Yes the coalition partners are working well together (or thick as thieves depending on your outlook), but that won’t always be the case. It is highly likely, bordering on inevitable, that at some point the coalition will face a tricky issue which could split the government if not handled correctly.

What should civil servants do? Many might stay calm, quiet, and out of the way – leaving the political issues to the ministers.

At a talk this morning, Sir John Elvidge disagreed with this: “Don’t think what happens in the political sphere is wholly someone else’s business”, he said. “I have an interventionist view of what the civil service’s responsibilities are in these circumstances”.

What are the implications of an ‘interventionist’ bureaucracy? That would get things done and keep government moving – but, shouldn’t the politics be left to the politicians? This is rather cowardly but I’ll leave the answers to you: comments below please.

Special advisors

I won’t go into huge amounts of detail here because I’ve written about lessons from Scotland in a recent issue of CSW – and included Sir John as one of the many civil servants I interviewed – but a key point in that article was that special advisors become well-loved in a coalition for helping civil servants prompt the politicians without being totally ensnared within party politics.

Sir John had a special tip here. Find special advisors who “unlock the door and help you speak to other special advisors”.

Otherwise “if you’re unlucky, they may want to help you by acting as an intermediary.” Sir John the interventionist clearly would rather be speaking to people directly.