2 More than a question of procedure
5. During the course of World War II, cabinet ministers
were given ad hoc guidance on procedures it was desirable
they should follow. This was subsequently collected into one document
and first issued to new ministers by the then Prime Minister,
Clement Attlee, in 1945. Since then, the document has grown both
in size and status. The original version of Questions of Procedure
for Ministers (QPM) was 65 paragraphs long. In 1997 it had doubled
in size to 135 paragraphs and in the latest edition, published
on 21 July 2005, it has grown by over a quarter again, to 173
paragraphs.
6. The document has become equally weighty in status.
When Attlee circulated his guidance he observed only that it might
be "convenient" for colleagues. In 1992 the then Prime
Minister, John Major, published the document for the first time,
thus giving it unprecedented public profile. In 1997 QPM shed
its narrowly procedural image and became a fully fledged Ministerial
Code, taking its place alongside those for civil servants and
special advisers.
7. This change in title underlined how the nature
of regulation of ethical standards in public life had changed
and developed, even since the CSPL published its first report
in 1996. As Peter Riddell of The Times pointed out to us:
We are now in a much more code-based system.
Governments could still get round codes, like the Ministerial
Code, but the fact these things are published and are public documents,
your committee and the predecessor committee […], getting
the code more accepted - all of these things are gains.[2]
2 Oral evidence taken before the Public Administration
Select Committee on 2 February 2006, HC (2005-06) 884-i, Q 8 [Mr
Peter Riddell] Back
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