A Downing Street think tank would not make No.10 strategic

Morgan McSweeney, former chief of staff to former prime minister Keir Starmer, recently told a (supposedly) private event that it was “impossible” for No.10 to be strategic. He put this down to high levels of scrutiny on government policy-making squeezing the space for creative thinking, pointing the finger in part at the ever-bashable Freedom of Information (FoI) Act.

His proposed solution was a No.10 think tank, separate enough from government to be exempt from the usual scrutiny but – presumably at least – close enough to be of more use to government than the rest of the think tank ecosystem. McSweeney is right that No10 is not strategic – the Institute has been making that point for some time – but building an arm’s-length think tank is not the right way to address this strategy gap.

No.10 is not strategic

The UK has a weak, underpowered and overwhelmed centre, and No.10 gets sucked into micromanagement and daily crisis response in a way that makes it nigh-on impossible to be ‘big-picture strategic’.  

There have been various attempts to address this in the past, hiving off some thinkers from the hustle of the day job and giving them space to think differently. While Tony Blair’s strategy unit, which applied consultancy approaches (novel in Whitehall at the time) and managed its own recruitment, is generally seen as having achieved this aim, successive governments have struggled to create a way for big thinking to be embedded in the No10 operation.

Part of that challenge is the ever-faster news cycle, and part of it is a repeated failure to strengthen the centre of government – or to properly devolve more decision-making – despite the multitude of complex challenges that government faces.  

There are existing routes for creative thinking in government

McSweeney may well be right that there was not enough creative thinking in No.10 during his time. That would usually come from one of three sources. First, from ministers and special advisers themselves – much has been written about Starmer’s lack of vision and the lack of policy development in his opposition, and this clearly played out in his premiership. Second, the civil service should be thinking creatively within the political frameworks set out by ministers. We know this isn’t happening, not necessarily through lack of capability but through a culture and set of incentives that squashes out curiosity among policy officials. Third, the think tank ecosystem should be part of that creativity, including Labour Together (now Think Labour), where McSweeney was director from 2017. The problem is not that there are a lack of units or routes for creative thinking inside government, but that the existing ones seemed not to be working.

There is also an argument, espoused by many and alluded to by McSweeney, that the FoI act shuts down space for creative thinking in government. But this is a weak complaint. The act has an exemption for the formulation of government policy. That exemption is qualified, meaning government has to prove it is in the public interest to keep the information private, and it can be challenged. But it is a regularly used exemption, and the principle of safe space for policy development is widely recognised in our system – so government can and often does win the argument to keep that policy development private. There is clearly a fear inside government around FOI, but it is not matched by the reality of what is disclosed. It should not be a block on creative thinking, and ministers and officials both have a role in setting the record straight inside government to avoid unhelpful and unnecessary cautiousness.

Burnham and Romeo need to stick the course on central reforms

Andy Burnham and Antonia Romeo, the cabinet secretary, are on the right track to build a more creative and strategic centre of government. The establishment of a new Office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet – provided that its leaders do not fudge responsibilities and take the time to actually bed in the new identity of OPMC – should bolster capacity at the centre. No.10 North has a specific focus on devolution and growth and should have the space – and physical distance from the chaos of Downing Street – to think differently on those areas. Romeo’s stated desire to bring more curiosity into the civil service is the right instinct.  

There will be resistance, caution and distraction, particularly when things go wrong, but Burnham and Romeo should stick to their plans. Central government needs to let go the overly prescriptive performance tracking that prevents proper devolution and leaves the centre overwhelmed. The OPMC must give the centre the space it needs to think strategically, and departments the space they need to deliver. And the ongoing review into the civil service must address the culture that dampens that creativity as much as the structures that currently hamstring the civil service. Morgan McSweeney’s diagnosis of No10 is not wrong, but the answer is to create a more strategic centre of government rather than in a No10-adjacent think tank.