Obscure Scribblers: A History of Parliamentary Journalism by Andrew Sparrow

For additional reading that presents a slightly more critical view of today’s book review subject, I recommend John Lanchester’s review of Nick Davies’ Flat Earth News in the 6 March 2008 edition of the London Review of Books (no subscription required).

Obscure Scribblers: A History of Parliamentary Journalism by Andrew Sparrow

Dr Samuel Johnson did it, and towards the end of his life he expressed regret, remorse, and some embarrassment that he had ever tried it in the first place. A little less than a century later, Charles Dickens started to do it, too, and according to his contemporaries he had a very real talent for it. Governments have tried to ban it, or restrict it with tough legislation and harsh criticism of its practices, but as public opinion has become more permissive and social standards are less strictly upheld, its most ardent practitioners are getting away with a lot more than they would have been able to dream of even a generation ago.

The ‘it’ in question, of course, is parliamentary journalism.

Andrew Sparrow is a political correspondent with the Daily Telegraph, and in Obscure Scribblers he has compiled a compact history of political journalism in Britain, from illicitly printed political pamphlets distributed in the days of Oliver Cromwell to the spin doctors and breaking-news approach of the modern newsroom. The book’s title comes from an epithet used by Sir William Meredith, a baronet who sat in Parliament in the mid-1700s. Sir William denounced the ambitious young men who would fight to claim a seat in the public galleries and dash off reports of parliamentary proceedings for the various newspapers and gazettes that were published in London. He claimed that popular reporting of parliamentary debates would sully the quality of debate and lead to inaccurate and contradictory reporting on the substance of the issues being discussed. As Sparrow’s book clearly shows, mutual hostilities between politicians and the press are certainly nothing new — even three centuries ago, MPs and peers seemed to either moan about how the reporters make too much of every trivial thing that happens in Westminster or sulk about how their stunning speeches and thrilling debates are being ignored by the press. Yet the journalists themselves do not always come away from Sparrow’s history covered in glory; the practices of parliamentary journalism, particularly with regard to ‘off the record’ or ‘lobby’ briefings, are often as restrictive, insular, and narrow-minded as those of the politicians who are put on the spot. Unsurprisingly, the ‘obscure scribbers’ who have clawed their way into Westminster are very jealous of their proximity to the people in power. (To take just one example, not all of the protests against the radio broadcasting and later televising of Parliament have come from the politicians.) But as journalism as a profession continues to evolve, political reporting will evolve with it, and traditions that have worked well enough in the past may not be so applicable even in the near future.

The main strength of Obscure Scribblers comes from the fact that Sparrow keeps closely to his subject and resists the temptation to try to broaden his scope too greatly. In some ways, this strength contributes to the book’s only real weakness, in that the reader would definitely benefit from some prior knowledge of modern political history to better understand the importance of some of the less well-known historical incidents Sparrow mentions. The book could be a little longer in some respects, but the pace and tone seldom slacken and the writing, if a little dry, is far from dull. There are plenty of amusing anecdotes, the history writing is solid without ending up bogged down in petty details, and Alastair Campbell gets a thorough kicking by the end of it. Few bad things can be said about that.

Coalition: The Politics and Personalities of Coalition Governments Since 1850 by Mark Oaten

I suppose I ought to make the obligatory joke about a well-hung parliament, but considering that I’m about to take out the knives for this review, perhaps naughty humour isn’t entirely suitable for the situation.

Coalition: The Politics and Personalities of Coalition Governments Since 1850 by Mark Oaten

Ever since the British political system began to settle into the particular alignment of factions and interests that we now recognise as the forerunners of modern political parties, voters have come to expect that a specific political party will be able to win a majority of seats and form a government. On the rare occasions when no one party has an outright majority — most often known as a ‘hung parliament’ — politicians and political parties have to scramble to find a solution and settle on an agreement that will be acceptable to the denizens of the Westminster village and (to a lesser exent) to the country as a whole. In other countries, this agreement takes the form of coalition governments, often given catchy names based on the identifying colours of the political parties involved — ‘traffic light coalition’ (from the German Ampelkoalition) or ‘purple coalition’ (the social-democrat-and-liberal coalition that governed the Netherlands throughout most of the 1990s). Yet coalitions are a rarity in British political history, found only in times of extreme stress on the existing political system. As Benjamin Disraeli’s observed, back in the mid-nineteenth century, ‘This too I know, that England does not love coalitions‘. With that statement in mind, Liberal Democrat MP Mark Oaten has taken it upon himself to examine the history of flawed and failed coalitions in British politics, attempting to determine whether Britain can embrace coalition government as an alternative to the ‘Punch and Judy’ tactics of combative government that have steadily lost favour in the polls.

Here, this review must pause for a moment, and attempt to separate the opinions of the copyeditor from the opinions of the political historian. All questions of content and analysis aside, I have never seen a professionally published book contain so many glaring punctuation, stylistic, and contextual errors. If I had left so many mistakes in a text that had passed through my hands, I would go to my supervisor and ask to be fired on the spot. There are simply no good or even mediocre excuses for some of the errors in this text. On the first page, readers are informed that the Corn Laws were repealed in 1946 (a full century off), and later on in the book a reference is made to the July 2004 London bombings (a year too early). There are sentences that simply do not make sense with the words given, as if someone was working from a taped transcription without bothering to actually check the text for context and word use. My copy of the book is the standard Harriman House hardback edition — not even a first printing or a proof copy, in which these mistakes might be understandable if not forgivable. But even without trying to look deeper into the text, readers first have to fight to actually read it from start to finish without becoming mired down in the words on the page.

That said, the analysis in itself is seems superficial at times. True, the history is there, but it wavers between being too simplistic for those who know the politics of various coalition governments and being too obscure for those who have never studied the subject before. More than a few conclusions are drawn without much of a solid argument to support them. Case in point, and symptomatic of a broader trend: Oaten believes that the established convention of hung parliaments that allows the ruling Prime Minister to attempt to form a government should be scrapped in favour of automatically giving the leader of the largest political party in the House the first crack at government-forming — he claims that existing conventions are not ‘fair’ to the party that wins the most seats. Setting aside the question of fairness in politics, the arithmetic of seats and votes do not always add up to make that the most advantageous choice for maintaining a stable government after an election, and he seldom brings in other opinions to back up his own.

Among the good aspects of Coalition are the brief chapter on the semi-successful coalition in the Scottish Parliament and the number of personal interviews which Oaten conducted and from which he was able to quote to illustrate the thinking of those who participated in two of the most recent attempts at coalition government in Britain: the Lib-Lab pact of the mid-1970s and the Joint Cabinet Committee between Labour and the Liberal Democrats in the late 1990s. The quotes included provide some interesting insight into recent political history. Yet even this recently published book has been overtaken by events — the structure of the last chapter hangs very heavily on how Sir Menzies Campbell might react as Liberal Democrat leader in a hung parliament, yet that task will fall to Nick Clegg now (or to whoever is Lib Dem leader at the time of the next election). In general, Oaten seems to conclude that a coalition government would be ever-so lovely but probably not that feasible, and that the Liberal Democrats will decide the balance of power at the next General Election. Disraeli could have told him the first, and the second is not nearly as cut-and-dried as the honourable member for Winchester might like to think.

The Hands of History: Parliamentary Sketches 1997-2007 by Simon Hoggart

Slipping in an extra review this week to make up for the paucity of postings last month. I have other reviews still to finish, but this one seemed to come out most easily.

The Hands of History: Parliamentary Sketches 1997-2007 by Simon Hoggart

Based on an earlier review of Playing to the Gallery, Simon Hoggart’s collection of Guardian parliamentary sketches from the early Blair years, it may come as little surprise to learn that I eagerly picked up a copy of The Hands of History, Hoggart’s more recently published collection of sketches spanning the Blair decade. The index at the back of the book is not quite as funny as the previous one, but it gives readers a good idea of what to expect within. John Prescott, master of the unintelligible and angry speech for any occasion, from party conferences to PMQs. Sir Peter Tapsell MP (Louth and Horncastle), one of the last of the old Tory knights of the shires, whose oratorical style almost demands that the Hansard editors cast his words in bronze. Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) and his collection of wigs. More inane New Labour jargon, more Conservative party leadership circuses contests, more of Tony Blair’s verb-free sentences…all of the old friends and foes are back.

Much of what I said earlier about the humour of Hoggart’s parliamentary sketch-writing still holds true, though seeing a much broader range of sketches reveals a few small weaknesses that are common to anyone who writes on regular subject on a regular basis. The most notable one is that Hoggart has quite a few standard jokes, several of which are mentioned above, and seeing them repeated in successive sketches grows a little tiring over time. (Though in one of his editorial notes, he mentions that some readers will write in to complain if he hasn’t made one of his usual references in a while.) The Hands of History does manage to catch the highlights of the Blair decade, sticking mostly to the well-known incidents and leaving out much of the day-to-day petty dramas. (I wish he’d included this sketch from mid-February 2006, if only for the amusement value, but space in the book was at a premium and the incident itself has almost certainly been forgotten.) Hoggart often has a fine gift for picking out the metaphors from the reality, as in this description from the time in May 2004 when Fathers4Justice protestors threw flour-filled condoms at Blair during his Question Time:

What an amazing shot by the protestor, throwing from hundreds of feet along a downward trajectory! And how marvellously apt! It had been aimed at Blair but it had exploded all over Brown. The protestors had thrown Britain’s finest political metaphor.

Like Hoggart’s previous book, The Hands of History knows its intended readership. If a collection of parliamentary sketches about the past ten years sounds like it would be entertaining reading, then it is not likely to disappoint — even if the politicians mentioned within do, more often than not.

Playing to the Gallery: Parliamentary Sketches from Blair Year Zero by Simon Hoggart

A quick review this Sunday, since I’m sort of in the middle of travelling at the moment.

Playing to the Gallery: Parliamentary Sketches from Blair Year Zero by Simon Hoggart

The craft of writing parliamentary sketches is a fairly longstanding tradition in the history of modern journalism. Charles Dickens even tried his hand at it, back in the day when several pages of the quality press were devoted to reporting the ins and outs of whatever had happened that day in the Commons and the Lords. But now that Hansard is available online, viewers can watch debates through BBC Parliament, and most newspapers have cut down the column inches devoted to parliamentary coverage, parliamentary sketches might well seem to be on the way out as well. But the art of capturing memorable moments in the alternating frenzy and dullness of the Westminster village is not easily acquired — and it would be a shame if some of the cleverest sketches of the Guardian’s Simon Hoggart were to be lost to the maze of microfilm and Internet archives without being collected somewhere for quick, easy reading.

Playing to the Gallery is a collection of Simon Hoggart’s sketches, a selection of the ‘best bits’ as collected works are so often touted. The sketches are not merely from 1997; the selected sketches begin with the pre-election coverage of April 1997 and run until well into 2002, giving a full range of the first five years of the Blair government. Plenty of familiar faces grace the pages, and some mostly forgotten faces crop up now and then, including perennial stalking horse Michael Heseltine, the ageing and now deceased rake Alan Clark, and the former Madam Speaker Betty Boothroyd. The index, for that matter, is one of the best parts of the book; the entries are pithy summaries that are almost complete sketches in and of themselves. The entries for Tony Blair include ‘helps William Hague into heffalump trap, 169-71‘ and ‘treats Parliament like late-night radio call-in, 107-9‘. Ken Livingstone, as it happens, ‘launches campaign for London mayor with high-pitched whining noise, 154-5‘. One of John Prescott’s many notable moments includes an incident in which he ‘blames Tories for rain, 188-90‘. There’s just enough truth to the exaggerations to make for fine and accurate parody.

Hoggart is quite skilled at deciphering the often unintelligible proclamations of John Prescott, and he takes pleasure in finding and holding up for ridicule some of the most vapid examples of New Labour prose — he actively points out how the New Labour speech style all but abandons verbs in its attempt to make promises without actually promising anything. I spent most of my reading time alternating between chuckling and wincing, for beneath the humour lies a certain amount of wry bitterness, a little voice that says, ‘Is this really what we’ve managed to dig up, push past the post, and stuff into that faux-Gothic monstrosity in SW1A?’ Playing to the Gallery is a collection made for politicos and political junkies, true, but it’s a sad trueism that no history is forgotten quite so easily as that of the recent past. Even those who are less than fond of the state of political reporting in this day and age would be able to spend a few worthwhile moments looking at one or two of the sketches compiled in this book.

How to Be a Civil Servant by Martin Stanley

Gerald Kaufman’s How to Be a Minister was a sly, satirical look at what happens to politicians who find themselves a few inches nearer to the top of the greasy pole. But for their counterparts in administration, the mandarins of Whitehall, the equivalent guidebook was a little longer in coming.

How to Be a Civil Servant by Martin Stanley

Martin Stanley is a former senior official in the Cabinet Office who then went on to head the Postal Services Commission. His book, How to Be a Civil Servant, is written primarily for an incoming civil servant who will be working in Whitehall — most of the information relates to how to deal with ministers and junior ministers, Parliament, and the EU. Far from being written in impenetrable bureaucratese, the text is clear and straightforward, very well-organised. And it is far from dull, as a few examples will illustrate:

…it is perfectly proper for our drafts to omit facts and arguments which might cast doubt on the appropriateness of [policies]. In doing this, we are not being unprofessional. Rather, like the barrister whose principal duty is to the court and who does not necessarily believe in the client’s case, we are simply providing the best possible professional service to our clients, without going so far as to mislead the Minister or Parliament. (11)

And on more specific subjects, such as individual jobs:

[Personal Private Secretaries] are on call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and know where all the bodies are buried. For this reason, they are usually promoted when they leave Private Office…. (21)

And yes, it does mention Sir Humphrey Appleby of Yes, Minister fame, but only as a convenient shorthand reference when referring to the Cabinet Secretariat.

How to Be a Civil Servant is a delightfully witty but remarkably practical book for anyone who happens to be entering into a fast-track, high-flying Civil Service job. For that matter, the chapters about Parliamentary Questions and how to respond to them would be most enlightening for newly elected Members of Parliament, let alone a civil servant. The book is tongue-in-cheek without being overly sarcastic, which makes it more of an actual ‘how to’ book than Kaufman’s satirical study. And for those who’ve any interest in looking at Whitehall from a rather less cynical and scheming viewpoint, How to Be a Civil Servant is probably the most helpful text that’s out there.

In addition to the book, the author has created a companion Web site at http://www.civilservant.org.uk. The Web site is well worth exploring in its own right, not least because it has any number of files and pages that are worth looking at…in my opinion, this one in particular.

How to Beat Sir Humphrey: Every Citizen’s Guide to Fighting Officialdom by Antony Jay

In my undergraduate days, I wrote a massive honours thesis on my pet obsession at the time (and somewhat still, to this day): the 1980s satirical political comedy Yes, Minister. As part of my quest to get my hands on every bit of Yes, Minister merchandise I could find, I purchased the DVDs and the ‘Hacker diaries’, acquired a complete set of Richard Crossman’s three-volume Diaries of a Cabinet Minister (key background texts for much of the series), and managed to find the 1988 and 1989 day planners in near-mint condition. Yet I still scour the Internet in search of other items that I’m looking for…and this book was one of those items. I found it in audiobook format first before finding it in paperback — but more on that shortly.

How to Beat Sir Humphrey: Every Citizen’s Guide to Fighting Officialdom by Antony Jay

Antony Jay wrote How to Beat Sir Humphrey about a decade ago, and in it he has written a step-by-step overview of how ordinary citizens can combat government- or private finance-backed plans that they feel will be detrimental to their community — plans for development that can be as localised as an old building being torn down to make room for a supermarket, or as expansive as a proposed motorway extension. How to Beat Sir Humphrey describes how to organise an action group for best efficiency, ways to raise money and community awareness about the project, pitfalls to avoid at all cost, and how to potentially beat the local officials and the bureaucrats at their own game. One thing to note: the book is written with the intent of fighting British officialdom, so it’s possible that other countries might have different steps or bureaucratic levels that Jay doesn’t mention. But most of the strategies seem to have universal merit and application…such as festooning a local official’s car with yards and yards of ‘red tape’ as a mild protest to draw media attention to the cause.

Jay admits at the end of the book that the suggestions he gives in How to Beat Sir Humphrey are not wholly fail-proof. Sometimes, even one’s best efforts will not be successful, and the project will go through in spite of local disapproval. But he suggests that even the effort made to organise citizens in a civically responsible fashion is one of the things that strengthens our civil society, and that the game itself is really always worth the candle.

For fans of Jay’s television work, the audiobook release is an even better find than the original text itself. Why? Because the person who reads the audiobook is none other than Derek Fowlds, the actor who played high-flying civil servant Bernard Woolley with such pedantic charm in Yes, Minister and Yes, Prime Minister. Hearing Derek Fowlds reading the audiobook is an experience that almost borders on the bizarre. Listening to Bernard Woolley give you advice on how to combat Sir Humphrey Appleby and those of his ilk — you almost have to suspend disbelief in order to wrap your head around that set-up. It’s an extra little treat for those who enjoyed the original television satire.

Britain Decides: The UK General Election 2005 edited by Andrew Geddes and Jonathan Tonge

I picked up this book from the sale table at The Strand bookshop in New York City a few weeks ago, gleefully carrying it off for nearly a quarter of its regular retail price. An excellent find, I must say.

Britain Decides: The UK General Election 2005 edited by Andrew Geddes and Jonathan Tonge

The UK General Election of May 2005 was, in the observant words of Labour MP Tony Wright (Cannock Chase), ‘the election that nobody really wanted to have — not the politicians, not the media, and certainly not the electorate’. People knew that it was coming, and for the most part there was sense of resignation at what the expected outcome would be. The Labour Party would get a sharp kick in the polls (so to speak), but not really enough to completely wipe out its majority. Some seats would change hands, some MPs (almost certainly including John Prescott) would say or do things that would come back to haunt them at some point down the line, one or two constituencies would have particularly nasty campaign battles that would dominate the national news for the better part of the run-up to the election itself. And though all of these things certainly did happen, the ‘expected events’ seemed to blur together — which meant that some of the more interesting (from a political historian’s perspective) aspects of the 2005 election often happened to be overlooked.

Election synopsis books are becoming increasingly popular in the publishing business; for the 2005 General Election, I can think of at least three books I might turn to for analysis of the parties, the polls, the campaigns, and the final results. Britain Decides: The UK General Election 2005 would probably not have been the first book I’d have thought of, but after reading it there’s no doubt that it is a worthy addition to include with longstanding publications such as Dennis Kavanagh and David Butler’s British General Election series. The contributing authors have provided a set of fine essays on what one might consider the usual topics — the Labour, Conservative, and Liberal Democrat election campaigns; special points of interest regarding the election campaigns and outcomes in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland; and reports on the influence of the Internet and the mainstream media outlets during the campaign. The book also has a dozen tidy and well-laid-out single-page summaries of some of the more notable election results, such as George Galloway’s upset victory over sitting Labour MP Oona King in Bethnal Green and Bow, Ulster Unionist Party leader David Trimble losing his seat in Upper Bann, and the late Peter Law’s protest against Labour’s all-women shortlist in Blaenau Gwent. In addition to the usual facts and figures, the book contains a reflective essay by the abovementioned Labour MP Tony Wright, providing one sitting MP’s thoughts and feelings about what it was like to be on the ground during the campaign.

Having had a little bit of experience on the ground myself at the 2005 General Election (I spent Election Night at the BBC Studios in Shepherd’s Bush, watching the results come in until the wee hours of the morning), I found Geddes and Tonge’s book to be quite fascinating. I’m not really much of a psephologist — statistics aren’t my forte, even when it comes to statistical analysis of elections — but the book is written in such a way as to be accessible to an audience that is interested in elections at a bit of a distance, away from the immediacy of the media hype and the nonstop bickering of the candidates. Even if, as the book suggests, it didn’t entirely seem as if ‘Britain’ collectively decided much of anything in May 2005 (except perhaps that Tony Blair’s days in Downing Street were numbered), this retrospective looks at some of the decisions made during the election and draws some thoughtful conclusions about the state of British politics going into Labour’s historic third term.

The Prime Minister: The Office and Its Holders Since 1945 by Peter Hennessy

Catching up after a few days of missed postings — I may end up switching over to a Tuesday/Sunday posting schedule after this week, just to spread out the backlog a bit.

I thought I’d posted this one already, but a look through my tags suggests that I haven’t. I’ve another Hennessy book coming up for review soon after this one, most likely on Sunday.

The Prime Minister: The Office and Its Holders Since 1945 by Peter Hennessy

Like much of the British political system, the office of the Prime Minister (and First Lord of the Treasury) of Great Britain has been sort of cobbled together over the centuries into the form that exists today. As such, there’s an intriguing amount of flexibility in its job scope and job description that quite a lot of people don’t often notice. For instance, a prime minister doesn’t necessarily have to be the leader of the largest political party in the House of Commons — in 1940, Neville Chamberlain stayed on as leader of the Conservative Party for a few months after Winston Churchill officially became PM. A study of the office of Prime Minister in the years since World War II has to look at a subject that is deceptively complex to contemplate, all the more so because each successive PM has added his or her own interpretation of the duties and responsibilities (and perks) that come with being at the top of the greasy pole. In The Prime Minister: The Office and Its Holders Since 1945, Peter Hennessy has written a neat and very compact analysis that incorporates insight and input from a wide range of senior officials, politicians, and media people, all of whom provide a running commentary on the changes that have taken place over the years.

Interestingly, Hennessy seems to take it as a mission to ‘redeem’ premiers that perhaps haven’t been given the credit they deserve for their achievements in their time in office. He has quite a few kind words for Clement Attlee’s seemingly unflappable outlook on governing, Sir Alec Douglas-Home’s sense of duty and determination, Edward Heath’s successful European entry negotiations, and Jim Callaghan’s deep roots in the labour movement. But he’s not above castigating a prime minister for serious flaws or failings — he points out Anthony Eden’s near-monomaniacal hatred of General Nasser and Harold Wilson’s slapdash attempts to control inter-Cabinet squabbles as special examples of leadership problems. Even Winston Churchill is dismissed as having been too old and too steeped in wartime tradition to think that he could manage Britain at peace (leaving Korea and Indochina aside for the moment, that is). As for what he has to say about Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair…well, let’s just say that he thinks their approaches to Cabinet government leave much to be desired.

As a study of the premiership and as a person-by-person analysis of those who have held the office of First Lord of the Treasury since 1945, I can only say that this book is invaluable. Even if it’s occasionally a little frustrating to look at the footnotes and see ‘Private information’ as the source for a really insightful comment or quotation, it’s rather difficult to fault the breadth, depth, or quality of Hennessy’s research on this topic.

Below the Parapet: The Autobiography of Denis Thatcher by Carol Thatcher

This book doesn’t quite fall into the ‘diaries/memoirs’ or ‘dead politicians’ category, so I’ve set up a new ‘biographies’ category that ought to do the trick.

Below the Parapet: The Autobiography of Denis Thatcher by Carol Thatcher

It’s always interesting to see children of the famous writing biographies of their parents, and even more interesting when these biographies are not overly coloured with bitterness for any neglect or lack of attention that the parents might have displayed when their offspring were growing up. And Carol Thatcher’s book about her father overcomes quite a bit of established opinion in its attempt to make Sir Denis Thatcher less of a caricature and more of a real person.

The general image most people have of Denis Thatcher is that of a bumbling, stumbling sot, given to making inappropriate comments about people of colour and always slinking away to the golf links whenever he can wriggle out of the iron grip of She Who Devours A Red Box And A Permanent Secretary At Breakfast Each Morning. Private Eye’s ‘Dear Bill’ letters have most of the responsibility for that image, but Denis Thatcher tended to play along at times, most notably when he replied to a woman’s question about what he did all day by saying, ‘Well, when I’m not completely pissed I like to play a round of golf’. On the whole, though, much of his time was spent ‘below the parapet’, quietly working as an executive at his fairly successful paint-making business and keeping out of the limelight as much as possible.

Below the Parapet is very much the story of a daughter trying to promote her father as a man in his own right, out of her famous mother’s shadow. And she succeeds, for the most part, though there are times when the careful reader can see the cracks in her attempts to play up the idea of the Thatchers as a family who just happened to be famous. (She certainly doesn’t have much time for her brother Mark — and from the sound of the book, neither did her father — and there’s an undercurrent of uneasiness in the way she talks about her mother.) It’s a fairly subdued sort of autobiography, and goes well with the fairly subdued sort of man Denis Thatcher was.

How to Be a Minister by Gerald Kaufman

In lieu of a rambling, disjointed post about the things that I find wrong or misleading with Jenni Russell’s recent Guardian.co.uk article about the deteriorating relationships between ministers and civil servants, here’s a review of a fairly light-hearted but meaningful book about the difficulties involved in being a member of any particular Government.

How to Be a Minister by Gerald Kaufman

Labour MP Gerald Kaufman (Manchester Gorton) worked as a press advisor to Harold Wilson and later became a junior Minister under Wilson and then under Jim Callaghan. Today, he is probably best known to the general public for his description of the 1983 Labour election manifesto as ‘the longest suicide note in history’. But one of the other things he is known for is his book How to Be a Minister, written and published shortly after Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister. Presumably, Kaufman wanted to write about his experiences as a Minister when his memories (and perhaps his wounds) were still fresh, and that’s essentially what he does — he gives advice on how to be a Minister, drawing on personal experiences and observations of the foibles of the 1970s Labour Governments.

The book’s chapters cover a wide range of Ministerial topics, touching on everything from working with trade unions to running (and not being run by) your Department to not getting in trouble with your Prime Minister. One thing that Kaufman does emphasise — understandably, considering his situation — is the fact that every Minister is an ex-Minister waiting to happen, and that one of the worst things you can do as a Minister is to fall under the impression that you will be in office forever. The entire last chapter of the book is devoted to the tricky task of leaving office gracefully, if you can help it, and how this difficult task can be managed with a minimum of pain and suffering. The book is liberally sprinkled with examples of ‘how to do’ and ‘how not to do’ things as a Minister, and fortunately Kaufman is willing to put up his own failures, as well as his successes, for the readers’ examination.

All in all, How to Be a Minister a nice, quick read, and it’s sitting on my bookshelf with my other ministerial diaries and memoirs as a sort of meta-piece about life in government. Kaufman is able to look back on his tenure as Minister with irony and general good humour…two things that are not always part of a politician’s retrospective on his or her career.