08/10/2013 00:00
TW
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by RAY FLEMING
CABINET government is a fine idea in theory but difficult to manage in practice. In Britain it brings together some twenty senior ministers who are entitled to contribute to discussion about the whole range of government business at one or two meetings a week lasting about two hours.

With the increase in the range of responsibilities falling on the government and the national and international considerations impinging on them it becomes difficult for the Cabinet to function efficiently; there are several Cabinet committees which look at specific policy areas and remit their findings to the full Cabinet. The Cabinet system has existed for a very long time so Gordon Brown's decision to create a National Economic Council to focus on economic and financial issues is a major break with tradition. The Council will in effect be similar to War Cabinets of the past but with its sights on the economic battles that will have to be fought in the coming years. It will have 19 ministerial members - a large number that reflects the way in which global economic problems now affect so many areas of national life. There will be some uneasiness in other departments, especially the Treasury, about this new Council's powers. As part of Gordon Brown's belief that government needs an admixture of business thinking he has asked Paul Myners, chairman of the Guardian Group and former chairman of Marks & Spencer, to become a member of the Council. He has also recruited Sir John Bland of Vodaphone, Lord Browne, former boss of BP and Sir Victor Blank, chairman of LLoyds TSB, as “business ambassadors” for the government.