In a hung parliament, the art of political survival is to retain control of events and not to become their victim. This is far from easy. It is 24/7 political work, as Labour found between 1974 and 1979, a process brilliantly depicted in James Graham’s play This House. But Theresa May or her successor must master that art if the Tories are to prosper as a minority government.
May faces three acute problems in doing so. The first is the parliamentary arithmetic is against her. The second is that the Conservatives are a wide coalition of political views and interests, with many internal disagreements. The third is that May’s previous highly centralised and controlled style of government has been the antithesis of the nimble flexibility that the new situation requires.
Four days into this new landscape, May has done some things that help to equip her for the changed governmental skills she must now acquire and use. The resignations of her chiefs of staff Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill clear some space for new thinking and personnel. The return of Michael Gove does something to insulate her from a leadership challenge. And the promotion of Damian Green to an as yet ill-defined and unofficial deputy prime minister role starts to widen the circle too.
From May’s point of view, however, this isn’t enough. If she is to survive not just for a few days, but for months and even for a couple of years – if she is going to have any hope of disproving George Osborne’s jibe that she is a dead woman walking – she is going to have to be more innovative still.
Fortunately for her, there is a model from very recent British government that she could draw on, if she is wise enough to understand the full extent of the change in governing style that is now required.
Between 2010 and 2015, the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition was held together by written agreements, compromises and structures. But by far the most important of the structures was the “quad group”, an innovation that was one of the undoubted successes of the five-year deal between the two parties.
The quad was the regular meeting of the four most senior members of the coalition – David Cameron, George Osborne, Nick Clegg and Danny Alexander. Though not even part of the original formal coalition agreement, the quad quickly came to acquire semi-formal status. It met once a month, and more often in the run-up to budgets and autumn statements. It was, in effect, an inner cabinet. Even when it was not taking formal spending decisions, it was the forum at which common positions were hammered out that could hold the government together.
The politics of 2017 are, of course, different from those of 2010. But a quad, or something like it and adapted to the new hung parliament, is surely essential. Though May is not leading a formal coalition, she leads an informal one – the Tory party is divided over Brexit and many other issues, and she needs to find ways of shaping the government so that it acquires stability and purpose.
May’s quad should be based on herself as prime minister, Green as her deputy, the chancellor Philip Hammond and the Brexit secretary David Davis. From time to time it could perhaps be expanded for particular issues such as anti-terrorism, as the 2010-15 quad was when welfare reform and banking reform were worked out. But it should be made a formal mechanism of government.
The essential purposes would be clear – integration of policymaking across government, collective leadership with the prime minister literally not notionally the first among equals, hammering out compromises on key policy initiatives examined in depth, a signal to the party that all interests were being considered in policymaking, and a signal to the country that the government was dynamic not inert.
There is, however, one sobering fact for prospective quad members to consider. Seven years after the original quad was formed, not one of its members remains in active politics. Cameron, Osborne, Clegg and Alexander have all gone.
Yet what’s the alternative for May after 8 June? A quad group, or something similar, would be one way of showing explicitly that business as usual is not an option. A quad is not a magic wand. But it helped to make government work in difficult circumstances in 2010-15, and there is no reason why it could not work now.
