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New ministers should be given time to understand their roles 

Newly appointed ministers are facing a busy few days, but both they and government will benefit if they are given time to understand their roles

Newly appointed ministers are facing a busy few days, but both they and government will benefit if they are given time to understand their roles, says Tim Durrant.

Promotions to the cabinet mean vacancies are opened up aross more in more junior ministerial positions. Some of these new ministers will be entering government for the first time, and their first few days in the job will be a whirlwind of meetings and briefing. This can be overwhelming. They should take, and be given, time – by both the prime minister and their departmental officials – to get up to speed with their new roles before making big decisions.

The excitement of being promoted doesn't last for long before the work kicks in

For many former ministers, the day they were first appointed to public office is a moment to cherish. Jeremy Hunt ecalled his appointment as culture secretary, his first cabinet role, as “probably the happiest moment in [his] entire ministerial career… because nothing is going wrong, and it’s all downside after that”. But the job begins straight after the excitement of the conversation with the prime minister. Tracey Crouch was heading off on holiday when she was appointed as a junior minister at the Department of Culture, Media and Sport in May 2015. A few hours after she arrived at her hotel, a ministerial box of papers was delivered and she “realised straight away that your timetable was not your own anymore.”

A new minister who is in London will head straight to their department. Their private office will probably have prepared a big pile of briefings on their new role and the key issues facing the department, but there won’t be much time to read it all. Alan Johnson’s impression from various ministerial roles was: “If anyone’s got past page 50, well done! Because you start reading it and suddenly the job’s on top of you.” Hugo Swire’s ministerial role at the Foreign Office began in similar fashion, as “one minute you’re not a minister, the next you’ve got people saying ‘Minister, sign this, sign that.’”

Ministers are expected to take decisions from the moment of their appointment

Every minister has responsibility for important issues and needs to understand complex detail. They are unlikely to get a handover from their predecessor, so will instead need to make sense of a huge amount information in a relatively short time. Jo Swinson, who was a business minister in the coalition, said that she was “suddenly thrown into this ridiculous world where you're supposed to be an expert on everything in your brief overnight… which is obviously impossible.”

Jacqui Smith agrees: “You have a pretty short period of grace in terms of people’s expectations of whether or not you’re going to be up to speed.” She also recalls being asked to take decisions on a review of the national curriculum on her first day as an education minister.

Ministers should (try to) take their time over decisions

Given the complexity of their decisions, ministers should be sure to understand an issue before coming to a firm view. Former chancellor Ken Clarke, who held various other cabinet-level roles, advised new ministers to “ignore the advice of colleagues… about something you must do straight away, until you have had a meeting or two about it.” Ed Vaizey went further, saying new junior ministers should tell their secretary of state, “don’t ask me to make any major decisions for two months” while they get to grips with their new responsibilities.

However, ministers often want to move quickly to make an impact – after all, they may not get long in the job. It can also be difficult to resist the demands of the government machine for constant decision making. But the prime minister and his team have reportedly said they want the government to focus on getting things done rather than hyperactive announcements and media management. Giving ministers the time to understand their remits will help them drive change. And the message from previous ministers is clear. Newly appointed ministers should take, and be given, the time to find their feet and work out what it is they want to achieve before they get completely stuck in to their work – and stuck on the daily treadmill of government.

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