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My begrudging admiration for David Cameron

June 10, 2012 7:44 pm

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This morning on 5live I admitted, under duress, my begrudging admiration for David Cameron. Don’t worry, it’s limited.

It’s not to do with the handling of the economy, the public service “reforms” his government have pushed, or the lovely jumper he was wearing over the Jubilee weekend. It’s to do with how he handles his ministers.

Now at the moment Cameron is facing calls to dispose of two ministers in particular – Hunt and Warsi. As It happens I think that Hunt should clearly have gone by now, and that it’s immaterial whether Warsi goes or not (she’s a non-entity doing a non-job – harsh perhaps, but fair). On this occasion though, as he has done for the most part during his tenure as PM, Cameron has stuck with his ministers. Now in some cases that was clearly the wrong decision (the slow lingering demise of Liam Fox for example), but it is in complete contrast with the hyperactive reshuffle fever that used to come over Labour periodically during our time in government.

By all means shuffle your pack to get the best out of them, but often Labour ministers weren’t in place long enough to understand their brief before they were sent to learn a new one or were dispatched from government altogether. That doesn’t seem to be a problem that similarly afflicts this government. A symptom of coalition perhaps? Maybe. but whatever the reason it should be welcomed.

Whether it’s loyalty or weakness, on balance it’s a positive thing. Stable, knowledgeable government is always preferable to that of a government that is desperate to show that it is doing “something” (anything). The fear leads to “initiativeitis” and before we know it the Today Programme is cluttered with the white noise of meaningless announcements. That in turn leads to climbdowns and u-turns.

Although perhaps the remarkable achievement of the Cameron government has been to manage u-turns and climbdowns with a largely stable personnel. Then again, stability doesn’t necessarily mean competence, does it?

Related posts:

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  2. John Mann: “clear that David Cameron was directly involved” in BskyB bid
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  • Guest

    Get well soon Mark

    • Dave Postles

      I fear it’s terminal.

      • AlanGiles

        Poor old Mark. You are being harsh to him -I always feel he tries to be fair, and I sort of understand what he means, but had I been Cameron I would have insisted Hunt went at the same time as Adam Smith, as for Warsi, you know my views on people who make “mistakes” where personal and financial integrity is concerned, and she would be out as well. I think it was right to get rid of David Laws for the same reason and I frankly don’t think he should return, which seems to be something that DC and Nick Clegg agree on.

        You can say, in his defence,  that Cameron doesn’t have a Mandelson character laying down poison – I know there are those in the Conservatives who have a problem with Warsi, not just connected with her gaffes, but there doesn’t seem to be centrally mounted campaigns – just remember how Mandy used to operate with anyone who upset the Dear Leader. 

        • AlanGiles

          * I should have clarified – what I meant was Cameron/Clegg want Laws rehabilitated, I honestly don’t think fiddlers should be given a second opportunity – especially when they concoct an intricate story to try to excuse themselves

          • treborc1

             Labour had a great rehab Unit look at Mandy.

          • Billsilver

            My God!
            I agree with you.
            On this one anyway.

          • treborc1

             better go and vomit then

          • Billsilver

            Don’t forget to wipe the kitchen floor afterwards then Treborc1.
            You wouldn’t want the cat to slip over would you?

  • Wyatt Twerp

    Pity Ed Miliband didn’t shuffle that Joke(er) Liam Byrne out of his pack when he had the chance.

  • http://twitter.com/_DaveTalbot David Talbot

    Yep, I admire Cameron on this issue too, Mark.

    Government works best if Ministers aren’t being sacked or reshuffled all the time. Think of all the Ministers that could have gone, bar Laws, Fox and Huhne who were all masters of their own downfall. Cable, Clarke, Lansley, Hunt and Warsi – all could (and some, indeed, should) have gone. But under Labour they certainly would have all been dispatched. 

    Under Labour planned reshuffles, and unexpected ones, happened far too frequently. The constant dance of Ministers was a significant factor in so many of them failing to make significant marks on their departments, and more generally the breakdown collective Government decision-making, which near totally disintegrated.

    Cameron seems to have learnt from this. And he has almost certainly set a precedent of Ministerial continuity – of which the benefits are immense. Ministers need time to establish themselves in their departments, to acquire authority and knowledge on their respective portfolios. Civil servants won’t treat them with too much respect if they know Ministers are like passing buses. It also sends a very clear message to our infantile media that no matter how loud they squeal they will not always get a Ministerial scalp.

    So, on this one, kudos to Cameron.

    • Alexwilliamz

      Not so sure, I can think of plenty of ministers that hung on to their posts, despite a number of mistakes. We don;t know if these people will not be reshuffled at a later date. My guess is they are also useful canon fodder to keep to much flack from hitting Cameron, whom the tories believe is their main asset at present according to opinion polls.

  • http://twitter.com/RF_McCarthy Roger McCarthy

    Partly this is down to coalitions necessarily being less flexible than one party govts – particularly as both the Tories and their Lib Dem Quislings are deeply divided internally but must maintain the illusion of solidarity for fear of the whole mess unravelling and them having to pay for their crimes now rather than in May 2015. 

    Bang on about New Labour’s reshuffle mania – this was particularly destructive in housing where the perennial inexperience of his opponents made even a Grant Shapps look knowledgeable.

  • http://twitter.com/tristanpw1 TristanPriceWilliams

    It’s probably the fact that he has all the best people (the only) out there already… and the rest is just dross.

    You’ll remember about 20 days into the coalition government when they had to accept the resignation of David Laws for having ‘misled’ over his expenses, and they had to move Alexander from the very junior post of Scotland Secretary to the much more senior one at the Treasury. 

    They had no one else. 

    Fortunately the Scottish job was a non job that could just as well be done by the office cleaner on his day off. David Muddle was  clearly out of the question so they brought in someone who hadn’t been thought suitable even for the most lowly junior minister .. Michael Moore. And goodness me, they were right the first time. 

    Get rid of Hunt and give the job to…. oh right… no one. They might have to ask labour for someone!

  • JoeDM

    What exactly did Hunt do wrong once he was given responsibility for the BSkyB bid?

    He seems to have followed due process and provided a valid audit trail for all decision points up to when the bid was withdrawn.   The evidence so far seems to show a minister who put behind him his own views and moved forward on the basis of legal and authorative  advice.

    • AlanGiles

      Oh come of it, Joe: Hunt claims that he was neutral on the Sky  bid, yet we found out that he had written memos to Osborne, which showed that this wasn’t true. He told his adviser Smith, the night before he resigned he didn’t have to , the next mlorning Hunt had turned 180 degrees.

      Then there are the fawning sycophantic texts to Michel, the Sky PR man, in which they called each other “daddy” and each congratulated the other on TV performances (performance being the right word) which augered well for the Sky bid.

      So Hunt lied about his neutrality – he “forgot” to mention all the contacts he had had with Sky officials, at the very least he looks untrustworthy and unreliable.

      Only the most jejune Tory cannot see this.

      • JC

        Alan, can you suggest someone who would have been in any way near neutral given the intense politicization of the issue. Remember that the EU investigated and were happy to accept the NI purchase of the remaining BSB shares. 

        • AlanGiles

          Certainly they could have found somebody less gung-ho than Hunt. What makes ikt worse in his case was that he tried to give the impression of neutrality, when he was anything but – yet another hypocrite is the last thing politics needs.

          As regards who could have been a better candidate after Vince Cable was removed – well, with respect, I am not privy to their thoughts, but somebody less anxious to see the bid succeed should have been able to have been recruited. Hunt was clearly too biased.

          • Dave Postles

            It could have been Clegg with his free and roving ministerial role.

        • Dave Postles

          1 He misinformed the House of Commons about the amount of contact and whether he had intervened in the process when Cable had responsibility.
          2 He did not control or wrongly advised his special adviser – either way, probably contravening the ministerial code.
          Those are the issues.

    • Chris

       Putting it into perspective. If a member of your local Planning Committee had made remarks about a developer like Hunt about Murdoch then they would be disbarred from deciding on a planning application for that developer. And of course this bid was at least as important so the same standards should apply!

  • AlanGiles

    Nothing to do with Mark’s article,  but nowhere more appropriate to put it.

    If parents on a council housing estate did this, wouldn’t Mr. C be talking about “Broken Britain” and Eric Pickles lecturing on “feckless” parents?:

    http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/uk/david-cameron-leaves-daughter-eight-at-pub-after-sunday-lunch-7835569.html 

    • treborc1

       You want to  go over listen to Brown at the inquiry it’s hilarious, he’s trying to put everything idiotic thing he got wrong right.    Dear god the bloke is on another world.

    • Dave Postles

      It was only Nancy.  It only becomes careless at this level when it is mislaying two or leaving one in a handbag. 

    • Jeremy_Preece

      The Camerons are lucky. Not only would they have been in trouble with social services if they were an ordinary family, but in Portugal, the experince of the McCaine family shows what could have happened, at least the latter knew where Maddinine was, and it was not in a public bar.

      We should not have been surprised by the hypocracy though. After the riots Cameron’s tough line on those who rioted and any ordinary youth who break the law is in such contrast with his own behaviour at the same age. His student days are well known, where Daddy paid the cheque to all those who little boy Cameron and his chums, wrecked the property of, but then he says several times that “we all do things when we are young”. So that it all right then, but only if you are one of the elete.  Otherwise you should be punished.

      One rule for them, and another for the rest.

  • http://twitter.com/ChristyQuinn Christy Quinn

    I admire Cameron most for his treatment of the Bloody Sunday enquiry. His apology on behalf of the Armed Forces meant a lot to me and I think it will be seen to have helped heal over some of the worst sores of the Troubles.

  • Jeremy_Preece

    Perhaps we are being too kind to Cameron. What if he is so arrogant he feels that it doesn’t matter and he can probably ride out his troubles since he has his media friends to drip feed enough propaganda to keep enough pulic opinion on side.
    I maintain that this arrogance is one that makes him try on as many toxic policies as possible from the most unacceptable and extreme Tory agenda possible (hatchet on NHS, and freeze public sector worker pay while cutting tax for the top 5% etc. etc.).

    His U-turns are like Arthur Daily trying on ever more extreme rip-offs and then when challenged, back peddles with, “no no, didn’t mean it like that”. Or like a naughty school boy nicking sweats, who when challenged puts some of the sweets back and says “no, sorry just looking”.

    • Dave Postles

      Sounds right to me.

    • Jason Plessas

      Is it really too much for you to handle that Cameron might just be a human being with some positive qualities as well as bad?

      • Jeremy_Preece

        Has it occured to you to actually open your eyes and see what is really there Jason?
        Cameron lied to Britain and is pressing on with his hatchet job of the NHS, after U turning on his pledge, so has not the mandate to do so. Cameron has frozen the salary of so many public sector workers while prices rise higher and higher thereby giving them a pay cut. He has let Vodafone and other pals off their tax, since he would rather use the deficit as an excuse to punish single mothers and the unemployed. He has cat the tax of the very rich few.
        This is a man who was born into wealth and privallage and has had everything handed to him on a silver plate.
        He spent his youth as a latter day Bertie Worcester bing drinking his way through his university and using his privallage to enable himself to behave in the way that he condems others for.
        We hear that there is no money for proper policing and so he wages war on the police force, and goes about cutting 20% of their budget. At the same time he goes about creating new elected police commisioners at a cost of over 100 million.

        Just look at his politcal record. If Britain played politics on a level playing field then he would be being hounded out of office for any one of a whole range of bad policies that he is following. If he had been a Labour PM and not a Tory he would have been ousted time and time again.

        I find his hypocrasy absolutely overwhelming. We hear that for all his family values he is the sort of parent who forgets to take his 8 year old daughter from the pub. We hear that we are all in it together, and after he has made the lower and middle poorer, and the rich richer.

        Yes Cameron is a human being. But I stand by everything that I have said. He is a shifty politician who’s real agenda is absolutely abhorrant to so many right thinking people that he has to camouflage himself as Mr Nice Guy and Middle of the Road in order to survive.

        All that I have said about his method of distraction holds.

        I am all for looking for the good in everyone, but please remember not to go soft and misty eyed about David Cameron. He would have your soul sold for a few pence if he thought that he and his rich friends would benefit from it. At the end of the day, I can not find it in me to see much to admire about DC. He chooses to be ignorant of the damage his government causes to so many ordinary people, and what he stands for just winds me up.

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