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Ministerial Accountability
Suggested Answer Guide
The doctrine of collective and individual responsibility are effective tools in
ensuring the accountability of ministers to Parliament. Discuss.
Discuss the nature and importance of the doctrine of ministerial
responsibility to the working of the United Kingdom constitution.
Individual and collective responsibility are examples of conventions that
form an important source of constitutional law. They are defined by Hilaire
Barnett in Constitutional and Administrative Law as non-legal
constitutional rules which imposes an obligation on those bound by the
convention and are largely political in nature. They govern the exercise of
discretionary powers and regulate many practices in the workings of
central government. Conventions regulate the relationship between the
various organs of government and supplement the legal rules. Because of
its non legally binding nature it helps remove certain aspects of the
working of the constitution from the jurisdiction of the courts and helps
preserve the doctrine of the separation of powers but at the same time
the breach of convention is uncertain and can lead to abuse by an
irresponsible
government.
Professor Wade has defined the convention of ministerial responsibility as
the accountability and responsibility of those who govern to whom they
govern. Under these broad ambits are the collective responsibility of the
Cabinet to parliament and ultimately the electorate for policy and
administration, the individual responsibility of ministers for the policy and
administration of his or her department and the individual responsibility of
ministers for their personal conduct.
Collective responsibility is evidenced by three interrelated observations;
that the government must speak with one voice, cabinet discussions are
confidential and the government must resign if it loses a confidence vote.
The convention of collective responsibility emphasizes the unanimity of
government and its accountability to parliament. The rationale for the
convention lies in the need for the government to speak with one voice is
the presentation of a unanimous front to the parliament, and ultimately
the electorate in order to maintain confidence. It is by convention that
once the cabinet arrives at a decision, then every member of the cabinet
must support that decision regardless of any disagreement beforehand.
The ministers are then held collectively to be accountable to Parliament.
The Prime Minister has head of the Cabinet is questioned during the Prime
Minister question time making him accountable for the collective decisions
of the cabinet.

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Collective responsibility ensures that the Cabinet is accountable wholly

and singularly for any decisions. While this convention works effectively in
keeping the pack together it may not necessarily foster free and fair
debate. Collective responsibility is more often looked as a political tool to
reinforce party unity. It also helps maintain the governments control over
legislation and to contain unpopular public disagreements between
departments. A Minister has no choice but to resign if he or she is not able
to adhere to this convention. The resignations of the late Robin Cook,
former Foreign Secretary and Clare Short, Secretary of State for
International Development was due to disagreements with their
colleagues over the Iraq war. Collective responsibility dents the
accountability of the Government to Parliament because a resignation is
indicative of a disagreement for reasons which are never made known.
The confidentiality of Cabinet discussions is often used as a cloak to
disguise covert decisions under the banner of unanimity of a decision. The
Hutton enquiry into the death of Dr David Kelly provides an idea of how
information on the presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq could
have been sexed up by the Cabinet in order to go to war with Iraq.
Although it is not known for sure whether it was or not the decision to go
to war was based on secret cabinet meetings which allowed for action to
be taken without consultation with Parliament. This element of collective
responsibility decreases the level of accountability of the Cabinet to
Parliament.
Secrecy in the Matrick Churchill and Arms to Iraq affair enabled ministers
who knew about the sale of arms to Iraq signed public immunity
certificates thus denying the courts evidence which enabled the
defendants to go scot free and hide the bigger crime of sanctioning of a
government which sanctioned the illegal sale. This over emphasis on
secrecy can backfire when ministers who have resigned author tell all
memoirs that can embarrass the government as what happened with the
release of the Blunkett tapes by former minister, David Blunkett.
The third aspect of collective responsibility ensures that ministers are
accountable to Parliament through the availability of the no confidence
motion. The Government must resign if it loses a confidence vote and
the support of Parliament. This goes to the very heart of accountability
and has occurred on multiple occasions. The resignation of the James
Callaghan Government in 1979 after a vote of no confidence and the
consequent general election is an example.
Collective responsibility has been undermined by the fact that not all
important decisions of national policy are taken in full cabinet. Some
decisions are taken effectively by a few ministers meeting with the PM,
subject at most to confirmation by the cabinet. For example the budget
proposals are settled by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in consultation
with the PM and not by the full cabinet.
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Individual responsibility consists of two different limbs : firstly

responsibility to Parliament for the conduct of his or her department,
actions carried out by the department in pursuit of government policies
and discharge of responsibilities laid down upon him/her as minister and
secondly responsibility for personal conduct.
The rationale behind the convention of individual ministerial responsibility
is to foster a sense of accountability of individual ministers to Parliament
and the electorate as well for acts of his or her civil servants. This
convention preserves anonymity of civil servants and shields them from
attack on the floor of the House of Parliament and enables to carry out the
day to day administration of executive powers and policies while
maintaining their position as anonymous advisers of government
ministers.
The convention advocates policy culpability during parliamentary
sessions. A minister is required to answer questions, introduce and defend
bills, participate in debates, supply information and justify his
departments policies. He must accept responsibility for all policy and
administrative bungling that is subject to parliamentary scrutiny.
There has been a greater erosion of individual responsibility due to the
increasing size and complexity of modern government departments and it
is hard to foresee 100 ministers accepting responsibility for the acts of
700,000 civil servants. There is also an increasing use of executive
agencies or next step agencies running key areas of the administration
diluting the responsibility of the Minister heading the department.
Increasingly inter department committees are formed to make secure
coordination between departments with the same problem make it
difficult to pinpoint the individual minister to be accountable for any
wrongdoings.
Because of the nature of conventions, a breach of individual responsibility
may not result in any punitive effect. A Minister may or may not resign.
Case in point was the call for Michael Howard, the Home Secretary to
resign after the a number of prison breakouts in the late 1980s. He argued
that the runningof the prisons was chiefly the responsibility of the Prison
Service. Sometimes the erring minister may be transferred to another
post. This lack of accountability often buries the incompetency and
inefficiency even further.
Also individual responsibility is also likely to be defeated by collective
responsibility. The government will usually rally behind a Minister who is
being criticized under the convention of collective responsibility or the
Minister will remain as he still has the support of the Prime Minister. Thus
we see the collision of the two conventions resulting in accountability
being the victim.
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In the area of personal conduct ministers have to be accountable and this

is made available through the courts. In M v Home Office, it was ruled that
an injunction could be granted in an action against a minister personally
and that applications for judicial review are not proceedings against the
Crown for the purposes of the Crown Proceedings Act 1947. This
jurisdiction may seldom need to be exercised, but its existence may help
to ensure that government is conducted according to law. In the words lf
Nolan, LJ,
"The proper constitutional relationship of the executive with the courts is
that the courts will respect all acts of the executive within its lawful
province, and that the executive will respect all decisions of the courts as
to what its lawful province is".
To make the government more accountable to Parliament the following is
suggested:
The link between individual responsibility and collective responsibility
should be severed. Individual and collective responsibility are governed by
conventions. There is therfor a need for clarity in codifying some of these
conventions to make ministers more accountable. This requires
parliamentary muscle in the form of statutes rather than leaving it to
practices, habits or obligations which are dependent on political
correctness
rather
than
accountability.
Reform of collective and individual ministerial responsibility:
The Nolan Committee has suggested that the Prime Minister be given
explicit powers to determine whether ministers have upheld the required
standard of conduct rather than laying down hard and fast rules regarding
financial
conduct
and
sexual
conduct.
The Scott Report recommended for an abandonment of the blanket refusal
to answer parliamentary questions and that more emphasis be placed
accountability in answering questions and giving an account to Parliament
as
opposed
to
acceptance
of
responsibility
by
Ministers.
The Public Service Committee Report also emphasized that proper and
rigorous scrutiny and accountability is a more important feature of
ministerial responsibility than parliaments ability to force that ministers
resignation.
Additionally there must be clear guidelines which regulate accountability
of ministers and what are the penalties for not acting responsibly. A set of
codes similar to the Civil Servant Code of Practice could do formulated to
cover ministerial responsibility.
The Freedom of Information Act 2000 which confers on citizens a general
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right of access to data is a step in the right direction and makes it appear
there is more transparency and openness in government.

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