Author Archives: Max Goplerud

The ‘Revolving Door’ of Special Advisers?

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max-gopleud

A recent article in the Telegraph was critical of a ‘revolving door’ of special advisers (spads) from the last Labour government into charities or think tanks.

As outlined in the forthcoming book on spads by Ben Yong and Robert Hazell, this blog post wishes to point out that the Telegraph article tells only an incomplete story;[1] first, a ‘revolving door’ implies not merely that spads go to work in a given sector after leaving office but that they also did so before. Second, the article does not examine where Conservative spads head after their time in Whitehall.

On the idea of a revolving door, our project coded the careers of special advisers before and after their time in Whitehall. The data suggest that the idea of a ‘revolving door’ with respect to the non-profit sector is overblown. Rather, of those who worked in the non-profit sector at some point in their career (32% of Labour and 15% of Conservative spads), the vast majority (74%) only joined that sector after leaving Whitehall.

When looking at think tanks, the claims in the Telegraph article are on stronger ground. Labour advisers were again more likely to work in a think tank after leaving Whitehall (15% vs 8% for the Conservatives). Moreover, of those who worked for a think tank at any point in their career, around 30% of Labour did so both before and after their time as a special adviser (the definition of a ‘revolving door’) whilst only 6% of Conservative ones did so.

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Fewer Special Advisers run for Parliament than is generally thought, but those that do are quick to climb the ladder

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Special Advisers becoming Members of Parliament is a phenomenon seen as symptomatic of a wider ‘professionalisation’ of British politics. Looking at the career progress of those Special Advisers who served between 1979 and 2010, Max Goplerud shows that they do not all seek a berth in Parliament, though those that do tend to experience rapid career progression. 

The notion that Special Advisers (“spads”) turned-MPs dominate the Government and Opposition frontbenches appears periodically in the media as exemplifying the rise of ‘career politicians’ and the ‘professionalisation of politics’. A forthcoming book on Special Advisers by Ben Yong and Robert Hazell of the Constitution Unit explores the profession from 1979 to the present government and provides a detailed look into who they are, what they do, and their relationships and interactions with other actors in the political system.

My recent article for Parliamentary Affairs explores the ‘myth’ outlined above: Is it actually the case that Special Advisers invariably go into politics and rise to the top? The answer, in short, is no. Those Special Advisers who do run for Parliament are not particularly representative of the wider profession.

Despite the presence of some high profile MPs who were previously Special Advisers (most prominently David Cameron and Ed Miliband), the reality is less straightforward. While it is clear that the Special Advisers who do run for Parliament are generally successful (both in terms of their electoral success and subsequently in being promoted), they are not representative of the wider “spad” group. A more satisfactory explanation is that underlying factors drive a certain type of ambitious, politically minded individual to both become a Special Adviser and stand for Parliament. Those individuals are then in a strong position to draw upon the skills and connections they amassed during their time in Whitehall to further advance their political careers.

Special Advisers as Candidates

In total, around 25% of Conservative (1979-1997) and 10% of Labour (1997-2010) Special Advisers ran for Parliament at some point, with most of them doing so after leaving Whitehall. Whilst high compared to the proportion of other groups in the population, it is not so high in absolute terms. These individuals are somewhat younger than the ‘normal’ Special Adviser, with around 40%  of those standing for Parliament aged under 30 on their on their appointment as a special adviser. Conversely, only 25% of ‘ordinary’ Special Advisers are that young.

Figure 1: Number of special adviser candidates by general election

Coloured-SpAd-map

 

This difference might be uninteresting if these ex-Special Advisers took a number of tries to get into Parliament or contested unwinnable seats. However, that is resoundingly not the case; 80% of “spads” (46 individuals) who stood after leaving Whitehall became MPs at some point. For Labour, 18 out of the 21 former Special Advisers who stood for Parliament have won every General Election they contested.

Special Advisers as MPs

Of those Special Advisers-turned-MPs, nearly half have achieved high office as a Secretary of State (or Shadow Secretary of State) at some point in their parliamentary career, with a full 80% achieving the rank of at least Minister of State. This is very different compared to the great mass of MPs who generally remain on the backbenches.

Special Advisers who become MPs tend to skip the established ‘career ladder’ and head straight to the frontbenches; many become Ministers of State without having first served as a Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) or other comparable junior role. They also tend to be very young upon entering government. The data suggest that 17 ex-Special Advisers became (Shadow) Minister of State before their 40th birthday. Compare this to the median parliamentary candidate who is still attempting to be elected to Parliament at that age. This is also not only a Labour phenomenon—rapid promotion of Special Advisers also occurred under Conservative governments. For at least the last thirty years, Special Advisers-turned-MPs have experienced ‘super-charged’ careers in Parliament, outstripping even other types of ‘career politicians’.

On balance, there is clearly some credibility to the dominant narrative about Special Advisers becoming ministers insofar as those who have ministerial office as their goal seem to be quite successful at achieving it. The evidence suggests that having been a Special Adviser is a good signal that an individual is;

  • loyal to the party, and
  • has valuable prior experience with how government works.

Key actors, particularly selection bodies for parliamentary candidates and the party leadership (who may well be their former boss!) may see this as desirable and therefore push for these ex-Special Advisers to be placed in safe seats and promoted rapidly.

Yet, we should be careful to distinguish between those Special Advisers who do run for Parliament from those who do not. It is possible to be critical of the advancement of the first group whilst making a different evaluation about the desirability of the profession of “spads” more broadly. If one thinks this rapid promotion is normatively undesirable, it is a problem for the political parties to solve rather than an issue with Special Advisers writ large.

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Note: this post represents the views of the author. It is based upon an article for Parliamentary Affairs which can be found here. It was originally posted on Democratic Audit: http://buff.ly/1frMuPI

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Return to the dark: the continuing lack of transparency over spads

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11th July 2013

The government released its response to the Public Administration Select Committee’s report on special advisers (spads) yesterday[1]. The more anorak-minded of us focused on Paragraph 8 where the government said something that is certainly misleading if not simply false:

“This Government has already significantly increased the transparency around all special advisers. The names and salary paybands of all special advisers are now published on a quarterly basis.”

Whilst the second sentence used to be true, nothing has been published since a report on 19 October 2012[2]. It is unclear why they would assert something to the contrary in an official publication.

It is only through relying on second-hand and unofficial sources that we are able to examine the number of spads, but it appears that about ten new spads have started working for the government who have not been named in any data release.

As this is about 10% of the total number who have worked for the Coalition at any point, this shows that the lack of clear data limits transparency and hampers data collection, whilst privileging those with pre-existing connections to the government (and frustrating researchers!).

Moreover, some of these spads have quite interesting backgrounds (e.g. the Lib Dem PPC who stood down to become a special adviser[3] or the Conservative spad assigned to a Minister of State who does not attend Cabinet[4]) and not all appointments have been noticed (even by bloggers who are normally quite watchful of these things, e.g. Guido Fawkes[5]).

Unfortunately, these secondary sources do not list information how much individual spads earn (or their collective pay bill), and thus that information will remain sadly in the dark until an eager MP asks a parliamentary question (as was normally the case until Tony Blair began releasing annual lists around 2003) or the government releases its next “eagerly” awaited list.

For those who are interested, information on the new spads is listed below:

Name

Minister

Department

Frith, Emily

Norman Lamb

Health

Gallagher, Will

Chris Grayling

Justice

Jones, Ed

Jeremy Hunt

Health

King, Nick

Maria Miller

DCMS

Masser, Alastair

Lord Hill

Leader of the Lords

O’Brien, Neil

George Osborne

Treasury

Parkinson, Stephen

Theresa May

Home Office

Rogers, Thea

George Osborne

Treasury

Talbot-Rice, Sam

Jeremy Hunt

Health

Wild, James

Michael Fallon

Business

Also, as far as our data shows, there are 89 spads in post (as of May-June 2013), a number which is certainly quite near the numbers reached during the New Labour governments.

Won’t Anyone Think of the Special Advisers?

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To quote @OwenBarder on Twitter yesterday morning: “Spare a thought for many Special Advisers today, caught in a horrible game of musical chairs”. Here are two:

1) The number of spads is very likely to increase to near 90.

Grant Shapps in his new role as Minister without Portfolio and Conservative Party Co-Chair will probably be able to appoint one or two spads; Chris Grayling’s promotion to Secretary of State for Justice will allow him to appoint two spads.

Normally, these changes wouldn’t increase overall numbers, as the old ministers’ spads would lose their jobs; however, since both Baroness Warsi and Ken Clarke will still be attending Cabinet, it seems highly likely that both will keep their spads.

Further, as David Laws is being brought back into government, it seems likely that Nick Clegg will push for him to be allowed to appoint a spad in Laws’ cross-departmental role.

2) This reshuffle will show whether spads under the Coalition are more like those under the previous Conservative or Labour governments.

Under the Conservative governments (1979-97), there were more spads who remained in the same departments and served multiple ministers over long periods of time. These represented relatively stable ‘expert’ spads who knew the brief, had connections, etc. and were able to assist incoming ministers. By contrast, Labour had a generally higher turnover of spads, meaning that when their minister left, they were more likely to leave the department (either to follow their minister or to leave government entirely).

One test of this will be whether Jonathan Caine remains a spad at the Northern Irish Office. He was a spad there for five years under John Major and he was brought back in 2010 to work for Owen Paterson. We will see if Theresa Villiers will become his fourth Secretary of State, if she’ll replace him for her own choice of spad, or if she’ll be allowed to do both—returning to the tradition of having two spads in the Northern Irish Office that characterised the Labour governments.