Poltical Power (3) Prime Minister

Many cabinet ministers would like to become the Prime Minister. They believe that this would give them real power. Unfortunately, the prime minister has far less power than they expect. The Prime Minister does not have a government department to carry out their wishes. They have assigned all of them out to the members of their cabinet. They depend on them to carry out the party’s political promises.

A few cabinet ministers will be really effective and get their plans implemented. A few will be incompetent, and the rest will be mediocre, because they have been given a task they have never done before. The inevitable consequence is that most of the party’s plans do not get implemented.

The main thing the Prime Minister has to do is to identify early the cabinet ministers that are incompetent, and get rid of them before they do too much harm. They have to watch for disasters emerging and shut them down before they get out of control.

The other task that the Prime Minister has to do is to communicate to the public and explain to them what the government is doing. They have to be doing this constantly ready for the next election. Prime Ministers cannot do things themselves. They have to persuade others to do the things they want done. That is not easy.