the particular situation required, and 
allowed, in relation to the formulation of new legislation, although 
representatives of the independent schools were also heavily involved in 
planning the details of the Assisted Places Scheme with the DES 
(Salter and Tapper, 1985; Edwards cL J, 1989). 
Perhaps a greater contrast in the impact of a policy area on the 
work of advisers may, ironically, be seen in the differences between 
Sexton's success with the Assisted Places Scheme, and his and Oliver 
Letwin's failure to persuade the DES and Keith Joseph that it was 
practical to introduce an Educational Vouchers Scheme. This is one of 
the exceptions noted by Holmes (1987) to his general comment, quoted in 
Chapter 3, about Margaret Thatcher's Government not being deflected by 
the civil service. The opinion that the civil service blocked this 
scheme is vehemently expressed in 'public choice' terminology by 
proponents of the scheme such as Seldon (1986, Summary): 'Bureaucrats as 
a class must be expected to oppose it because it would substantially 
reduce their authority. ' Other commentators suggest that ministers 
simply came to accept the advice of officials that there would be 
enormous difficulties in implementation. Letwin commented: 
313 
it is mistaken to represent officials as if they were 
obstructive against the wishes of the minister. They were in 
my view wholly obstructive, but not against the wishes of the 
minister. I think they were fulfilling their duty perfectly 
well in the sense that Sir Keith thought vouchers was an 
attractive principle and he would like to explore it. My job 
was to explore how to do it and their job was to explore how 
not. 
The difference in scope between the two schemes partly explains the 
different roles played by the advisers, and their degree of success, in 
advocating the adoption of the policies. Furthermore, Sexton's 
knowledge about schools willing and eager to participate in any 
Assisted Places Scheme, provided a stronger knowledge base than the 
arguments supporting the Vouchers Scheme which were largely 
theoretical despite the strength with which they were advocated and 
some preparatory work undertaken by Kent County Council (Seldon). Even 
the comparable experience from the United States (primarily the 
experiment at Alum Rock, California, see Seldon) was much less 
substantial than that (described, for example, by Meehans) available to 
Lester and others in support of the need to tackle 'indirect 
discrimination'. 
314 
SECTION $ý EXAMPLES Q EFFECTIVE ADVISERS. 
The study has demonstrated the diverse nature both of the needs of 
ministers for assistance and of the background, recruitment, and roles 
of advisers. Therefore, it would be unproductive to attempt to produce 
a full typology of advisers covering all the possible categories. 
Furthermore, the previous chapter illustrated various ways in which 
advisers could be ineffective and/or receive a hostile reaction from the 
civil service. For these reasons this section will be limited to 
identifying several categories of effective advisers. The two clearest 
categories are: 'the All-rounder' and 'the Highflier'. Of the advisers 
interviewed, outstanding examples of the former include: Brian Abel- 
Smith, Anthony Lester, Maurice Peston, and Adam Ridley; and of the 
second category: David Lipsey, Michael Portillo, and Jack Straw. 
Examples of the effective work of these advisers have been used at 
various points throughout this study. Favourable comments about them 
were made by most, though not necessarily all, the ministers, officials, 
and other advisers who knew of their work; and sometimes even by 
politicians from the other party. Patrick Jenkin, for example, 
commented that Jack Straw, 'was very much respected by the department - 
they thought he was the best special adviser any minister had ever had. ' 
A few of the All-rounders might even have been in a category that 
could be called the 'Depsecs'. Even the Depsecs were not, of course, 
full permanent deputy secretaries, but some had the equivalent grade and 
status; Roy Hattersley explicitly stated, 'Maurice Peston worked like a 
deputy secretary, with a political view. ' Roger Dyson's reference to 
Abel-Smith almost becoming a deputy secretary was noted earlier. In 
each case the All-rounder had many roles on policy issues, cabinet 
briefing, and other areas that involved the need for expert knowledge 
and political judgment. In some cases they pulled together diverse 
strands within the department. The width of their role, their 
perspective on issues, and their political skills, knowledge, and 
commitment, distinguished them from other specialists and made it 
inappropriate to regard them as solely specialist advisers. 
315 
Various comments demonstrate the way in which their role was seen 
to be broad. Brian Cubbon said, 'of all the special advisers I have 
come across I think Anthony Lester was the most mature in the 
argumentation and background he brought to the preparation of 
legislation against discrimination. ' Although when he appointed Lester, 
whom he already regarded as a friend, Roy Jenkins specifically wanted 
him to concentrate on anti-discrimination legislation, Lester was free 
to, 'pronounce on the whole range of Home Office affairs' in a way in 
which, as we have seen, John Harris was no longer able to do. In 1980 
Brian Abel-Smith wrote, 'What the outside academic brings to government 
is not depth of knowledge, but breadth of knowledge, what he also brings 
is a larger historical perspective. ' A senior DHSS official echoed 
these sentiments when he said of Abel-Smith: 'he was right across the 
board; that was one of his great merits, that he had a view across this 
very large department. ' Patrick Nairne said of Abel-Smith: 
He is one of the world's experts on health service systems ... 
and he provided a particular degree of historical/academic 
continuity in relation to the build up of the National Health 
Service. He was able, against that background, to be an 
adviser about strategy ... and was also able to advise the 
minister from the standpoint of being a committed member of 
the Labour Party. 
According to Douglas Wass, 'Adam Ridley, with his background in the 
Conservative Research Department, his previous experience of Whitehall, 
and his training as an economist, did make quite a big input over a wide 
area of policy. ' Similarly, another official said of Adam Ridley, 'he 
is very like a civil servant, and indeed would make a very good civil 
servant. He got involved in everything; very energetic. ' David Hill 
thought that his advisory colleague, Maurice Peston, 'obviously was the 
economic specialist adviser, but Maurice was also a man who had very 
strong views on other subjects ... and 
had general advice to give. ' 
We saw earlier that both Peston and Roy Hattersley felt that 
Peston's role was so wide that he could no longer play it satisfactorily 
when he became part time because of the need to return to his academic 
career. This illustrates the great pressures on All-rounders. In 
contrast to the recognized security of the deputy secretary role within 
the hierarchy, various factors might make it difficult to sustain the 
role of All-rounder and each point is relevant for at least one of the 
316 
individuals cited. The independence of the All-rounder might be 
weakened by pressure to be absorbed into the civil service system. His 
influence might be lessened by a change of minister. The length of time 
he could hold the position might be curtailed by the need to maintain 
links with a previous occupation on which his expertise might be based. 
The term highflier is often applied by the civil service to 
officials who are rising rapidly in the hierarchy and are likely to 
spend a period as private secretary to a minister. It was, therefore, 
deliberately chosen because several of the features that distinguish the 
effective special adviser who is a Highflier, are similar to those 
characteristics of good private secretaries, but Highflier advisers also 
exhibit political skills, being able to liaise with politicians and 
others, sometimes crossing uncertain boundaries. Quite a number of the 
younger (usually in their 20's) special advisers have provided good 
political support for their ministers in terms of speech writing, party 
liaison, and spotting political landmines. In addition to all those 
skills the Highfliers have managed to develop a relationship with civil 
servants in the department that is complementary to that of the private 
secretary. This relationship is not necessarily based on policy 
expertise, but on knowing and understanding the minister's mind and the 
political constraints within which he operates in a way that is made 
mutually advantageous to the minister and the officials. Furthermore, 
they were able to develop informal links with politicians and pressure 
groups that meant that they could bring in information useful to the 
department. Officials were often keen to engage the Highfliers in the 
department's affairs. Such officials ranged from permanent secretaries 
to officials at about assistant secretary rank recognized by the 
Highfliers as often being people keen to show their abilities at policy 
making and who might have been proposing options that had been winnowed 
out of the final submission. 
The general point that advisers can help liaise between the 
minister and the department has been made before, but the following 
additional quotations, starting with Donald Maitland on Michael 
Portillo, illustrate ways in which the Highfliers were seen as being 
particularly adept at it: 
317 
If you were to draw up a specification for a political 
adviser, I think he would get a plus on every point ... I think a 'bridge' is part of the role, 'channel' is part of the 
role, 'lubricant' is part of the role, 'confidant' on both 
sides. 
Michael Portillo had proved extremely good at being a liaison 
between me and various parts of the department in a thoroughly 
constructive way. And I think he got on extremely well with 
everybody in the department without necessarily becoming too 
seduced by the department. (David Howell). 
They were really a bridge between Barbara Castle and the 
department, as well as with the political world ... And they were an effective bridge and people whose judgment I respected 
and trusted, and confidence I trusted. (Senior DHSS Official). 
The private office did a lot of the bridging but the political 
adviser was doing it in a different context, a different 
dimension (Andrew Semple on David Lipsey). 
In contrast to the All-rounder, the Highflier was unlikely to have 
a major impact on policy development. He was the lubricant, not the 
powerhouse. Both categories, especially the Highflier, were able, 
however, to overcome the delicacy in the role described in Chapter 3, 
and successfully counteract uncertainty absorption, but to do so in an 
open way so that the officials were generally aware of what was being 
sent to the minister. As was noted, Brian Abel-Smith had the confidence 
to see that it was beneficial for the Secretary of State if the civil 
service knew beforehand what the adviser was saying. 
The categorization of advisers developed in this section is less 
comprehensive but more complex than the division between specialist 
advisers and political advisers referred to early in this study. It 
allows the political dimension of the All-rounder's role to be 
accommodated, and recognizes that the personal skills displayed by 
Highfliers meant that even without a relevant background expertise, they 
could rapidly be brought into the dialogue on issues within a 
department. Commenting on the terms specialist and political advisers, 
a DHSS official said of Abel-Smith, 'He was that admirable thing, a 
combination of the two, and this why I said ... we were particularly 
lucky. ' Bulmer's application to the UK of the four Images (See Chapter 
3 Section C) is also useful here. Two advisers whose roles he described 
as being 'consonant with Image IV' (1988, p. 38), in which the line 
between advice and political action became blurred, were Peston and 
318 
Abel-Smith. 
A further group of advisers are the Specialists and Businessmen. 
Whilst they might have had more influence on specific policies than even 
some of the All-rounders, and they combined expertise with varying 
degrees of ability to work with people in the system, they tended to 
operate more within a specialist field, rather than displaying a wide 
range of political skills or roles. Successful examples of this group, 
including Tom Baron, Arthur Cockfield, Jeffrey Sterling, and David 
Young, played such disparate roles that it is impossible to argue they 
form a further precise category. In some cases, for example Arthur 
Cockfield, their previous Whitehall experience was considerably greater 
than that of the All-rounders. In other cases, including David Young, it 
was less. For many of his eight years as an adviser, Jeffrey Sterling 
was very part time, whereas Tom Baron served full time - but for a 
period limited to six months from the outset. 
SECTION C CHARACTERISTICS OF EFFECTIVE ADVISERS. 
Characteristics Q# All-rounders md Highfliers. 
Identifying these categories highlights the characteristics of effective 
advisers and some of these qualities will now be examined, before 
broadening the analysis. It is a truism to say that individual 
qualities are important for determining success. However, for advisers 
who have little inherent institutional status on which to fall back, 
their individual qualities - as judged by ministers and officials - are 
crucial. 
The importance of personal qualities is perhaps particularly 
crucial in the case of Highfliers because these were the common factor 
they shared, rather than any similarity in the extent to which they had 
prior experience of working with the minister or the subject matter. 
David Lipsey had been working as research assistant in Opposition for 
the Shadow Environment Secretary who became Secretary of State. Michael 
Portillo had been the CRD desk officer covering Energy, but his shadow 
minister, Tom King, did not become the Secretary of State for Energy. 
Jack Straw had not had previous experience of working either for Barbara 
319 
Castle or in Health and Social Security matters. Indeed in an article 
in ]J. ig Sunday Times on 21 April 1974 about the newly appointed Labour 
advisers, Hugo Young wrote of Straw: 'his party biography catalogues 
his "special interests" - "education, transport and planning, community 
development, law reform, race relations, industrial relations". 
Virtually everything, that is, except health or social security at which 
department he is now a special adviser. ' All effective advisers are 
likely to share qualities of intelligence, a capacity for hard work, 
drafting skills, political judgment, and ability to get on with 
officials. 
All-rounders not only possessed considerable expertise and 
political commitment but, perhaps even more importantly, combined these 
factors to provide a personal commitment to the policies ministers 
wished to see introduced, and to the minister himself. Patrick Nairne 
claimed that in addition to great knowledge and political sensitivity 
advisers such as Abel-Smith, 'were personally committed to the minister 
so that the minister felt when she was talking to them that these people 
were wholly on her side. ' John Biffen referred to the 'close 
compatibility' between Adam Ridley and Geoffrey Howe. In most cases 
All-rounders had previous experience of working in Whitehall and 'knew 
the ropes'. Several quotations illustrate how some of these points 
could be brought together. In the Na, Minister series Roy Hattersley 
described his adviser's attributes: 
He was Professor Maurice Peston who, from my point of view, 
had the supreme advantage of almost exactly sharing my 
political beliefs ... We both believed in the direct 
intervention of the government in the economy. In his phrase, 
we thought that the Department of Prices had the primary job 
of setting the guidelines for the mixed economy: how companies 
worked, levels of competition, attack on monopolies, control 
of prices, influence of advertising. We thought that was the 
department's job, and when I arrived at the department very 
many of the civil servants didn't think that was the 
department's job, and my task was to convince them that it 
was. Now having somebody who shared my views almost exactly 
but could also support them with a body of academic belief, 
with a substantial academic reputation, with that marvellous 
cachet of being called a professor, was a major advantage 
(Young and Sloman, 1982, pp. 88-9). 
320 
In his assessment in Tg Sum Times 19 September 1976 of the work 
of advisers in their first couple of years, Hugo Young thought that the 
influence of advisers had generally been marginal, but there were a few 
exceptions: 
At the Home Office, Anthony Lester made a major impact by 
working with the grain of the civil service. He became the 
principal technical author of the new laws on race relations 
and sex equality. On a broader front, he gave significant 
advice on non-departmental matters and was accepted on 
official committees, notably the recent working party on human 
rights proposals. 
A combination of genuine expertise, tactical flair and 
strategic vision, backed by the complete support of Roy 
Jenkins, are held in the department to account for a success 
which mostly, they do not grudge him. 
The Highfliers did not necessarily possess expertise, but, in 
addition to their strong personal and political commitment to their 
minister, the striking feature about them was the respect in which they 
were held by officials. They gained the trust of officials, without 
losing that of the minister. The general point is well made by Ian 
Bancroft, who thought highly of David Lipsey and Jack Straw who both 
were advisers in the DoE whilst he was permanent secretary. Bright 
young special advisers, he thought, 'can pick up the essentials of a 
subject very quickly - the most important thing is how to handle 
people. ' They had to be trusted to get information from the department 
and party offices. 
This stress on personal qualities helps explain why it is useful to 
supply comments on advisers' attributes. A few more can be selected 
from the many possible, to add to those already used to illustrate this 
point. George Moseley, who was also permanent secretary at the DoE, 
particularly valued advisers who would 'engage' with the department and 
be, 'a policy enabler, a translater, a liaison-man. ' He commented that 
Lipsey and Straw, 
are the two who stand out in a sense as being the sort of 
political adviser that I regard as of significant benefit to 
the permanent staff ... My thesis about wanting to see some 
permanent recognition of the means, and indeed desirability, 
of extending the ministerial private office to include a 
political dimension, depends very much for its success, and 
321 
advantage to the civil service, on having calibre people in 
there. 
An official commented that Michael Portillo, 'was talked to and 
trusted' at the Department of Energy. More advisers could justifiably 
be included in the Highflier category than the All-rounders category, 
with the examples quoted being some of the outstanding ones. 
Various points in the model developed in Chapter 3 help explain the 
effectiveness of these categories of special advisers. First, it was 
suggested that people who could contribute from both ends of the 
technical-values spectrum might be particularly valuable. All-rounders 
can do this, and their strong commitment to, and compatability with, 
their minister enabled them to comment directly to him. Their degree of 
expertise meant, as observed by Klein and Lewis (p. 17), that they 
regarded themselves as having a degree of independence, even though they 
were close to their minister. The ability of both categories, 
especially the Highfliers, to get on with a variety of people, added to 
their political sensitivity, allowed them to operate along many channels 
of information both inside the department, where they could move up and 
down the hierarchy, and outside. Furthermore, their intelligence and 
drafting ability facilitated the processing of the information gathered, 
to the benefit of their minister. 
General Characteristics. 
Many of the attributes just referred to will be further explored in this 
general sub-section, in which characteristics rather than categories 
are analysed. Not every effective adviser would necessarily expect to 
possess all the characteristics, but the two mentioned most frequently 
were, the ability to gain the respect of civil servants, and to be 
clearly in receipt of strong backing from the minister. 
(i) Various elements could contribute towards gaining the respect of 
officials. They wanted to feel they could trust the adviser and 
welcomed advisers who 'worked with the grain. ' Where advisers, for 
example Roger Liddle, made a point of being open with officials this was 
usually much appreciated. Intellect, ability to operate at speed, and 
drafting skills were admired. In the words of Jack Straw: 'people 
322 
recognized certain administrative skills of a similar kind to theirs. ' 
Several officials thought effective advisers were those who were, 'clean 
about the house. ' 
Some took the argument further and suggested that effective 
advisers not only worked with the grain, and eschewed hostility, but 
also made a point of being friendly. According to Derek Scott, 'much of 
the written work on this underestimates the importance of personality in 
the role of special advisers ... a willingness to get along with 
at least 20 to 30 key civil servants. ' Officials in the Treasury thought 
that Scott got on well with people and according to one, Scott's 
attendance at the permanent secretary's planning meetings, 'was a 
tribute to his personality and skills. ' The permanent secretary, 
Douglas Wass, also believed, 'the most effective advisers were those who 
set about positively to work with the civil service machine. ' 
Foreign Office officials too, often laid stress on the adviser's 
personality. John Graham thought an effective adviser had to have the 
trust of the civil service and the minister. To gain this he believed 
it important that the adviser should know the subject and have some 
general wisdom. In addition Miles Hudson was, 'a congenial character'. 
We have seen that Lord Home thought the individual qualities of Hudson 
were important reasons for making the appointment originally. 
Furthermore, Hudson was, 'a very gregarious amusing person and livened 
the whole place up ... he fitted in very well and was certainly useful'. 
Similarly Tom McCaffrey thought that if advisers were to be effective 
they had to, 'gain the respect of civil servants. ' This he felt Tom 
McNally was able to do not only because he was knowledgeable about the 
politics of Labour Party foreign policy, but also because he adopted a 
friendly attitude towards the civil service. Another Foreign Office 
official claimed there was a 'frisson of concern' about special 
advisers, but David Stephen was, 'Well equipped in personal skills to 
deal with it. People liked him and trusted him and he had sane views. 
Personality is the key to special advisers' effectiveness. ' In all three 
examples, and others, the friendliness was only one component of the 
factors that led to the adviser gaining the trust of officials. 
323 
Often the advisers worked well where a good relationship was 
established with the private office. Although there was some feeling 
that advisers provided a commitment that private secretaries could not 
provide, some of the most successful special advisers operated in tandem 
with successful private secretaries who were close to their ministers, 
for example, John Harris and David Dowler; Jack Straw and Norman Warner. 
This fits in with the argument that good ministers know how to get the 
best out of people. There have been some suggestions that influential 
well-established special advisers have been in a position to suggest 
names to the minister when it was necessary to appoint a new principal 
private secretary. 
(ii) All the Highfliers and All-rounders had clear ministerial support, 
which is the other element often described as the key to advisory 
effectiveness. Walter (p. 175-6) describes some ministers and advisers 
as having a relationship based on a form of symbiosis and suggests such 
pairing may be integral to groups around leaders. Whilst the importance 
of the aide/confidant role has been described, it is noticeable that 
three of the All-rounders identified and all the Highfliers worked for 
more than one minister. 
Specialists interviewed thought their link with the minister and 
his support made their position stronger than that of an expert brought 
in by the department. The importance of ministerial backing was often 
commented on by ministers, advisers, and officials. At the Treasury in 
1979, for example, Douglas Wass believed that, 'the fact that Cropper 
and Ridley enjoyed the confidence of Sir Geoffrey meant that they were 
taken seriously by the department. ' Similarly, Ridley observed that the 
reasons why he was able to be involved with the department included, 
'absolutely unequivocal ministerial backing, and it became clear early 
on that if we intervened on something, there was a serious chance that 
our intervention would carry weight. ' 
At MAFF, Terry Dawes thought the reaction of civil servants was, 
'if they offended Ann [Carlton] they offended the minister. ' Richard 
Ehrman reflected the widespread opinion noted earlier: 
324 
the way they deal with the special adviser is they just watch 
to see how much he has got the minister's ear. If you haven't 
got the minister's ear you are a nobody ... and if you have got his ear, and you are in on all the important things, then 
you have clout and influence; so the aide/confidant role is 
frightfully important to the special adviser. 
Some of the junior advisers without any relevant subject expertise 
recognized how much they relied on their ability to demonstrate to 
officials that they enjoyed their minister's confidence. Michael Dobbs 
took the argument further; not only did the press officer and other 
civil servants show him things because they could see that he had a very 
close relationship with the Secretary of State, but also his 
effectiveness was greater because of that of the minister who cast, 'a 
strong and long shadow in the department. ' Where an adviser believed 
there was a confrontational situation with the department, then support 
from the minister was important. Stuart Holland commented: 'there are 
plenty of frustrations from civil servants, but my experience was, both 
in the '60s (and I have given you one instance of it) and in the '70s, 
that if you had effective access to a minister who was interested in the 
issues, you could defeat the civil service. ' 
Most did not see the requirement for support from ministers in 
terms of defeating the bureaucracy, but there is considerable room for 
debate about the exact relationship between the two main 
characteristics. In addition to stressing the importance of ministerial 
backing, Ehrman emphasized the importance of the adviser getting on with 
the civil servants: 'You have got to work on your personal relationships 
with everyone. You have got to make yourself useful and friendly. ' Tom 
King felt his advisers, Katharine Ramsay and Richard Ehrman, 'were very 
effective and very helpful' and similarly thought that the ability to 
get on with the civil servants was crucial: 'it depends alot on the 
personality of the special adviser ... the ones I have had integrated 
themselves well into the team. ' Some ministers, including Bill Rodgers, 
were keen to ensure that officials knew that the minister's confidence 
in an adviser did not detract from his confidence in them. 
Many advisers, whilst recognizing the importance of developing a 
good relationship with the civil service, were clear that their main 
loyalty was to the minister who appointed them, and whose support they 
325 
usually thought was necessary. It was widely felt, therefore, that 
rather than, 'working with the grain of the civil service', the 
attribute should be, 'working with the grain of the civil service, but 
not being absorbed by it. ' Nevertheless, advisers such as Brian Abel- 
Smith and Jack Straw, who, as we have seen, deliberately developed good 
relations with officials, were also often in receipt of strong 
ministerial backing and this combination of attributes was appreciated 
by officials. Patrick Nairne, who thought highly of both, commented: 
Special advisers are an effective and successful development 
in Whitehall when they are able to add to the political 
sympathy they have with their minister a considerable degree 
of expertise or experience in the field in which the minister 
is operating and also an ability to work well, cooperatively, 
with officials, without prejudice to their commitment to the 
minister. 
Denis Healey suggested that the relationship developed with the civil 
service was even more important than ministerial support: 'if civil 
servants think the special adviser is no good, but has a close 
relationship with the minister, they have to fix him. ' 
Jim Prior illustrates the fine balance that has to be maintained. 
He thought that, 'to start with the private office would try to keep the 
chap out if they can', but once strong ministerial support had been 
established, 'there was not much difficulty. ' We saw earlier how Rob 
Shepherd felt he benefited from the strong support Prior displayed for 
him, and according to an official, 'Rob Shepherd got on terms really 
quite quickly with senior officials and got their trust. ' Prior also 
believed that, up to a point, the adviser, to be effective, had to get 
on well with officials: 
They must work with the civil service, and if they don't work 
well with the civil service, then they can be frozen out and 
they can have very little impact. On the other hand, they 
have got to keep themselves a little bit at arms length from 
the civil service, otherwise they become just another civil 
servant and they are not there to perform that duty. 
(iii) Prior's comment is similar to one from Tom Baron, and leads to 
another quality identified by several interviewees, especially 
ministers, as being important in an effective adviser - toughness and 
self confidence. Michael Heseltine wanted his advisers to work with the 
326 
civil service, 'as long as they were tough enough characters not to get 
taken over by it. ' 
At various points it has been shown that there was inevitably a 
degree of tension in the role of most effective advisers. But it was 
often those very advisers and/or their ministers who were amongst the 
keenest for advisers to be open with the civil service about their 
advice to ministers. 
Reference was made in some interviews to various other aspects of 
resilience. They include: being a self-starter - particularly 
important if the adviser is not to add to the overload on the minister; 
possession of, in the words of Darlington, 'a high tolerance of 
uncertainty', (1976, p. 21); and a degree of independence. Several All- 
rounders, including Peston and Lester, stressed that they were in a 
position where if they did not think they were getting adequate access, 
they could threaten to resign. Furthermore, as John Hoskyns emphasized, 
it can be claimed that effective advisers need to have an independence 
from the minister that enables them to speak bluntly when necessary. 
(iv) Usually such independence is associated with the possession of 
expertise, and this is the next attribute to be examined. Klein and 
Lewis's concept of Labour specialist advisers possessing, 'expertise 
independent of their political role' (p. 17) was also applicable in the 
case of Roger Dyson, one of few academics serving as a Conservative 
special adviser. He stated, 'if I had any value it was in my academic 
expertise, where I gave views irrespective of party stance, or in my 
knowledge of the service, when I was able to feed in information which 
warned the Secretary of State. ' On issues such as industrial relations 
in the health service, Jenkin viewed Dyson as being 'a real expert' and, 
'found him quite invaluable. ' 
Possession of expertise was vital for those brought in to play a 
specialist role, and earlier we examined the attitude adopted by 
officials towards specialist advisers and noted that Boswell 
highlighted the Tories' usual preference for practioners over academics. 
He commented: 'I had the distinction of being part time and of working 
the rest of the time as a farmer, i. e. as a client of my own ministry. 
327 
This gave me both an insight in to the practical effects of our policies 
and something of an expert entree to official discussions. ' 
Some officials, in common with certain advisers and ministers, 
believed that if advisers did not possess specific expertise they were 
less likely to have any impact. Examples were cited, in addition to 
those in the previous sub-section, where advisers had both contacts and 
knowledge, for example Alistair Ross Gooby with the City and pension 
fund investment, and this was thought to be useful It may be more 
important for advisers to have attributes such as a policy expertise 
when the minister wishes to introduce radical policies. 
Several interviewees saw the possession of expertise as a factor 
that would engender the respect of officials. John Smith thought an 
effective adviser would be, as was his adviser Vincent Cable, 'expert 
enough to be able to evaluate civil service advice in a way that is 
respected by civil servants - he should be capable of conducting a 
dialogue. ' Some doubts about the universal importance of expertise 
arise from the experience of Ann Carlton. She worked for Tony Crosland 
and John Silkin at the DoE and for John Silkin at MAFF and the contrast 
in her level of expertise is demonstrated by two reports in specialist 
journals: 
She has unparalleled knowledge and experience of local 
government within the Transport House staff and a real 
understanding of the grass roots of the Labour Party's local 
government activity (Local Government Chronicle, 22 November 
1974). 
Mr Silkin seems to rely on Mrs Carlton's advice to a 
considerable degree - though when she accompanied him to the 
Ministry of Agriculture from the Department of the Environment 
last autumn she knew perhaps as little as he did about farming 
( Weekly, 4 March 1977). 
Carlton admits that initially she knew little about agriculture. 
When she talked to a junior minister he said he had found something very 
useful and produced the ISý Animals Bggk. Carlton, amused, 
thought the Minister himself ought to have something better than a 
junior minister and so, she comments, 'I went out and bought John f 
Observer D. Qgk Qf Animals. ' She believed that her experience as Labour's 
local government officer was an advantage at the DoE because she knew: 
328 
the issues; the local councillors; and the civil servants with whom she 
worked as adviser to the Local Government Minister. Nevertheless, as 
indicated in her 1986 Tribune article quoted earlier, Carlton was 
happier at MAFF than at the DoE. As previously demonstrated, the 
strength of the relationship with the minister, and the civil servants 
appreciation of this, was a crucial factor in her effectiveness, which, 
in turn, according to Terry Dawes, was an important element in the 
success of John Silkin who was a strong minister. 
(v) Various advisers who had previous experience as civil servants 
thought that was an advantage. They included: Vincent Cable; Howard 
Davies; Vicky Kidd; Joan Mitchell; Maurice Peston; Adam Ridley; Derek 
Scott and Maggie Sidgreaves. John Houston benefited from his earlier 
spell in the cabinet of a European Commissioner. 
(vi) The final attribute is particularly important for the younger, 
non-specialist, advisers if they are to avoid drifting towards the 
'pretender' category identified in Figure 5 (Chapter 3) as somebody 
without political or analytical skills. This is knowledge of the 
political scene and the ability to predict developments and the likely 
reaction by the minister, the party, and possibly the public, to 
proposals. This is variously described as political sensitivity, flair, 
or nous and its possession often contributed towards the adviser gaining 
respect from officials. It is not always clear which qualities are most 
desirable for a political career, nor how far such abilities are innate, 
or can be learnt. However, political nous should probably be included, 
along with several of the others discussed in this sub-section, in a 
list of characteristics of effective politicians. An indication of the 
ability of various advisers who were perceived as effective is their 
subsequent rapid political rise. Of the departmental advisers this 
applied in particular to Margaret Beckett, Arthur Cockfield, Michael 
Portillo, Jack Straw, and David Young who became Cabinet or Shadow 
Cabinet Ministers. A similar point is relevant for others, including Tim 
Boswell, John Cope, and Robert Jackson, who became ministers. 
329 
Situational Factors. 
Various situational factors, it has been suggested, can be associated 
with the effectiveness of advisers. However, few clear patterns can be 
discerned; several advisers, for example, who worked in small 
departments thought that that was an advantage, but effective advisers 
were found in departments of all sizes. Nevertheless, four points can 
be identified. 
(i) Advisers often functioned well where there was more than one of 
them. All the cited examples of All-rounders operated with at least one 
other adviser. Many who worked with others felt strongly that it was 
advantageous, and some of those who acted alone believed that was a 
limitation. Stuart Sexton, for example, 'welcomed' the arrival of an 
additional adviser, Oliver Letwin, in the DES and both stated they 
worked closely together on some issues, especially the proposals to 
introduce vouchers. Having more than one adviser also allowed a 
minister to appoint a team with a range of skills. This was noticeable 
in the DHSS team under Labour and the Treasury team since 1979. It was 
possible, for example, for Nigel Lawson, because he had other advisers 
with strong party links, to make some interesting appointments of 
talented people who were not members of the Tory party. They included 
Howard Davies, perhaps the nearest British equivalent to the typical 
member of a French cabinet in that he could offer the minister recent 
experience of the department as well as sole loyalty. 
Where there was more than one adviser, opinions sometimes differed 
as to how far they could be called a team. The three advisers in the 
Treasury were widely, though not universally, regarded as being a team, 
not only by themselves but also by others. For example, although 
serving at differnt times, both Arthur Cockfield, as Minister of State, 
and Norman Lamont, as Financial Secretary, thought that the three 
advisers worked as a team for the group of ministers. Whilst he was at 
the Treasury Robin Harris thought there was very much a team under Adam 
Ridley who 'was a good leader'. The advisers did not meet together as a 
team, but all attended prayer meetings. There were various, and 
somewhat diverse, opinions about whether the DHSS advisers were a team, 
but quotations from David Metcalf and Paul Chapman illustrate the middle 
330 
of the range views: 
There was quite an element of team work, but it was team work 
through personal good will, not through any structure. 
There were some aspects of team work around it and certainly 
there was a lot of camaraderie and cooperation ... but it didn't function as a formal team in the sense of having 
regular meetings as a team. 
Various qualifications can be made to the statement that advisers 
work most effectively if they are not alone. Some advisers functioned 
well on their own. They included, taking one example from each period: 
Miles Hudson, Roger Liddle, and Edward Bickham. Each was well regarded 
by ministers and officials alike. Certain advisers, for example Miles 
Hudson, would not have welcomed the appointment of an additional 
adviser. Furthermore, building on the analysis of the degree of team 
work, it can be shown, first that holding a more junior post in a group 
was sometimes less attractive than being the sole adviser, second that 
some advisers did not see groups as teams, and third that sometimes 
problems can exist within groups. The following points are relevant to 
discussion later about proposed reforms, and are again taken from the 
two groups of advisers which are clearly identified as the most 
effective teams - Labour advisers in the DHSS from 1974-9, and the 
Tories in the Treasury from 1979. 
It may be more than coincidence that in the period from 1979 to 
1987 there were two 'Advisers to the Chancellor of the Exchequer', which 
was recognized as the senior post, and six designated as 'Adviser to the 
Financial Secretary', although in practice usually appointed by, and 
working to, the Chancellor. Whilst the six were generally effective and 
left to take up good opportunities, it was perhaps sometimes a less 
satisfying role. Robin Harris compared his two periods as an adviser: 
'In the Treasury I was the junior special adviser ... and my 
functions 
were limited and they were propagandist. When I was in the Home Office 
I was the only special adviser ... I was not a great confidant of 
Geoffrey Howe, but I was a confidant of Leon Brittan. ' 
Lynda Rouse similarly worked as adviser to the Financial Secretary 
and as the only adviser in a different department - Energy, where she 
was highly regarded by officials. She moved in the opposite direction 
331 
from Harris as she went with Nigel Lawson from Energy to the Treasury, 
in fact taking over Harris's Treasury slot in June 1983. She commented: 
'I never felt as happy there as I had in the Department of Energy and 
didn't really settle in to a role distinct from the other two advisers 
that made much sense. ' 
Several aspects of the experience of Labour advisers in the DHSS 
indicate issues that might have to be resolved if a group of advisers is 
to work to maximum effectiveness. The two advisers, Paul Chapman and 
Geoff Alltimes, recruited essentially as personal or research assistants 
to Brian Abel-Smith, played slightly different roles, but Abel-Smith 
found it difficult to use them to full advantage and observed, 'they 
didn't save all that much time, although they tried very hard. ' Chapman 
believed that his workload tended to be in the more marginal areas and, 
therefore, stated: 'I suspect if I had not been there, what would have 
happened is that my areas of work simply would not have had been 
addressed by any special adviser. I don't think it would have had the 
effect of diluting what they were doing. ' He thought a civil servant 
who had been exposed to some of the policy issues would probably have 
been more use to Abel-Smith. He considered that although initially he 
had been well used towards the end it became less obvious that he had a 
role, and his work had become less interesting because it was very much 
about issues of presentation. Alltimes followed Chapman but when David 
Townsend was appointed, following Alltimes's departure, the role had 
more clearly evolved into one for a separate adviser, not an assistant, 
covering the social services brief; and Townsend had greater experience 
prior to his appointment by David Ennals. 
However, the role of Tony Lynes demonstrates that even appointing 
somebody with a well established reputation for subject expertise needs 
careful planning. There appears to have been some confusion over how 
far he was an assistant to Abel-Smith, and how far a special adviser 
with the brief to cover a specialist field. At the end of 1975, for 
example, Barbara Castle was questioned in the Commons about her 
advisers. On 4 November she referred to her four advisers, outlined the 
work of Jack Straw, and described Abel-Smith as a distinguished expert 
explaining, 'two support him in his work', (Official $g , Vol. 
899, 
cols 205-6). On 9 December, in a Written Answer, the roles were 
332 
described a little more fully. Following the account of Abel-Smith's 
functions, the answer continued: 'He is assisted by Mr Alltimes. Mr 
Lynes advises on social security questions and attends appropriate 
meetings held by ministers', (Official Reps, Vol. 902, col. 144). 
Without referring to this in particular, Lynes argued that being a 
special adviser but also being billed as somebody else's assistant 
would mean that nobody knew where you stood. It was one thing for a 
special adviser to have a research assistant, but, he argued, 
once you say A is a special adviser, and B is a special 
adviser, then the implication of that is both A and B are 
providing advice to ministers; and you can pay one more than 
the other if you want to, but basically they are fulfilling 
the same role; and you can divide the job up by subjects, 
obviously, but what you can't do is to say you are both 
special advisers but B's advice has to be channelled through 
A. So if that is what is happening B is not a special 
adviser, B is just a research assistant ... that wasn't 
generally happening in my case. 
Although, as has been described, Lynes found a very satisfactory 
role based in the Supplementary Benefits Commission, and his work was 
valued by ministers and officials, this discussion raises important 
issues which would need to be addressed if schemes to expand the current 
number of advisers were adopted. Furthermore, although the Policy Unit 
is sometimes viewed as a model, there are differences between Number Ten 
and departments which would make problematic the successful introduction 
of a group of senior policy advisers working for a departmental 
minister. It is easier to allocate responsibilities amongst the seven 
or eight members of the Number Ten Policy Unit who between them are 
attempting to cover most departments of state. 
So, whilst working where there was more than one adviser was a 
situation that was likely to increase effectiveness, or, at least, 
satisfaction, problems could be encountered. 
(ii) Several advisers thought it was preferable to be appointed when 
the minister was new to the department - especially when it was an 
incoming Government and the adviser had been involved in developing 
manifesto proposals. It was clear too, to officials, that advisers who 
had been assisting with policy formulation in Opposition, for example 
333 
Robbie Gilbert and Rob Shepherd, should be involved as part of the team 
in drawing up consultative documents and legislation in the fields most 
important to the new minister. Similarly, in addition to the previously 
examined views of Jim Prior, Lord Gowrie, the Minister of State at the 
Department of Employment in 1979, also thought that the advisers, 
Gilbert and Shepherd, were 'very good' at pushing the 'step-by-step' 
approach on industrial relations legislation devised in Opposition. 
(iii) Michael Heseltine, Tom Baron, and officials all believed that 
bringing Baron in for just a six month period was very effective. 
Heseltine argued, 'it is quite urgent to have the six months, and then 
if they are going to do it, they have got to do it fast. ' Another 
situation which seemed to be effective was for an All-rounder, Anthony 
Lester, to pull in a specialist, Angela Byre, to work with him for the 
duration of a specific major project - the preparation of the Sex 
Discrimination legislation. He suggested that her appointment to assist 
him with that issue helped to enable him to engage in a wide range of 
activities and made a 'big difference' to his effectiveness. These are 
individualistic, not general, points but they could have wider 
application in any development of the system. 
(iv) Some advisers, for example Tim Boswell and Peter Davis, were 
appointed when the department was facing a major crisis and felt they 
were particularly welcome. Other advisers thought that during a crisis 
their contribution was most appreciated. There are two elements to 
this. First, 'an extra pair of hands' in performing presentational and 
liaison tasks, especially of a riskier nature and where the boundaries 
were uncertain. A general thesis being expounded in this study is that 
advisers provide flexibility in the system and are an immediate way of 
responding to ministers' needs. The requirements are intensified during 
a crisis. Second, having somebody close to a minister to act as a 
'safety valve' or 'medieval fool', to absorb the minister's 
frustrations, to speak bluntly to him, or to provide reassurance, is 
particularly valued during a crisis. We saw that assistance with crisis 
management was considered important by several advisers in the DHSS, 
including Mike Hartley-Brewer who was also one who believed the 
adviser's role was sometimes akin to that of a medieval fool. His 
minister, David Ennals, agreed with the idea the advisers could have a 
334 
psychological role and added, 'they could also criticize my performance 
in a way that civil servants couldn't. ' 
Perhaps the best evidence to support the argument that an adviser 
can play a medieval fool role comes from Douglas Hurd who thought that 
the adviser was the only person who was likely to be around who could 
say, when necessary, "'Well, that as an awful speech", or, "you clearly 
were exasperated by those people and you shouldn't have been because 
they were trying their best. "' When he was serving as political 
secretary to the Prime Minister, he used to say similar things to Ted 
Heath, 'and not many people did and he used always to say, "what a fool 
you are sir", but nevertheless it was important. ' Similarly, as an 
adviser, Edward Bickham felt that he was in a privileged position so 
that on rare occasions when Hurd, 'had done something that I thought 
could have been performed better, I thought it was actually one of my 
duties to tell him so. ' At other times advisers believed it was useful 
to provide unequivocal support for the minister. According to Maurice 
Peston, 
A lot of the work is almost psychotherapeutic in the sense 
that what you are trying to do is either tell the minister 
that his instincts are right, or reassure him in some other 
way ... ministers like someone to say, 'Yes, you are right', because they are sitting there being bombarded by people 
telling them, 'Yes, but. ' 
These points partially overlap with some made when considering the 
desirability of having a strong relationship with the minister, and the 
various aspects and characteristics of effectiveness are important 
elements in the final assessment of the system which can now be made. 
335 
]IN; ASSESSMENTS AND PROPROSALS. 
The evidence gathered in the preceding chapters will now be used to draw 
conclusions and make assessments of some of the major findings. 
Assessments will be attempted of: the overall effectiveness of 
individual advisers; how far the system has been accepted; the 
appropriateness of the model set out in Chapter 3; and the impact of the 
system of advisers on the system of government. In Chapter 3 the 
analysis moved from an examination of the needs of ministers to the 
development of a model of a place for advisers. Here the exposition 
flows in the opposite direction: from the narrower focus, in Section C, 
of confirming the appropriateness of the model's features, to the broader 
and much more problematic issue, in Section D, of whether the system of 
advisers makes a sufficiently effective contribution to the system of 
government to provide solutions to the various problems identified. 
Finally the assessments and the model will be used to examine various 
proposals for reform. 
SECTION j OVERALL EFFECTIVENESS QE INDIVIDUAL SPECIAL 
ADVISERS AND CRITICISMS QP THEIR WORK. 
The effectiveness of special advisers varies enormously. It was claimed 
earlier that the diversity in the age and background of special advisers 
was probably greater than that of any other group of people in 
Whitehall. It is not surprising, therefore, that their effectiveness 
should also vary. However, there was often a broad measure of agreement 
from different actors about the effectiveness of an individual adviser. 
There were, though, some notable exceptions. For example, Tony Benn 
claimed that his advisers: 
provided eyes and ears for me which greatly strengthened the 
position of the minister in controlling the department ... [The functions] I asked them to undertake they undertook 
brilliantly ... I could have done with more of them, or with 
more MPs ... I think 
they were underpaid and under-recognized 
but that wasn't of my doing really ... [Without them] 
I wouldn't 
have been able to write a paper [for Cabinet] on nuclear 
power; I wouldn't have been able to put in alternative papers 
on the IMF; ... the EMS; I wouldn't have been able to make contact 
with other ministers; I wouldn't have had the same 
relations with the Parliamentary Party, the National Executive; 
public speeches. It was a comprehensive service they provided. 
336 
In an article entitled, How Whitehall's Mandarins tamed i Labour's 
3$ Spg&ial Advisers, Hugo Young suggested in Sunday Times 19 
September 1976 that one of the few examples of the concept of special 
advisers being made to work was provided by Benn's advisers and that 
'they have achieved quite a lot. ' But various respondents held up the 
experience of Tony Benn's advisers as an example of how not to operate 
the system of special advisers. Critical comments were volunteered by 
diverse civil servants, ministers, and advisers alike during general 
discussion on the effectiveness of the system of advisers. Depending 
upon one's position, however, this may be taken to indicate either that 
they were effective in helping the minister in the confrontational 
attitude he adopted towards the department and in overcoming what he 
regarded as civil service obstruction to the extent that he did, or that 
they made it harder for Benn to achieve his goals in the department. 
This example is particularly interesting because it represents the 
clearest clash between what were seen to be the two key attributes of 
effective advisers - gaining the respect of officials and possessing 
clear ministerial backing. It was widely agreed that the latter was 
vital for Benn's advisers. 
There was naturally some reluctance on the part of ministers to 
criticize their own advisers but in general ministers were aware of, and 
sometimes shared, civil service reservations about the effectiveness of 
certain advisers. One minister admitted he made a bad appointment and 
in the end asked the appointee to leave, and another reported that his 
adviser 'got in the hair' of civil servants and was therefore moved out. 
A few advisers attracted particular scorn from officials. One suggested 
that the civil service could, 'eat the little baskets for breakfast' and 
another described one adviser as a 'nothing'. Very occasionally former 
permanent secretaries or junior ministers had forgotten the existence of 
a particular adviser which suggests he had not been effective. 
There is some evidence that a minister was less likely to reappoint 
when either the adviser left, or the minister moved departments, if he 
inherited an adviser from another minister or from the period of 
Opposition. This does not necessarily mean the adviser was not 
effective but might indicate that the minister was not particularly keen 
to have one in the first place. 
337 
An analysis of opinions expressed in the interviews suggests that 
about 20 per cent of advisers could be classified as being ineffective. 
This does not, of course, mean the remaining ones were universally 
regarded as effective, nor that they were effective in all their 
activities. 
Despite the generally reasonably high level of effectiveness, many 
advisers were limited by the ambiguity in the role, and some by the 
hostility of the civil service and the hostility or indifference of 
politicians. It was a very demanding position and one which, in a 
manner similar to some private secretaries, many of the best felt they 
could only hold for a number of years. Where advisers were considered 
to be ineffective they were more likely to be the younger political 
advisers - whose role was sometimes dismissed even by the specialist 
advisers. Some specialists found being only part time severely limited 
their impact. A few advisers suggested that their effectiveness was 
limited because the minister did not properly work out how to use them. 
More ministers than not believed themselves to be (and probably 
were) somewhat more effective in relation to at least some of their 
tasks when they had special advisers. This finding seems consistent 
with the comments of Smith from Australia: 'ministers themselves showed 
no signs of wanting to revert to earlier arrangements. If they had 
criticisms of ministerial staff, they were more likely to be about other 
ministers' staff than their own or of the system as a whole. However, 
this may have indicated acceptance rather a judgment of effectiveness' 
(1977 p. 155). 
In this study only a few examples were reported of civil servants 
thinking that ministers were less effective, or relations worse, because 
of the presence of advisers. This was even the case in some situations 
where advisers were felt to be ineffective or unnecessary; in such 
circumstances the civil servants usually felt they could neutralize the 
adviser. Perhaps the greatest problems for officials, and sometimes for 
ministers, came when advisers had their own agenda, different from that 
of the minister, and insisted on pursuing it in the department or in the 
party even after the minister had made his lack of support clear. This 
illustrates the potential dangers of the adviser as protagonist, rather 
338 
than analyst. In a few instances it was felt that advisers were 
disloyal to their ministers. 
If advisers could not build the good working relationship with 
officials that many ministers wished them to have this could reduce 
their effectiveness. Having resigned as adviser to Denis Healey, Adrian 
Ham (1976, and 1981) was critical of the influence of officials. 
Healey claims, 
The role of the outside expert in Whitehall is a difficult 
one; if he cannot get on with the civil service he can do more 
harm than good. Either he will isolate his Minister from what 
should be his main source of advice, or he will kick his heels 
with frustration and become a source of continual friction. 
The same is true of an outside political adviser; my first had 
a reciprocated mistrust of all permanent officials, while the 
second, Derek Scott, did me yeoman service because he could 
argue with the Treasury without losing its confidence (p. 391). 
Some officials also believed that advisers took up an excessive 
amount of the minister's time. Furthermore, advisers sometimes used 
their privileged position to draw to their minister's attention items 
that ministers did not have the time and/or inclination to process. The 
danger of this would be greater with a larger team of advisers. Judith 
Hart shrewdly observed: 'One of the problems about expert advisers is 
that they can create problems for you to deal with which weren't really 
on your desk before, and you think, "Oh God, I wish I didn't know about 
this. " I am sure it is terribly useful for them to do that but it does 
create rather than resolve overload. ' 
Difficulties also arose in a few cases where advisers failed to 
negotiate with adequate care the delicate balance, referred to in 
Chapter 3, involved in counteracting the uncertainty absorption, but 
doing so in an open way. 
In considering the overall effectiveness of an individual adviser, 
the key point was his effectiveness in performing the functions required 
of him by the minister. Furthermore, the importance of a minister in 
determining the role of his adviser, and in legitimizing his activities, 
means that the adviser is likely to be effective only to the extent, and 
in the form, that the minister wishes to have advisory support. This 
339 
underlines the main conclusion emerging from this research - enormous 
variety exists in the system in terms of effectiveness, reasons for 
appointment, and roles played. 
The influence of the minister's wishes is illustrated by one area 
in which advisers potentially face criticism. There is a very fine line 
between being ineffective through acting as a protagonist for views 
which a minister once supported but has come to realize are 
impracticable, and possibly being the licensed fool, or political 
conscience, which the minister appointed the adviser to be. In this 
situation there can be considerable ambiguity for the adviser. It was 
noted that Barbara Castle stressed the need for, 'a political conscience 
at the heart of the departmental battle. ' In those circumstances Tony 
Lynes, for example, was meeting his minister's wishes whilst possibly 
appearing awkward: 
I think the extra that one had wasn't so much to the minister 
- perhaps it ought to have been - as to ideas and policies. 
There were times when I was pushing policies which might well 
have embarrassed the minister, and the department was loyally 
telling me not to ... to some extent you can act as the 
minister's conscience in the way the civil service can't .. Part of the civil service's job is to make the minister's job 
as easy as possible -that is not the job of all special 
advisers. 
Similarly, Adam Ridley's comment about having, 'far more licence to say, 
"are you sure you want to change that policy? "' is relevant. When 
playing this role an adviser with clear ministerial backing is not being 
the 'political commissar' or 'party apparatchik' so despised and 
derided, especially by civil servants. 
340 
SECTION I GROWING ACCEPTANCE AM CYCLICAL PHASSES. 
Before making a final assessment about the degree of acceptability the 
system now enjoys, a slightly different way of examining possible 
changes in how the role is perceived could be developed. It 
is tentatively suggested that there are various cyclical phases 
influencing the need for, and role and effectiveness of, special 
advisers. 
(i) When a party comes to power after a period in Opposition it 
entertains, as described in Chapter 3, some suspicion about how far the 
civil service will cooperate in implementing party policies. Chapter 4 
discussed how such fears were seen, especially by officials, as a reason 
behind ministers' appointment of advisers. Such suspicion existed in 
1964 and 1974 and was a factor. The same was to some extent true in 
1970 and 1979 as noted in the article by George Cardona (1981). 
However, in 1970 the main emphasis was more on changes in the machinery- 
of- government than the introduction of political secretaries, and in 
1979 the undoubted element of suspicion was, as in 1970, counterbalanced 
to some extent by a desire to behave differently from the previous 
Labour Administration. This initial suspicion meant, as we saw in the 
analysis of reasons, that some ministers and people in the party saw a 
need for advisers. First, they could provide knowledge of the policies, 
political commitment, and the technical expertise that might be of value 
to help push through the department policies devised in Opposition. The 
suggestion that the development of special advisers has coincided with 
the growth of adversarial politics seems especially relevant here. 
Second, they could act as people already known to the minister and 
therefore able to play an aide/confidant role. As John Lyttle observed: 
For a newly appointed minister moving into a department where 
he or she doesn't know anyone at all, the first few months are 
critical, and it's rather important, I think, psychologically 
as well as in political ways, that the minister should have 
someone whom he or she knows well and to whom they can 
instantly relate. That relationship develops within a 
department but it certainly isn't there when a minister moves 
in. 
341 
Support for this view comes from various permanent secretaries. 
George Moseley thought that ministers, 'need them at all stages, but 
particularly in policy formulation stages and in the early days in the 
department. ' Similarly, Patrick Nairne described how advisers, 'help 
the minister stand up to the department sometimes, particularly when he 
or she first arrives and a department feels it a duty to point out some 
of the difficulties. ' 
There is a contrary view, perhaps particularly relevant for 1979, 
that a newly elected government has greater political will and less need 
for advisers than a mid-term or dying government. 
(ii) After ministers had been in post for a while, some came to depend 
even more on their civil servants whom they saw not to be blocking their 
policies. Some ministers came to rely less on advisers, especially 
specialist ones, but at the same time certain people in the party came 
to think the need for advisers was greater. The picture was described 
in general by Ian Bancroft who claimed that new ministers came in: 
armed with one or two special advisers who had been invaluable 
to them in Opposition providing ideas and helping to write 
speeches and so on ... and then ... the ministers tended to discover that there was really quite a useful corpus of 
knowledge existing in the department itself amongst the 
regular officials ... over a period of time the special 
advisers found that their privileged access to the minister 
became more and more attenuated. This was not the result of 
vile plots on the part of the permanent secretary or private 
secretary, it was simply a question of pressure of time. 
One specific example of this phenomenon was described earlier - 
Robert Carr soon found he had less need than he had anticipated to rely 
on Stephen Abbott. Pollitt discusses how, also in 1970, even in the 
first hundred days of the Conservative Government, the new junior 
minister and adviser at the CSD faced similar problems: 'Howell - and 
probably Schreiber even more - found their former status on machinery 
questions somewhat eroded. Neither headed a department. Neither had 
automatic access to Heath (as Armstrong, Trend, Meyjes, Rayner and 
Jellicoe did). Most important, their former role as a co-ordinating 
secretariat was naturally assumed by the Civil Service' (1984, p. 90). 
342 
Commenting in 1969 Sam Brittan observed: 'one can generalise that 
irregulars are a phenomenon of new governments, ... This timing is a 
misfortune ... They would be more useful several years later when 
ministers have become part of the machine and their ideas have dried up, 
but that is when they least feel the need for outside influences' 
(p. 331). 
A similar development has been observed elsewhere. In Australia, 
Wilenski commented on the role of 'Staffers' appointed under Whitlam's 
Government: 'while the influence of these staffs tended to fade after 
the first six months they did provide continued additional support to 
the exercise of ministerial control' (p. 100). A more scathing 
assessment comes from Canada: 
The classic pattern has recurred: lack of expertise, 
experience and resources compared to departments has led to 
ministerial staff losing their influence after leading certain 
ministers into costly mistakes. The outcome is that the 
senior civil service has been able to stand its ground against 
private political staff, although there is a manifest 
continuing unease (Bourgault and Dion, p. 164). 
The suggestion that events prove that the civil service will 
implement any government's policy wishes seemed particularly valid under 
Margaret Thatcher's Government (see, for example, Rose, 1986, p. 50; Fry, 
1990). This view has been challenged (see, for example, Simmonds, 1988) 
by people who believe that some government policies were blocked, and 
that more advisers or politically appointed civil servants are required 
to maintain the thrust of policies - in the name of democracy. 
Sometimes it is alleged that both ministers and advisers were defeated 
by the bureaucracy. Thus Alfred Sherman wrote to T Times declaring: 
'In 1979, John Hoskyns and I decided that since the Treasury team and 
its advisers had been swallowed alive by the Treasury knights, the PM 
needed an adviser of her own who was strong enough to close his ears to 
their siren-song' (1 August 1990). 
This is a minority opinion. The bulk of the evidence suggests that 
the Civil Service did not block the Government in the 1980s, even if the 
perception in 1979 was that they might well do so. Evidence in 10 IjAIS 
in Whitehall, collected by an RIPA Working Group (1987), suggested that 
although the civil service had not been politicized, more civil servants 
343 
with 'a can-do' attitude had been promoted, i. e. officials with an 
enthusiastic attitude towards implementing the Government's policies. 
Some advocates of reform recognize that opinions are mixed about whether 
radical policies have been blocked, but claim that this does not 
invalidate the argument for reforms such as the introduction of 
cabinets. John Hoskyns, for example, in introducing the Re-skilling 
Government Seminar in May 1986, referred to three red herrings which 
tended to get raised during discussions about reform of the 
machinery-of-government. The second of which, 
is that the Government has already been radical to a 
surprising extent and therefore there is really no need to do 
anything. I think opinions might differ about how radical the 
Government really have been. In any case I think that that 
is probably in spite of the difficulties inherent in the system 
rather than because of, and I think that that is indeed a bit 
of a cop-out (IOD, 1986, p. 2). 
(iii) In mid-term governments tend to run into presentational problems 
and might drift away from their parties. This increases the need, 
therefore, for advisers to help with presentation, liaison, and 
cohesion. Evidence to support this comes from Douglas Hurd (1979); from 
the expansion of advisers and respondents' different emphases on reasons 
for appointment after 1981; and from the efforts at greater liaison made 
by the Policy Unit since 1983. 
(iv) The issues of presentation and cohesion become especially 
important in the run up to an election when advisers have a major role 
in helping to prepare the manifesto. The role played by advisers in the 
1983 and 1987 elections is thought to have influenced Margaret Thatcher 
to look more favourably upon advisers. We saw (Chapter 8 Section B) how 
networks are more effective at these times. 
The suggestion that the role of advisers might vary at different 
stages in a government is compatible with the flexibility of the 
proposed model of the place of special advisers. As noted by Stephen 
Sherbourne, it is a further reason against having a blue-print for the 
introduction of special advisers. 
344 
Acceptance by Civil Service wd Institutionalization. 
Despite a number of caveats mentioned earlier there is now greater 
acceptance of the role of special advisers and this can probably be 
associated with increased formalization of the role noted in Chapter 
7, Section E. On the basis of his long experience Douglas Hurd linked 
the two points. By the late 1980s he thought the relationship with the 
department was much more worked out than it had been in earlier periods: 
'he [Edward Bickham] is now part of the Home Office machinery and the 
civil service would be lost without him ... there are things 
he does 
which makes their life easier as well as mine. ' There is a potential 
problem in making phase (ii) of the cyclical sequence compatible with 
the concept of the growing acceptance of advisers: phase (ii) suggests 
sometimes as ministers become established they begin to see less need 
for advisers which might in turn reduce their acceptability to 
officials. However, often relationships build up between ministers and 
advisers who were not well acquainted at the time of appointment. 
Furthermore, it may well be that ministers who come to appreciate that 
the civil service is not obstructing them, will also find that the 
special adviser's role flourishes, rather than contracts, in the 
positive atmosphere. The proposition is expressed most clearly by 
Michael Palliser, whom it is worth quoting at length: 
It starts very often - the idea of having a special adviser - from the notion that you need someone to keep an eye on the 
civil service to make sure they are doing what you want them 
to by carrying out the policy of the political party in 
power ... There 
is a tendency to think of the Foreign Office 
as having a Foreign Office policy and that you need someone to 
keep an eºe on that and to advise you and tip you off if 
things aren t being done. The interesting thing to me was how 
well the special advisers, after an initial period of getting 
into the swing of it, got on with the rest of the Office .. The reason why, in my view, it always worked extremely well, 
(any one of those you mentioned [Miles Hudson, Tom McNally, 
Denis Grennan, David Lipsey, Michael Stewart, and David 
Stephen] would tell you they had a very happy relationship) is 
that there is actually a misconception in the general public, 
but also amongst politicians, about this thing called a 
Foreign Office foreign policy ... I have seen this over many 
years, that where you have a Foreign Secretary, of whatever 
party, who knows what he wants to do and has a policy, that 
will be carried out very faithfully by the Foreign Office 
One of the reasons why special advisers, after they have been 
in the Foreign Office for a short while, got on so well with 
the Office was because they themselves came to realize that 
345 
the Office simply wanted to be told what to do and would then 
advise to the best of its ability on how this could be 
done ... and that being so there was almost bound to be a perfectly satisfactory relationship with the special advisers. 
Whilst many respondents did not see the situation in quite such 
harmonious terms or see the bureaucracy as being so compliant, 
nevertheless, the increased formalization in the role of some individual 
advisers, discussed earlier, could have been accompanied by greater 
acceptance of their presence. There was a rapid dissipation of 
suspicion towards advisers such as Jack Straw, Margaret Beckett, and Ann 
Carlton. Barbara Castle describes this in her Diaries, and Beckett's 
account was confirmed by officials: 'When I left, the private office and 
the permanent secretary said they had been apprehensive at the start, 
but felt it had worked well. They felt it had been helpful to them. ' 
At first, according to one official, the arrival of Ann Carlton at MAFF: 
was a bit of a shock to the system ... what do we want a 
political adviser for? What does she know about linseed oil? 
It was obviously that kind of reaction to some extent. But 
she so quickly made herself useful, and was so agreeable 
really, people found she didn't have horns, and she could 
help, and in a relatively short space of time she was 
accepted. 
Several reasons emerge to explain the favourable attitude adopted 
towards certain advisers. They were found to be: acceptable to civil 
servants because of the way they behaved; useful to civil servants; and 
not a threat. In describing the Labour advisers from 1974, Darlington 
in interview observed: 'There was a bit of suspicion at first, but I 
think the career civil servants rapidly got the measure of us, realized 
we were no great threat to them and the more enlightened of them found 
that on the contrary we could be quite useful to them if we established 
a working relationship. ' 
Growing acceptance at the level of the system has been described 
in Chapters 7 and 8. It is perhaps symbolized in the contrast between 
the favourable comments about advisers made by the FDA to the Treasury 
and Civil Service Committee in 1986 (Vol. 2, p. 73) and the attitude they 
adopted in 1974, when the FDA chairman was quoted by Darlington (p. 40) 
as saying that he feared 'a barrier between us and the minister. ' This, 
in turn, was rather less hostile than the attitude of the Civil and 
346 
Public Servants Association (CPSA) to the appointment of John Cope to 
the DTI in 1972. His arrival was described by William Kendall of the 
CPSA as, 'pregnant with constitutional implications of a revolutionary 
kind' Mg TjIM, 9 October 1972, quoted in Rose, 1974). 
Some advisers were highly suspicious of the FDA's reported support 
for an increase in the number of advisers or their inclusion in an 
enlarged private office. An adviser commented: 
Some of us thought that the whole business of the cabinet, and 
this sudden acceptance of us, was so unreal it wasn't true, 
and that, in effect, if you had a cabinet with a special 
adviser in it, actually in the same room, you would be much 
more under control of the private office, and it was a self- 
serving civil service ploy. in order to incorporate us and 
nobble us more closely within the system. 
The danger of incorporation will be a theme running through this 
final chapter. It is also possible that some officials support advisers 
because they are seen as a way of preventing the development of 
something 'worse'. Furthermore, there were indications that advisers do 
not yet enjoy the universal confidence of officials, some of whom still 
refer to the special adviser 'experiment'. The expansion into new 
departments sometimes met difficulties and certain officials were 
thought to be continuing to oppose the system (see, for example, Butler, 
1986). At least one adviser thought that the civil service was hoping 
that this current study would produce evidence to show the system to be 
an aberation. 
Nevertheless, for whatever reasons, and they are diverse, advisers 
do now seem to be widely accepted. The debate in later sections is not 
between retention or abolition, but between maintenance or expansion. 
Various theories were explored to help explain the establishment 
of a place for advisers in the Whitehall scene. We saw in Chapter 3 
that Walter developed a theory to account for the growth of personal 
advisers to ministers. In his model advisers were viewed as an 
inevitable development in Western democracies to assist ministers faced 
by modern bureaucracies. His final sentences claimed: 'Their emergence 
is a manifestation of the functional role of the intelligentsia in 
modern politics. They are here to stay' (p. 188). 
347 
Within the UK, it is possible to see acceptance of the system of 
special advisers as evidence of the adaptability of the civil service. 
This is supported in two ways. First, as has been explained, many 
officials have been increasingly prepared to work with advisers and 
appreciate the contribution they can make. Second, in various ways, the 
civil service has responded by filling some of the gaps in the services 
provided to ministers that have been exposed by the activities of 
advisers. In particular, the civil service might well have viewed most 
advisers appointed in the 1980s as posing less of a threat to them than 
the group of economists who were introduced as advisers in the 1960s 
partly because there were then relatively few specialists within the 
ranks of the civil service. Now that the bureaucracy has adapted and 
greatly expanded its own economic advisory services, the need for 
economists to be introduced as advisers has declined although it has not 
vanished. 
The adaptability of the civil service could also be linked to a 
speculative theory about the increasingly favourable attitude officials 
have adopted towards advisers. There is much debate about the 
politicization of the bureaucracy, and many would deny it has occurred 
even if an increasing number of 'can-do' officials have been promoted. 
Some people see special advisers as an important mechanism for ensuring 
that the civil service maintains its traditional role. John Patten 
stated: 'I am a great believer in the British Civil Service remaining a 
non-political and non-politicized animal, hence QED I am a great 
believer in the political adviser system. ' Similar views were 
formulated, even before the politicization debate became so intense, by 
some Labour ministers such as John Smith who, in interview, argued that 
the advantage of advisers from the civil service perspective was that 
they, 'lessen any requirement on civil servants to be partisan in a 
party political way. ' This line of argument was further developed by 
Smithin a recent speech to the RIPA (1991). 
Whilst there is little evidence to take the argument further than 
claiming that civil servants find it convenient to have advisers around, 
it could be argued that in a climate in which their neutrality is under 
greater scrutiny than before, this is particularly useful. These issues 
were touched on by the Treasury and Civil Service Committee in 1990. A 
348 
witness from the FDA pointed out the existence of a continuum of 
political work, some of which had always been regarded as perfectly 
proper, and some, including writing the party conference speech, which 
had always been regarded as improper. He continued: 
We are concerned that the point on that continuum at which we 
stand between what is considered acceptable and what is 
considered not acceptable has been pushed somewhat, over many 
years past ... 
in the direction of officials doing rather more 
of Ministers' political work for them, as opposed to rather 
less, and we would like to see some check to that drift 
(1990, p. 8). 
The Committee did not specifically argue for advisers to do more of 
the political work but earlier the same witness had stated: 'there is 
scope for debate as to precisely which duties within Departments are 
best carried out by political advisers and which duties are best carried 
out by permanent career civil servants ... I think one could argue that 
some press office activities might be carried out by political 
advisers. ' (p. 7). This remains an issue which has not been resolved. 
Considerable room remains for debate about whether advisers can 
more appropriately be slotted into a partnership, or a conflict, model 
of the relationship between ministers and the bureaucracy in the UK. It 
has been suggested, and demonstrated, in this study that the perceptions 
of ministers adopting either position have often been that they need to 
appoint advisers. There is somewhat greater consensus about the model 
of the place that advisers can occupy. 
SECTION Cj APPROPRIATENESS QE IHE MODEL QE IHE PLAS 
AND ROLE Qf ADVISERS. 
The extent to which the system has been institutionalized is one of the 
many indications that there is a place and role for special advisers as 
set out in the model in Chapter 3. Various illustrations of aspects of 
the model have been included in this study, and the diversity that was 
implicit in the model has been amply demonstrated. Most features of the 
model appear to have been substantiated: 
(i) The importance of being the minister's 'own person', 'on the 
spot', 'in the know', independent of the department, and politically 
349 
committed. 
(ii) The possession of an informal, flexible, status that assists the 
adviser in operating along a range of possible lines of communication 
all of which are vital for the minister in his nodal position, but 
time-consuming unless delegated. Some cut across uncertain boundaries 
which potentially might be difficult for others to cross. Certain 
effective advisers were able to play the informal brokerage role set out 
in Chapter 3. 
(iii) The existence of a wide range of possible places for advisers to 
occupy and functions for them to perform. In the discussion of 
functions in Chapter 3, the independence and flexibility in the model 
were seen to be important and allow advisers to play many different 
roles. Advisers with the ability might achieve a position where they 
have some discretion to choose from amongst a large menu of possible 
roles and places. However, the role of any adviser is also the product 
of several interacting factors including: the minister's continuing 
wishes and needs; the capability of the adviser; and the capabilities, 
attitudes and expectations of others. Time pressures on ministers in 
fulfilling all the functions set out in Chapter 3 are great. There is 
always, therefore, plenty for the adviser to do, even if it is a time 
consuming chore. 
(iv) The existence of a variety of ways in which advisers can influence 
policy (even though their overall impact is limited). These include: 
bringing in expertise and/or knowledge of, and commitment to, party 
policies; being in a position to be able to 'sponsor' certain policies; 
being somebody independent of the department to look at issues and 
submissions; liaising with under-represented interest groups and so 
occasionally widening the relevant policy community; and, especially in 
the case of the Policy Unit, acting occasionally as brokers for a range 
of policy research centres. Partly on the basis of their role in policy 
making it is possible to consider the feasibility of developing a model 
of advisers equivalent to Meltsner's view of American policy analysts as 
members of a profession which had 'emerged' (1986, p. 300) or Walter's 
description of Australian advisers as a distinct group within the 
intelligentsia. In the UK, however, numbers are too few, and roles too 
diverse, for any such analysis to be very conclusive. Furthermore, we 
saw that Walter's attempt at psycho-analysis of the characteristics of 
ministerial advisers was inappropriate in the UK where many advisers 
350 
were eventually seeking, not shunning, a public role. However, the 
growth in the use of special advisers is sometimes seen as one of many 
ways in which social scientists and academic research may be brought 
into Government (Banting, 1979; Bulmer, 1987). Kavanagh suggests that 
advisers form part of a group called, 'for want of a better term', 
'political entrepreneurs'. It also consists of, 'members of think- 
tanks, researchers, and others who, holding no formal party position, 
contribute to the formulation of party policy' (1992, p. 18). 
Departmental special advisers form only one part of this group and, the 
present research has shown, at least up until 1987, advisers were 
involved in many activities in addition to policy formulation. 
Therefore, the wide-ranging but flexible model developed in Chapter 3 
remains an appropriate way of encompassing advisers' roles. 
(v) The combination of several of the above points to ensure the 
provision of a valued counter to the inevitable 'uncertainty absorption' 
that takes place in departments as a result of the minister being 
surrounded by generalist administrators. (As mentioned in Chapter 3 the 
concept of uncertainty absorption is being used here very broadly to 
cover most of the activities civil servants engage in when preparing 
simplified policy options to put to ministers. ) Playing this role 
inevitably involves the adviser in operating as an 'extra pair of eyes 
and ears'. In contacts with officials there is only limited scope for 
advisers to play an antagonistic role of somehow pushing reluctant 
officials towards acceptance of their minister's proposals. 
The contribution of advisers to countering 'uncertainty absorption' 
is probably greatest where there is most, rather than least, trust 
between officials and the advisers. It is important, as Norman Warner 
explained, for advisers and officials to agree as far as possible on the 
facts - it is no help to a minister to be presented with alternative 
sets of facts. Furthermore, whilst a certain degree of robustness may 
be necessary for an adviser to gain access to information, it is through 
building up trust with officials that advisers are usually most 
effective at gathering information. Where, as with Roger Dyson, extra 
information was being collected from outside the department, but covered 
the management responsibilities of the department, there was scope for 
considerable conflict. 
351 
Advisers and ministers who adopted a conflict model stressed 
different points from the majority. Thus, Frances Morrell asked: 
Why should it be thought to be in the interests of the 
minister for his special advisers to be closely integrated 
into the department that he has brought them into, to provide 
an alternative? ... of course there was tension between 
special advisers and civil servants. Any effective special 
advisers create tensions because they're an alternative source 
of advice. The tensions didn't reduce our effectiveness at 
all. 
Most interviewees felt that on this issue, at least, the more 
cooperative approach, in line with a partnership model, paid dividends 
when trying to counter 'uncertainty absorption'. Often advisers' 
dealings with the department were seen to be to the department's 
advantage as well. This forms one part of the 'incorporation thesis' 
which has perhaps best been described by Young and Sloman (1982), 
commenting on a contribution to their programme NQ, Minister by Ian 
Bancroft: 
Now, according to Sir Ian Bancroft, the head of the civil 
service, they are thoroughly approved of: which is perhaps 
another way of saying that they've been taken on board, 
absorbed in to the system, house trained, and, as agents of 
anything like radical change, ever so politely suffocated. 
Bancroft: 
I... For the most part they've been of considerable benefit to 
the ministers for whom they were working, and in a curious 
sort of sideways effect also to the departments in which they 
were working for those ministers, because they do provide an 
extra dimension in terms of being able to go to meetings, keep 
up contacts with the party of the day in a way which no civil 
servant possible could ... I found them overwhelmingly useful 
rather than the reverse. ' 
If we're talking about power, power as between ministers and 
civil servants, that sounds almost like an epitaph on the 
political-adviser experiment. At best they're a minor 
cosmetic on the great granite face of the body politic: good 
for appearances, even for a politician's self-regard, but not 
likely to change very much (p. 90-1). 
In response to that, Jack Straw, one of the advisers who worked 
with Ian Bancroft, argued: 
352 
You can't win on Hugo Young's basis and I wasn't absorbed. 
Whether we were successful - to an extent I was successful - depended on getting on with people ... What was the point of having a raging argument if you could get what you wanted 
without the raging argument ... That doesn't mean to say that there weren't meetings when I took a different view from 
officials. That happened a lot of the time. 
This discussion highlights the importance of the arguments at the 
end of the previous section about advisers fitting into both conflict 
and partnership models. Clearly the perceptions of ministers about the 
need for advisers, and of advisers about the most productive ways to 
function, vary widely. The systems theory used in Chapter 3 to help 
develop the model was useful in both indicating how factors such as the 
overload of information might contribute to the need for advisers, and 
identifying possible locations in which they could operate. However, 
although advisers have been shown to fulfil a variety of roles within 
systems theory as set out in Chapter 3, Section 4, the processes within 
the 'black box' of government can only be properly illuminated if the 
perceptions of the different actors are also analysed. Thus, for 
example, many agreed that ministers are overloaded, but only some 
ministers perceived of advisers as a way of relieving the overload. 
Acknowledging this duality of looking at the perceptions of actors 
within the framework of understanding the structural forces has been 
useful in helping to demonstrate the appropriateness of the flexible 
model developed in Chapter 3, and will also be important in the final 
assessments in the next section. 
SECTION M EFFECTIVENESS Of ADVISERS' CONTRIBUTIONS IQ 
SYSTEM Of GOVERNMENT. 
It is clear from this study that there is a place for advisers to occupy and 
functions for them to fulfil, and that these diverse functions are often 
performed to the satisfaction of ministers. The qualities of successful 
advisers have been highlighted. (The study may sometimes appear to be 
excessively eulogistic because of the necessary attention paid to these 
points. ) Nevertheless, crucial questions remain about the effectiveness of 
the contribution of the system of special advisers to the system of 
government. This is much more difficult to determine, and some of the results 
will appear much less impressive when viewed against the escalating 
requirements of ministers set out in Chapter 3. These remaining 
353 
questions may be grouped in four ways: 
(i) Are advisers necessary in principle? 
(ii) Do advisers constitute a solution to the problems 
facing ministers? 
(iii) Have advisers caused any harm to the system of 
government? 
(iv) Has the system of advisers as a whole been effective? 
(i) The first group of questions revolve around the issue of whether, 
if advisers can in practice enhance the effectiveness of some ministers, 
this demonstrates that they are necessary in principle. There are 
various ways of assessing this. Some ministers have managed perfectly 
satisfactorily without advisers - either entirely, or for a long period 
whilst a new adviser was being arranged. Several ministers who had had 
an adviser and found him quite useful, nevertheless, did not reappoint. 
They included Nicholas Edwards and Harold Lever. By contrast Peter Rees 
moved from being a junior Treasury minister to Minister of State at the 
Department of Trade, and, having worked with three advisers at the 
Treasury, thought the ministers at Trade might have been slightly more 
effective if they had had an adviser. David Ennals exclaimed, 'I'm 
always surprised when I hear ministers say they don't need special 
advisers. I think its an essential part of the structure of government. 
Obviously choice of the right characters is very important. ' 
The assessment from Ennals's permanent secretary, Patrick Nairne, 
was only slightly less positive: 
Are special advisers, at the end of the day, a luxury, or are 
they a necessi created by the growth of government, the 
great strains andpressures on ministers' requirements of the 
job? No quick answer to that. I think that any department 
can serve a minister effectively without special advisers ... and I don't think that special advisers are an absolute 
essential, but I do think they are not just a luxury. They 
are an additional accretion to government which has proved 
helpful, constructive, and in the sort of conditions we have 
354 
been talking about they have improved the quality of 
government, as well as providing a support to ministers. 
Maybe the support is more social and psychological than 
actually relieving them of the burden of office too much, but 
after all, don't we all want social, psychological support in 
hard times. 
One of the reasons why it is difficult to move from saying that 
advisers are valuable, to claiming that they are essential, is that by 
the very nature of their flexible role, the system does not collapse if 
they are not there. John Hunt contrasted their role with that of a 
private secretary, and said that the adviser's value lay in his being a 
'spare resource' with time to go off and spend time thinking about an 
issue or writing a speech. 
Some officials suggested there was no real need for advisers, but 
given they existed, things were found for them to do, and these could be 
useful activities. Others went further and said, 'they have been used 
for various tasks and people are then declaring, "they are the ideal 
person, close to us. "' 
A surprising number of activities that an adviser seems the ideal 
person to perform, can, in practice, be carried out by others. This 
includes activities that involve crossing uncertain boundaries. Ian 
Bancroft, for example, claims not to have compromised his 'political 
virginity' by the liaison activities he carried out with CRD when 
private secretary. Similarly, questions are raised about whether it has 
to be a politically committed person to fill the role. It is sometimes 
argued that the value comes from having an extra, talented, person in 
the team serving the minister, and that it need not be somebody with a 
political background. Lynda Rouse gave some credence to this argument 
by describing the previously referred to early evening meetings with the 
minister, the private secretary, and the chief information officer. A 
discussion about the presentation of government policies might cover the 
political input, the mechanics of getting journalists to understand and 
say the right thing, and the question of deciding on the right policy, 
'but you couldn't really say precisely who was doing what. ' 
Furthermore, she saw the political adviser's role as being, 'another 
member of the private office, another private secretary. ' However she 
thought there were some political things she did that the civil servants 
355 
could not do, and other of her activities that they would not have done. 
These issues were examined at length in Chapter 7, and we saw that 
there could be an advantage in having one person or group to perform the 
various functions, and that an adviser's mode of operation would be 
different. These findings can now be emphasized by looking at the 
combination of factors that come together in the model of the place of 
the adviser. It is a unique combination. A minister does not enjoy the 
same degree of flexibility as his adviser and officials do not have 
the freedom to assist the minister in party political activities. 
Advisers can play a unique role which complements the work of others, 
without precisely duplicating the work of others in their own fields. 
This position was recognized in the Government's 1986 response to the 
Seventh Report from Treasury and Civil Service Committee where, with 
reference to advisers, junior ministers, and PPSs, the point was made 
that, 'the functions of the three are distinct and different' 
(Cmnd. 9841, para 31). The Government response went on to observe, 
however, that the junior ministers and PPS may provide sufficient 
political input and some ministers have no advisers. This shows, it 
could be argued, that advisers have a distinct but not absolutely 
essential role. The distinct role means that, in the words of one 
official, 'the political adviser is there as an animal who bestrides 
officials within the department and the political views of the party. ' 
We have seen how advisers sometimes, by their activities, or by 
being the first to respond to an issue, reveal areas where services 
provided by officials are limited. However, it has been claimed that 
the civil service itself is sufficiently flexible to fill some of the 
gaps, and, in the long term fill them more proficiently than do 
advisers. In 1964 virtually all the 'irregulars' were experts, but 
there are now many specialists (especially economists) in the civil 
service, and as Henkel (1991) shows a much greater use of consultants, 
and most of the advisers by 1987 were playing a political more than 
specialist role. In several instances, advisers claim to have set up 
information gathering networks, or presentational arrangements, or 
parliamentary liaison systems that were eventually taken over by 
officials. For example, John Houston believed that the work he 
performed in liaising with MPs, and stressing within the Foreign Office 
356 
the importance of this activity, encouraged the Office to create a 
larger and more effective parliamentary liaison unit to cultivate MPs 
and explain Foreign Office opinions. The 1988 White Paper from the DTI, 
1I = The Department X41 Enterprise, (Cm. 278) implicitly argued for 
more secondments on the grounds that the department's officials needed 
to have the experience and knowledge that the then minister, David 
Young, brought to the department when he was a special adviser. 
The conclusion is that the value of advisers' contributions 
indicates that they are beneficial, if not essential. If major shifts 
do occur in the range of activities in which they can play a valuable 
role, then that is broadly in tune with the flexible model proposed for 
the role of advisers. As in Australia, the majority of ministers would 
not now like to be without them, and to the extent that effective 
ministers produce effective government, the contribution of advisers is 
helpful. The personal nature of the role means that it would not work 
if a minister did not want one; whilst they might not in principle, 
therefore, be absolutely necessary, all ministers should carefully 
consider whether they would not be better served by appointing at least 
one adviser. 
(ii) The second group of questions involves the extent to which 
advisers constitute a solution to the problems facing ministers. It is 
widely felt, and this was a conclusion of Klein and Lewis, that advisers 
help relieve the symptoms of problems such as overload, but they do not 
tackle the root causes. Advisers often help ministers perform slightly 
more functions, or operate a little more effectively, but do not usually 
make ministers noticeably less overloaded. Some ministers who have made 
important contributions to the discussion about the role of advisers, 
including Barbara Castle and Douglas Hurd, believe that advisers can 
reduce overload. To do so, they need to be top quality, and appreciate 
the importance of working with the bureaucracy. Starting with a 
specific example Douglas Hurd went on to develop the general argument: 
I am talking to the Home Affairs Committee of the 
Parliamentary Party this evening. That is a political 
occasion and I don't want a text, but I need thoughts on the 
sequence in which I should deal with matters and the kind of 
points I should make. Edward [Bickham] will do that. That 
will save me half an hour. As the media multiply, and this 
357 
burden of communications increases, which as I said in the 
[1986, RIPA] lecture is one of the main growths in pressure on 
government, the more you need people who are not civil 
servants by trade but who know the subject matter, know what 
the minister wants to say and can actually help to assemble it 
for him ... of course, if they are no good, they simply add to the load, so their quality is enormously important ... All the time you want your life simplified, not complicated; the last 
thing you want is to arbitrate on jurisdictional questions 
between members of your staff. 
Hurd was aware of the danger of adding too many advisers. Some 
other ministers though, especially Edmund Dell, believed that every 
adviser generated extra overload on the minister, by, as he told the 
Re-skilling Government Seminar, involving them in the activities of 
other departments, or in issues within their own department which could 
satisfactorily be left to junior ministers (IOD, 1986, p. 33-4). 
The discussion of overload in Chapter 3 included reference to 
several possible sources of overload as seen within systems theory. 
There it was suggested that the provision of extra channel capacity 
could reduce the overload of demands on the system but increase the 
overload on the decision maker. Although advisers could be seen as 
operating in this way, it is important to stress that when advisers 
provide this extra channel capacity it is often to parts of the 
political system with which the minister perceives it as desirable for 
him to have more contact. At other times advisers may help the minister 
cope with the overload by providing the reassurance that somebody of a 
like political mind has examined the demands that finally reach the 
minister after they have been processed by the permanent bureaucracy. 
One minor benefit to the system of government from the introduction 
of advisers in the UK is that it has added a degree of flexibility to 
the system by allowing some people to be given a title, and/or pay, 
and/or access to papers, to perform useful, but idiosyncratic, roles. 
These advisers include Robin Cooke and the successive secretaries to the 
Government Chief Whip. 
The very nature of an adviser's position as the loyal servant of 
his minister weakens his ability to perform functions such as advancing 
cohesion in government, or strengthening the role of the party in the 
government, if the government moves away from the party manifesto. 
358 
Benn's Diaries show how these two points may, indeed, be in conflict. 
Similarly, whilst advisers may help with effective presentation of 
the government case, there are zero-sum elements in the extent to which 
all ministers can appear to shine in the media. 
The small number of advisers limits the contribution they can make 
in areas such as: providing a means by which future politicians can 
gain valuable experience of how Whitehall functions; enhancing the 
ability of ministers to carry out their collective role (which again has 
zero-sum elements); and enabling more long term strategic thinking to take 
place in government. This point is not necessarily an argument against 
advisers, but possibly part of a case for additional reforms. The 
various aspects of this point can be examined by analysing the 
contributions of the largest group of departmental special advisers - 
the DHSS team under Labour. The first two items on this list were to 
some degree achieved by this slightly bigger group of advisers (several 
of whom, were part time). Jack Straw thinks that having been an adviser 
is of advantage to a political career, and various examples have already 
been given of the team's effectiveness on Cabinet briefing. The 
greatest problems arise in relation to long term thinking. According to 
Barbara Castle's private secretary, Norman Warner: 
If you're measuring effectiveness on the basis of ministerial 
success rate in getting through their policies, I think the 
Straw, Abel-Smith, Lynes trio scored pretty well. It's 
inevitable in the way we run government in this country that 
we don't actually have a long term strategic view very often. 
We're very much crisis management - short term, 
considerations. Now that's not the fault of the special 
advisers and to lay all those problems at the door of the 
special advisers is a nonsense because they were not set up to 
do that. They were set up to help the ministers achieve their 
political objectives, and most of those political objectives 
tended to be short term. 
This issue is of importance in the final section on suggested reforms 
because an understanding of the functions of possible new advisory units 
is required before the proposals can be assessed. 
Overall, the significance of the development of special advisers is 
that it represents the lowest common denominator of what could be 
achieved, and what was thought desirable. Devolution, for instance, 
359 
might tackle some of the root causes of overload on ministers, but it 
has proved to be less politically acceptable than the development of 
advisers. At the May 1986 Re-skilling Government Seminar John Hoskyns 
made similar points and many people commented that the main proposal in 
the prepared paper was to introduce a cabinet (IOD, 1986). Many 
additional reforms were supported at the seminar but, significantly, the 
final report from the Re-skilling Government Group (1987) consisted 
solely of the plan for the introduction of cabinets which is analysed in 
the next section. This outcome emphasizes the way advisers, or an 
extension of the system, are seen as the lowest common denominator. 
In his study of ministerial advisers in Australia, Smith suggested 
that the experiences of the advisers to the Whitlam Government, 'have 
not resolved any of the question marks that stand also against the work 
of special advisers in Britain or the PMO in Canada' (p. 156). However, 
he continued, this did not dispose of the forces in Australia or 
elsewhere that led to the development of advisers. In modern 
government, he claimed, 'two problems intertwine: the problem of 
enabling political parties to exercise meaningful control over the 
institutions of government, and the problem of appreciating and 
responding to changing social forces about which knowledge is scarce' 
(p. 156). To the extent that these are seen as problems facing British 
governments, it is perhaps instructive that even the larger groups of 
advisers used in Australia were deemed to be unsuccessful in dealing 
with them. 
(iii) The third set of questions concern whether any harm has been done 
to the system of government by the introduction of special advisers. 
Darlington (1976, Chapter 7) lists six objections that have been made 
against the system: 
(1) it should not exist - all advice should come from the civil 
service; 
(2) it involves personal patronage by ministers; 
(3) advisers have too much power and are non-accountable; 
(4) they constitute a security risk; 
(5) they should not be paid from public funds and are overpaid; 
(6) Parliament and the public know too little about the system. 
360 
Many of these points were discussed in the analyses of both the 
reactions of politicians and bureaucrats and the criticisms made of 
individual advisers' effectiveness. Darlington suggests a case could be 
made out against all the objections except the final one which is less 
relevant now than when Darlington wrote, and should be answered by this 
study. The remaining points can be considered in reverse order. 
The level of advisers' pay has been discussed, and is not generally 
thought to be excessive. It is now widely accepted that they should be 
paid from public funds. Indeed, making them temporary civil servants 
perhaps helps reduce the fourth objection. The evidence indicates both 
that advisers do not pose any security risk, and that the suggestions 
they have been responsible for embarrassing leaks of Government 
information are generally unfounded. Some advisers have been criticized 
on grounds of unaccountability, but flexibility is an inherent feature 
of their role, and they are answerable to the minister who could 
terminate their employment at any time and who has to answer questions 
about their activities in Parliament. The idea that advisers are too 
powerful is supported by very few people - many more criticize their 
lack of impact. The second objection also arises inevitably from the 
nature of their role, but there have not been the criticisms of 
nepotism made in Britain that have been alleged against a few of the 
larger number of advisers appointed in Australia (see, for example, R. 
Smith). 
The first objection is perhaps the most substantial, though also 
the explanation of why many advisers were originally appointed. Various 
specific points might flow from this line of criticism. One official, 
developing the argument described in Chapter 3 about the strength of 
generalist officials within the British civil service, argued that 
another layer of generalist advisers surrounding the minister would be 
damaging rather than helpful. 
Some people now argue that Margaret Thatcher politicized the civil 
service and that officials are expected to provide the answers wanted 
and ignore their traditional duty to provide objective advice. The 
accuracy of this suggestion is strongly disputed, but some who make it 
go on to claim that advisers are exacerbating the problem because, by 
361 
providing a steer on the minister's thinking, they are, in practice, 
further reducing the scope for objective analysis. This is referred to 
by some civil servants as a process of 'dejudgementalising' the service; 
according to Hennessy (1989) the introduction of economic advisers in 
1964 appeared to some Whitehall regulars, 'to be the thin end of a wedge 
of politicisation which has advanced ever since. One seasoned Treasury 
man, for example, traces to October 1964 a growing tendency among some 
career officials to trim their advice to ministerial preferences' 
(p. 189). 
This point is strongly made by a few officials, and is additional 
to criticism that some advisers have had their own agenda. An 
associated question has also been raised about the role of some 
advisers, especially in the Policy Unit, in acting as protagonists and 
brokering the proposals from policy research centres. Perhaps greater 
attention should be given to analysing, rather than brokering, the ideas 
so as to meet the criticism that in the 1980s the ways of processing the 
proposals coming from the think tanks were inadequate (see, for example, 
Donoughue, 1990). 
Other specific complaints include the alleged impact certain 
advisers had on some appointments and the fear - more about any future 
expanded system than the current one - that attractive jobs might go to 
advisers and lessen the appeal of the civil service. This point was 
made in the RIPA analysis of the secondments scheme in Whitehall. 
Gosling and Nutting (1990, p. 15-6) report an official as saying: 
'"Bringing in high-flyers can have a demoralizing effect on our own 
staff, especially where the secondee is used to do things that civil 
servants could do, and would benefit from doing*'. 
However, only a minority of officials saw advisers, overall, as a 
hindrance to the system of Government. 
(iv) The fourth set of questions involve the effectiveness of the 
system as a whole. This can be assessed in several ways. Opinions 
about the effectiveness of individual advisers can be collated as was 
done earlier. Furthermore, many respondents expressed opinions about 
the system as a whole and these too can be collated but again varied 
362 
widely. The view taken about special advisers at the start of a 
government can influence the later perception of effectiveness. For 
example, those who in 1974 took 'the invasion of Whitehall' (unday 
Times, 21 April 1974) view could, by 1976, claim, 'How Whitehall's 
Mandarins tamed Labour's 38 Special Advisers'. (Sum Times, 19 June 
1976). Some of the initial doubts expressed by Tories in 1979 were 
shown to be inappropriate as advisers proved their worth. 
Special advisers were sometimes seen as more influential than 
backbenchers, PPSs, and even, in a few instances, junior ministers. 
Theakston (1987) too reported that, 'in interview a permanent secretary 
recalled a special adviser who, "cut much more ice with the secretary of 
state" than a parliamentary under-secretary whom he named' (p. 99). In 
Lobbying Government, Charles Miller listed on a scale of 10-1 various 
categories of people thought to have influence. Special advisers were 
rated at 3- the same as PPSs and higher than backbench MPs. Sedgemore 
(1980) claims advisers who become MPs mostly lose power and influence. 
Several advisers who have become MPs supported this view. Douglas 
French thought that backbenchers could make more noise, 'but noise 
doesn't automatically mean influence', and that in terms of having 
an impact on decisions made by ministers, such as the content of the 
Budget, the adviser has more influence than an ordinary backbencher. 
Michael Portillo commented: 'Was I more influential as a special 
adviser than as a backbencher? Certainly, yes, no doubt about that; 
more influential as a special adviser than a PPS? Yes, I think I was, 
because of the inside knowledge - you don't have it as a PPS. ' 
Various other authors on British Government, however, have been 
rather dismissive of the role of special advisers, for example Greenwood 
and Wilson (1984) suggested that most, 'hitherto seem to have been 
largely neutralised by the civil service' (p. 85). Young and Sloman in 
their IQ, Mini r programme just quoted called it suffocation. 
To some extent this discrepancy might arise from different factors 
being taken into account. If effectiveness is taken as an aggregate of 
the perceptions of ministers about the effectiveness of individual 
advisers in carrying out what the minister wished, then a more 
favourable conclusion will probably be reached than if the effectiveness 
363 
of the system is judged according to its contribution to the system of 
government. Although this is only a partial explanation, it is an 
attempt to put in perspective what remains a very diverse range of 
opinions, even after allowance is made for the fact that people who 
worked with successful advisers were more likely to see the system as 
being effective. Further evidence to support this explanation comes 
from the stress many interviewees gave to the usefulness of advisers 
rather than to their influence. Although the Treasury and Civil Service 
Committee concluded in 1986 that, 'At present, Ministers make patchy and 
unsystematic use of special advisers' (1986, Vol. 1, para 5.23), this 
does not necessarily mean they are not, in general, satisfactorily 
performing the functions the diverse ministers require from them. 
Drawing on the evidence gathered in this study, and analysed in 
this chapter, it seems appropriate to make a generally positive 
assessment of the hypothesis expounded in Chapter 1. Special advisers 
have become sufficiently institutionalized for there to be a recognized 
place for them in the British system of government, and they can often 
play a reasonably effective role. The final part of the hypothesis is, 
as we have seen above, the most contentious and there are quite strong 
limitations on the degree of effectiveness - particularly when viewed 
against the needs of the system of government. By the mid 1980s there 
was a considerable movement in favour of extending the system so as to 
enhance its effectiveness. These proposals are examined in the final 
section. 
SECTION L PROPOSALS FOR REFORM. 
Summary Qf ßecent PWssals. 
In 1986-7 various proposals for reform, and usually for further 
development, of the system of special advisers came from: The Treasury 
and Civil Service Committee (Seventh Report, Session 1985-86); the 
Government Response (Cmnd 9841,1986); the TjW I& in Whitehall report 
produced by an RIPA Working Group (1987); the Re-skilling Government 
Group (1987); the Fabian Society (Lipsey, 1987). These proposals are 
given in tabular form in Table 7 with the functions of each proposed 
unit in relation to activities in a range of fields outlined in Table 8. 
364 
TABLE 7: Summary of various proposals for Reform of Special. Advisers' 
System. 
Proposed 
Name 
Features 
and 
Compos- 
ition 
Numbers 
For 
Whom 
Treasury Government 
& Civil Response 
Service (1986) 
Select 
Committee 
(1986) 
Ministers' 
Policy 
Unit 
Incorporate The Govern 
and re- -ment has 
inforce found the 
the present present 
private arrangement 
office. satisfact- 
Special ory where 
Advisers by the 
(SAs); functions 
PPS; civil of the 
servants private 
office, SA, 
and PPS are 
organizat- 
ionally 
separate. 
Should be The 
Limited in Government 
interests ofbelieves 
efficiency the number 
and of SAs 
containing should 
costs generally 
not exceed 
I per 
department 
Top Jobs Re-skiLLing 
in Whitehall Government 
- RIPA Group 
(1987) (1987) 
Ministers' 
expanded Cabinet 
Private Office 
To consolidate Blend: 
and then expand traditional 
existing 
support for 
ministers: 
SAs (political 
private 
office 
functions; 
political 
Fabians - 
(Lipsey, 
1987) 
Most ministers 
will want 
political 
advisers. 
Should be up to 
individual 
ministers to 
decide whether 
or not to set 
a formal 
cabinet. 
Many ministers 
will also want 
to bring in 
sympathetic 
outside experts 
to senior 
positions in 
background or appointees - 
outside experts)party and 
A number of constituency 
middle ranking 
civil servants 
seconded from 
department. 
6-8 plus 
clerical 
support. 
Both As a general 
ministerial rule only 
heads of Cabinet 
department ministers 
and where (and in 
appropriate exceptional 
junior cases other 
ministers ministers in 
charge of a 
department) 
should need a SA 
and outsiders; their depart- 
analysts ments. 
work; 
experts - 
young high 
flyers from 
department 
In addition 
to private 
office staff: 
Grade 
1 cabinet 
head 2 
2 outside 
experts 
2 outside 
4 
At least 
lor2 political 
advisers; 
sympathetic 
outsiders; 
Best if every 
department had 
at least 1 out- 
side adviser. 
'politicos'S 
2 rough 
diamonds 5&7 
1 insider 
Experiment for 
Secretaries of 
State and 
junior 
ministers 
Continued .... 
TABLE 7 Continued. 
Head of 
Unit 
Exper- 
iment 
It would be Would be a 
open to the Grade 2. 
minister to 
pick a career 
official or 
a senior figure 
to head the unit 
A full There would Best if compos- Balanced 
experiment be no ition and role experiment 
in more constitut- of such an in 9 named 
than 1 dep- tonal office were departments: 
artment - difficulty not laid down 4 for 
results about an centrally but Secretaries 
reported to experiment left to develop of State and 
select on the in a flexible 5 for 
committees. Lines manner Ministers of 
envisaged according to State in 
by the wishes of other 
committee. ministers. departments. 
The 
Government 
believes 
more thought 
should be 
given to the 
functions of 
a Policy 
Unit. No 
central 
Government 
initiative 
but not rule 
out further 
evolution. 
A minister 
can set up 
what is in all 
but name a 
cabinet 
whatever format 
structures may 
say. Different 
formulae may 
suit different 
ministers. Need 
to plan in 
advance other- 
wise crucial 
matters swept 
aside & whatever 
set up will be 
retained after 
Ist 100 days. 
TABLE 8: Summary of Functions of Each of the Units in Various Pr ss s 
for Reform. 
Treasury & Government Top Jobs in Re-skiLting Fabians - 
Civil Response & Whitehall - Government (Lipsey 
Service view of RIPA Group 1987) 
Select current (1987) (1987) 
Committee functions 
(1986) of special 
advisers 
(1986) 
Functions Policy Assisting Reasons: Advise minister Policy 
of unit in advice. with Increase on key problems advice. 
relation Increase departmental political Policy analysis Plus mar 
to minister's policy dev- weight of Long term minister 
activities influence in elopment- the minister thinking. will war 
in the Department especially in the to bring 
Department political department in synp- 
dimensions Functions: athetic 
Focus on outside 
political and experts 
policy issues. to senic 
Political position 
dimension to within 
advice. their 
Conveying a departnw 
political 
impulse of 
minister to 
department. 
Contribute fresh 
perspectives and 
approaches. 
Party Keep Repeats Maintain links Help Liaison 
minister Select 
in touch Committee 
view "keep 
him in 
touch" 
Cabinet Strengthen Advise Provide briefing Briefing Briefin 
minister's 
position 
Traditiona l Traditional Servicing Traditional 
private functions the minister private 
office of the office 
private functions 
office wou ld 
be fully 
preserved 
y 
s 
t 
r 
t 
.... Continued 
TABLE 8: Continued. 
Presentation Press adviser Civil Perhaps a Speech 
would be in servants ministerial writing 
unit and in press press adviser and pre 
could be office in tele- 
political same vision 
appointment position liaison 
as other 
civil 
servants 
Personal Confide 
Courtie 
Clown 
overload 
Pressure Maintain links (links to 
Groups outside 
research 
groups) 
Co- facilitate by Provide 
ordination linking with informs 
other ministers, network 
offices. 
ss 
nt 
r 
I 
Most of the points on the Tables are self-explanatory but it is worth 
stressing that the proposals generally include the suggestion that 
experiments be conducted. 
Summaa of Qpinions Gathered in ft Research. 
A large number of opinions about reforms to the system of advisers were 
gathered in the interviews and they varied greatly. Some proposals for 
reform went further than an increase in the number of special advisers. 
Tony Benn backed a reform which, as he told the Treasury and Civil 
Service Committee (1986, Vol. 2, p. 136) had been suggested earlier in the 
century by Fred Jowett, and was repeated by the 1977 Expenditure 
Committee (Vol. 1, para. 149), that ministers should take a group of 
backbench MPs into a department with them to perform functions similar 
to those now performed by advisers. There was some support for Denis 
Healey's approach in the 1960s of using a few officials in a special 
unit to advise a minister on the questions to ask to gain greater 
control over his department. On reflection, Denis Healey thought 
something like the Programme Evaluation Group (PEG) might be worth 
ministers trying again, although care would be needed to ensure that 
first, the right, high calibre, officials were appointed, and second, it 
did not become a buffer between the minister and the department. 
In all there was not so much support for some of the proposals 
outlined in the Tables as might have been assumed. Some former 
officials think that a number of people have the idea that because the 
system of special advisers has not worked then greater numbers are 
required. The questionnaire finding, discussed in Chapter 8, that 
comparatively few advisers felt their effectiveness limited by a lack of 
position within the administrative chain of command, suggests that there 
is less demand from advisers for a move into a more formal position than 
might have been expected. Again the comments from Norman Warner on the 
effective Labour team at DHSS are significant: 
365 
a proper position within the civil service chain of command 
would have been the kiss of death. Their effectiveness was to 
some extent based on a small amount of mystery about precisely 
how they operated and the fact that they were external .. There were enough of them for them to be mutually supportive. 
They were very well integrated with the private office. Both 
those two factors were fairly important ... If you put them in a formal relationship I would judge that they will become 
bureaucratized, they will not fulfill what they were meant to 
do. 
Overall about twice as many interviewees supported retention of the 
system at approximately its current size as advocated an increased 
number of advisers and a movement into a more formal position probably 
entailing amalgamation with the private office. It is impossible to be 
precise about the phrase 'approximately at its current size'; for the 
Tories who served as advisers in the Treasury, that would mean three, 
but for others it would mean only one or two. Hostility towards the 
idea of a cabinet was greatest amongst ministers. Some advisers opposed 
this idea, as mentioned previously, because they feared it would lead to 
incorporation; perhaps significantly, proportionately most support for 
cabinets came from civil servants, and one minister, William Waldegrave, 
who backed the idea did so to bring special advisers under proper 
'managerial discipline'. 
There was some support - especially from advisers - for the 
introduction of more outsiders into executive positions within the civil 
service and for a civil servant to be allocated to support advisers, in 
addition to a typist. 
Implications Qf t Assessments. 
(i) The first implication of the findings is that the role of advisers 
may change depending upon changing needs of ministers and the services 
they expect and receive from civil servants. It is important to 
consider (especially in the light of the comments about the cyclical 
phases of the role of advisers and the possible development of 
adversarial politics) how far changes in the civil service are permanent 
and how far a different government would have different requirements. 
There is a widespread view amongst former Labour advisers and ministers 
that the civil service has been politicized in a Tory direction. 
Although this claim is widely disputed (see Section D of this chapter), 
366 
its importance lies in the impact it might have on the behaviour of 
future non-Tory ministers. It does seem widely accepted that officials, 
if not politicized, at least adopt a 'can-do' attitude. Some accept 
that the same officials who adopt a 'can-do' attitude towards Tory 
policies might also adopt a 'can-do' attitude to non-Tory policies. 
Others believe that permanent officials more sympathetic to Labour would 
have to be promoted. Throughout the period of Tory Governments since 
1979 a series of Opposition figures have suggested that more special 
advisers would be required, sometimes adding that the task would be 
greater for the incoming ministers than in 1964 or 1974 (see, for 
example, Silkin, 1982, and 1987; John Cunningham - report in T1 
Inndent, 9 January 1989). 
Not all changes in ministerial needs, or current changes and 
proposed reforms in the civil service, would result in a demand for a 
greater number of special advisers or other partisan support staff for 
ministers. There are, however, a number of changes that it is claimed 
have had, or would have, this effect. They include: 
(a) A greater positive commitment by the civil service to achieving 
goals set out by ministers. In Imp JQbj in Wbitehall, it was suggested 
that this had happened; others claim that this can be seen in statements 
made by the former Cabinet Secretary about the role of civil servants 
(see, for example, the memorandum submitted by the Head of the Home 
Civil Service ( Armstrong Memorandum) to the Treasury and Civil 
Service Committee, 1986, Vol. 2, pp. 7-9). To the extent that ministers 
now expect a greater degree of positive commitment from the civil 
service there are areas such as the presentation and promotion of 
policies where some civil servants may be unable or unwilling to give 
the support that ministers require. Certain ministers agree that the 
civil service should not do this. Therefore there is/could be an 
expanded role here for advisers and one that, in part, helps to re- 
establish the uncertain boundary between 'can-do' officials enthusiastic 
to implement the Government's policies, and the party political arena. 
(b) The greater use of short term contracts for people with specific 
skills has been proposed. Whilst many such people would not be special 
advisers, a few could be deployed in a manner similar to that used by 
Michael Heseltine. Advocates of greater use of outsiders on short term 
367 
contracts do not necessarily see this as an alternative to appointing 
advisers. Thus, for example, William Rodgers (1982, p. 160) stated: 'The 
acceptance of the Special Adviser - one or more than one - as the rule 
not the exception would be consistent with a career Civil Service 
characterized by more adventurous recruitment, more movement in-and-out 
and better specialist training'. 
(c) A minister who takes a greater interest in the management of, and 
policy formulation within, his department might wish to develop a system 
similar to Denis Healey's PEG; this could be an alternative to, or have 
implications for, the role of special advisers. 
Perhaps the minister who came nearest to emulating Healey's arrangements 
was David Owen who, as one of the ministerial team in Defence in the 
1960s, had been impressed with PEG. In his autobiography (p. 263) Owen 
explained how he built a policy section within the private office. The 
special advisers were associated with this team. The increasing number 
of highflying officials who have left Whitehall could constitute a pool 
of people who could be brought back in as advisers with valuable 
knowledge about their department. Howard Davies has shown how this 
potentially delicate role can be successfully played. 
(d) Notwithstanding these contentions probably the biggest change in 
the perceived needs of ministers related to the development of advisers 
is that Tory ministers have increasingly come to accept that it is 
useful for them to have advisers. The need is thought to be 
particularly related to the performance of party political and 
presentational tasks where it is felt inappropriate to use civil 
servants. It therefore seems likely that special advisers in some form 
are here to stay. At the end of 1992 there were about 35 advisers 
covering virtually all departments (Vacher's, November 1992). The 
debate is about possible expansion of the system, or its integration 
into more radical changes. 
(ii) The second implication is that there should be no standard blueprint 
because the needs of ministers vary as does the capacity of departments 
to meet those needs. If ministers are forced to appoint advisers and find 
no use for them it will not work. Civil service cooperation with special 
advisers depends upon their perception of the relationship between 
advisers and the minister. 
368 
(iii) The present system is very flexible; different advisers have been 
used in very different ways and have been able to carve out valuable 
roles. This suggests that there might be continuing value in allowing 
ministers to experiment. However, given the previous point, there could 
be dangers in conducting experiments rigidly according to pre-conceived 
blueprints. In particular, the idea from the Re-skilling Government 
Group that their experiment should also be conducted with some junior 
ministers, whose Secretaries of State would continue with the ordinary 
current provision, would probably create unworkable strains. Already, 
some Secretaries of State have been reported to be uneasy if their 
adviser appears to be doing too much for junior ministers. 
(iv) There is no reason to assume that the system has to expand. The 
current system could be viewed as a finished product; the vast majority 
of the post 1981 expansion was in terms of more departments having an 
adviser, rather than larger teams being formed. The suggestion that the 
system of special advisers might represent a lowest common denominator 
is very important. It is certainly not the case that just because one 
or two advisers in a department have proved to be of benefit, a team of 
six in a unit such as a cabinet would be three times more beneficial. 
Indeed, two to three advisers might be the optimum size - because any 
further increase, especially if accompanied by consequential changes in 
the structure of the private office, might create dysfunctional 
tensions. An All-rounder and a Highflier, perhaps with a short term or 
part time businessman or specialist, may provide the perfect complements 
to the private office, whereas a larger team would possibly gum it up. 
Rdafin 1ýModel Qf the Advisers' Elm IQ 1h; E=sed RefQrns. 
The points developed in the previous paragraph could be said to 
flow from an acknowledgement of the nature of the model of the advisers' 
place developed in Chapter 3. That model was conceived following an 
analysis of various problems that ministers might perceive themselves as 
facing, despite the existence of traditional sources of support, in 
fulfilling their many roles. Some of the reasons for wanting to appoint 
extra people of their own were seen to be almost contradictory. Many 
commentators stressed the need for ministers to have access to more long 
term strategic analysis, but often ministers were more acutely aware of 
369 
the need for politically knowledgeable and sensitive advice and 
assistance - especially during immediate crises. 
The analysis in Section D of this chapter suggests that the system 
of special advisers (even where there were effective teams) has not 
fully addressed some of those problems confronting the system of 
government that were highlighted in Chapter 3. In particular, there is 
still thought to be a lack of long term, strategic analysis being 
conducted by people close to ministers. This has been a major theme in 
the criticisms made by John Hoskyns (1982, and 1983), and the Re- 
skilling Government Group he led. Thus one of the features of the 
cabinets proposed in the Group's final report (1987) was that they 
should include, 'analysts capable of policy research and development on 
long-term issues and with live links to outside research bodies' (Re- 
skilling Government Group, 1987, para. 3). 
Not all the reform proposals advocated the introduction of 
cabinets. Both the Treasury and Civil Service Committee (1986) and the 
RIPA Working Group (1987) explicitly stated they were not using the term 
because what they were proposing was not based on the French or 
continental models. The Treasury and Civil Service Committee stated 
that they wanted to dispose of the word cabinet partly because: 
we do not wish what we are to recommend to be seen in any way 
as a copy or even an adaptation of any of the existing 
continental systems. What we are proposing is more an 
expanded private office than a Win, in which the 
traditional functions of the private office would be fully 
preserved. However, to emphasise that it is also more than 
the existing private office we propose to call it a Minister's 
Policy Unit (Vol. 1, para. 5.28). 
In the RIPA report the considerable differences between the French 
and British civil services were explored and it was argued that, 'the 
French experience reveals a number of actual or potential drawbacks 
which lead us to oppose giving an executive role to ministerial staff 
units' (para. 5.16). The report endorsed the proposal from the Treasury 
and Civil Service Committee and, as noted in Table 7, advocated an 
expanded private office and it was claimed that, The new arrangement, 
which would be quite different from the French model, should perhaps not 
be called a cabinet to avoid any confusion' (para. 5.17). 
370 
However, as both proposals involve incorporating political and 
outside figures into a private office (which, at least in the RIPA 
report, could be headed by an outside political appointee) they do 
resemble cabinets in some ways. The Re-skilling Government report 
observes, 'we use the word "cabinet" to refer to the type of unit 
variously called, in recent debate, Executive Office, Minister's Policy 
Unit, expanded or enhanced Private Office' (para. 3). Furthermore, the 
Chairman of the Sub-committee which developed the Treasury and Civil 
Service Committee Report, Austin Mitchell, said in 1987 about his 
Report, 'the proposal for ministerial 'cabinets', renamed Minister's 
Policy Units, was well supported by the evidence' (p. 480). This 
suggests, in practice, it may be difficult to distinguish between the 
way the proposed reforms might develop, and traditional cabinets. 
This current study has demonstrated that special advisers have 
established a place within the existing system; but several related 
questions raise doubts about how a cabinet would fit into the system 
unless other radical changes were made. Theakston (1990, p. 48) recently 
commented: 'Appointing politically-committed outside experts in 
particular subjects and creating ministerial cabinets have, of course, 
been staple items in Labour's reform thinking for many years... The 
party leadership has, however, never properly faced up to difficult 
questions about exactly what a cabinet system should be and how it 
should operate. ' 
A succession of authors have noted that the introduction of 
cabinets would entail major changes in the British system of government 
(Rose, 1974, pp. 454-5; Klein and Lewis, pp. 21-2; Neville-Jones; RIPA, 
1987, para. 5.15 and 5.16; James, 1992, pp. 218-9). Some authors 
criticize the idea of introducing cabinets in the UK, others are 
concerned that the drawbacks should at least be acknowledged in any 
debate. The analysis below draws upon these authors and the findings of 
this study. Various issues would arise with any introduction of 
cabinets and might, to varying degrees, also be relevant for the 
proposals to extend private offices: 
371 
(i) Who would head the new unit? If it was headed by a career civil 
servant this would place advisers under the authority of a career civil 
servant for the first time. If, however, a political outsider was in 
command this might damage links with the department. In Australia R. 
Smith (p. 152) suggested that for the ministerial offices (which are 
somewhat similar to the proposals being made for the UK), 'the least 
tractable problem was the role of the [departmental] liaison officer. ' 
This current study has shown how effective advisers can occasionally 
assist the private office and permanent secretary in providing a perfect 
gear box for a minister with a clear and strong political will to move 
his department in the direction he wishes to go. 
(ii) How would the minister maintain the direct access to the senior 
departmental officials he currently enjoys? Neville-Jones and others 
refer to the dangers of a cabin serving to wall-off ministers from the 
department, and the department reacting negatively to a large group of 
political appointees. 
(iii) If the cabinets began, as in France, to direct the work of the 
departments what would be the role of permanent secretaries? 
(iv) If, again as on the continent, the cabinets became responsible for 
inter-departmental liaison, would departments stop performing this 
valuable function? 
(v) How would it be possible, within an enlarged team, to preserve the 
essential feature of the special adviser system i. e. that the adviser 
was the minister's 'own person'? A few difficulties within groups were 
indicated in the research and as soon as an even larger group was 
created then, inevitably, a hierarchy would emerge and this could mean 
that, on a miniature scale, all the problems of 'uncertainty 
absorption' began again as the head of the unit would have to filter out 
some of the material gathered by the team. It is difficult to imagine a 
minister having six 'alter egos'. As Douglas Hurd told the RIPA 
Conference in 1986: 
372 
If the chief constraint is a constraint on the Minister's 
time, it is not removed by increasing the number of voices 
around him. I remember a wise American journalist warning me 
against this belief with the illustration of the United States 
Senator trotting down the long corridors of Congress with his 
staffers running beside him desperately competing to catch a 
second or two of the great man's time (p. 10). 
Klein and Lewis also stressed that the key features of personal 
loyalty and trust depended on small numbers (p. 23). 
Given some of these questions, Hoskyns, in interview, suggested 
that his main concern was that a team of sufficiently senior people be 
appointed to conduct proper strategic thinking. It would not be 
absolutely necessary for such a group to go into the private office if 
this would be counter-productive. The problem then, however, as Dror 
(1987) has shown, is ensuring that notice is taken of such advice. As 
Lipsey (1987, pp. 25-6) commented: 
The problem with the Fulton-style cabin is this. If it 
concentrates (as it is supposed to) on the long term, it will 
no longer be part of the day to day decision-taking process, 
and it will become detached from ministers, whose time horizon 
is, necessarily, often short. Thus its policy work, however 
good, will tend to fall on stony ground. Where Fulton-style 
policy units have been created they have, on the whole, proved 
a failure for this reason. 
There is clearly much ground still to be debated and in the UK it 
is the long term strategic thinking that is the least tractable problem, 
but the presence of an effective group of about three special advisers, 
at least one of whom finds time for long term thinking, might be the 
optimum level of personal, political, support for ministers. Indeed, 
some of the evidence gathered in this study suggests that senior special 
advisers, because of their ability to contribute from both ends of 
political-technical spectrum described in Chapter 3, might be well 
placed to encourage ministers to accept the harsh implications of long 
term analysis. One of the most recent contributions to the debate comes 
from James (1992). He claims, 'special advisers have been a success ... 
'cabinets' would entail major changes to parts of the machinery, which 
at present seem to work well and about which ministers have little 
complaint. The need for political advice seems to be met adequately by 
special advisers' (pp. 218-19). Despite the ambiguities and remaining 
373 
problems this study has demonstrated there is a place within the current 
British system of government for advisers of the right calibre to play 
an effective role. 
374 
n' x Q= The Questionnaire S= IQ Special Advisers. 
Questionnaire Q al Advisers. 
1) Name: 
2) Department(s) Dates Full/part time 
3) Age at which recruited: 
4) Were you a member of the party in power when recruited? ... If so, what position(s) did you hold? 
5) How were you recruited? 
6) Starting remuneration and source: 
7) Occupation before becoming special adviser: 
8) Occupation after being a special adviser: 
9) Was your experience as a special adviser of benefit in your subsequent 
career development? 
10) What was your formal title? 
11) Did you have a formal job description or terms of reference? ... If not, were the functions that you were expected to carry out clearly 
stated at the time of your appointment? 
12) How many hours a week did you work? 
13) How close, physically, was your office to that of the minister? 
375 
14) Various reasons have been suggested for the appointment of special 
advisers. In the case of your appointment, what importance do you 
think was attached by the minister to each of the following: 
6 ubstan Consid 
erable 
Moder , Slight Negligible 
R 
a) Relieve the overload of 
business on ministers 
b) Provide political support 
within the departments 
staffed by "neutral" civil 
servants, to ministers 
wishing to introduce 
changes 
c) Fill any gaps in the 
knowledge or experience 
of the civil service with 
experts committed to the 
policies of the party. 
d) Help ministers carry out 
a more effective 
collective role in cabinet. 
e) Prevent ministers drifting 
away from the party by 
liaising with the various 
sections of the party. 
f) Help the ministers with 
the presentation of their 
views on departmental and 
general issues. 
g) Provide new/alternative 
policy ideas. 
h) Reduce the isolation of 
ministers by playing an 
aide/confidant role. 
i) other - please specify 
iat 
376 
ate 
15) How frequent was your contact (either face-to-face or by telephone) 
with: 
pe; ly Several 
times a 
week 
Weekly Less 
frequent 
Never 
a) The cabinet minister 
b) Junior minister(s) 
c) Parliamentary private 
secretary 
d) The private office 
e) The permanent secretary 
f) Other civil servants 
g) Advisers in the PM's 
policy unit 
h) Advisers to other 
ministers 
i) Backbench MPs 
j) Party officials 
k) Members of the CPRS 
L) Members of relevant 
pressure groups 
m) Academics/other 
specialists 
n) Government whips 
o) Journalists 
p) Others - please specify 
a 
377 
16) What amount of time did you spend on the following aspects 
of your work. 
Substa lConsid j Moder I Slight I Insignif 
-ntial 
I-erablel 
-ate 
II 
-icant 
a) Examining papers on depart- 
mental matters going to the 
minister and briefing him 
on them. 
b) Preparing reports on 
policy on departmental 
matters. 
C) Chasing up the progress 
on implementing the 
minister's wishes. 
d) Preparing briefs on non- 
departmental agenda items 
for cabinet or cabinet 
committees. 
e) Attending meetings of 
all the politicians 
within the department. 
Corresponding with party 
MPs, officials etc. / 
attending party meetings/ 
receiving party deputations 
on behalf of the minister. 
g) Speech writing. 
h) Discussing issues with the 
-minister. 
i) Attending meetings, visits, 
receiving deputations - 
other than party ones - 
with the minister on 
departmental business. 
J) Attending departmental 
meetings and receiving 
deputations - other 
than party ones - on 
behalf of the minister. 
k) Advising the minister on 
(and involvement with) the 
presentation of departmental 
policy and the minister's 
general views. 
l) Other - please specify. 
ý 
378 
17) To what extent was your contribution effective in the following 
aspects of your job: 
a) Examining papers on 
departmental matters 
going to ministers and 
briefing ministers on them. 
b) Preparing reports on policy 
on departmental matters. 
c) Chasing up the progress on 
implementing the minister's 
wishes. 
d) Preparing briefs on non. 
departmental agenda items 
for cabinet and cabinet 
committees. 
e) Attending meetings of 
all the politicians 
within the department. 
f) Corresponding with 
party MPs, officials etc. 
/attending party meetings/ 
receiving party deputations 
on behalf of the minister. 
g) Speech writing. 
h) Discussing issues with the 
minister. 
i) Attending meetings, visits, 
receiving deputations - 
other than party ones - 
with the minister on 
departmental business 
j) Attending departmental 
meetings and receiving 
deputations - other than 
party ones - on behalf of 
the minister. 
k) Advising the minister on 
(and involvement with) the 
presentation of depart- 
mental policy and the 
minister's general views. 
0 Other - please specify. 
substan 
tially 
Consider 
ably 
Modera 
teLy 
Slightly Insignif 
icantly 
379 
18) To what extent was your effectiveness limited by the following: 
IS 
tiaLty I ably 
I 
elY II nific 
ubstan lConsiderl Moderati Sliphtlyj Insig i 
antLy 
a) Inadequate access to the 
minister. 
b) inadequate access to 
official information. 
c) Inadequate active support 
from the private office. 
d) inadequate active support 
from the rest of the 
civil service. 
e) Inadequate experience of 
the way the department(s) 
operated. 
f) The lack of a proper 
position within the 
administrative chain 
of command. 
g) Difficult relations with 
junior ministers in the 
department. 
h) Inadequate knowledge of 
the policy issues. 
1) Inadequate time to carry 
out all the tasks. 
J) Absence of research 
staff. 
k) Other - please specify 
19) To which types of information were you not allowed access? 
380 
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