COORDINATION

Government ministers meet every week. Their meeting is called the Council of Ministers (conseil des ministres or ministerraad), which is one of the central components of the government. Each minister is responsible for drafting his or her proposal, and then submitting it to the Council. The Council’s secretariat then checks whether the proposal can be debated: Is it complete, technically sound, does it conflict with other decisions made in the past? Prior to this, some decisions are also discussed in specific inter-cabinet meetings (i.e., across some ministerial cabinets).
Proposals are debated by ministers only if they pass this first filter, which allows the ministers to directly focus on the issue’s strategic aspects. However, the most important strategic considerations are mainly political. Each potential project envisaged by the government is submitted beforehand to the Council of Ministers, which meets weekly. The Council is composed of a secretariat, who scrutinizes each proposal before it is debated and prepares the ministers’ council agenda, and the 14 line ministers plus the prime minister who debate each proposal.
Each project is debated and decisions are based on political consensus, not on majority voting. Either directly or through the council’s secretariat or the group of party leaders whithin government, the prime minister can block any item presented and either return it for redrafting, or turn it down completely.

Cabinet committees effectively prepare cabinet meetings. The government has four statutory cabinet committees, namely the Committee on Foreign and Security Policy (which meets also with the president whenever current business requires so), the Committee on European Union Affairs, the Cabinet Finance Committee, and the Cabinet Committee on Economic Policy. All these committees are chaired by the prime minister. In addition, there are various ministerial working groups, and the present (Prime Minister Matti) Vanhanen II cabinet has established 10 such groups. The task of these committees and groups is to prepare cabinet meetings, and the task is facilitated in terms of consensus-building by the structures encompassing and involving a rather large number of ministries and interests. For instance, there are seven ministers in the Committee on Foreign and Security Policy, and nine ministers in the Committee on European Union Affairs. In all, a large majority indeed of important cabinet issues are reviewed first by cabinet committees and working groups.

There are clear guidelines for policy formulation in the New Zealand core executive. All policy proposals are reviewed in cabinet committees. Full cabinet meetings therefore can focus on strategic policy debates and policy conflicts between coalition partners or between the government and its legislative support parties in the House of Representatives. In quantitative terms, from July 1, 2008 to June 30, 2009, the full cabinet met 45 times with on average 14 items for discussion while cabinet committees met 158 times with on average eight items on their agenda per meeting.

In line with the other established democracies, the scope and complexity of government policy has increased dramatically in recent years, making the use of cabinet committees crucial to effectively manage government business. Most items are considered by subcommittees of cabinet prior to full cabinet discussion, some of which are ad hoc (such as a committee charged with handling a national disaster, for example) others (such as the Security Committee or the Expenditure Review Committee) being semi-permanent standing committees.

A political committee consisting of the president, the minister of the interior, the ministers of Segpres and the minister of communication and press (Ministerio Secretaría General de Gobierno, Segegob), the minister of finance and the minister of justice holds weekly meetings. This committee was designed to ensure the representation of all parties participating in the Concertación coalition, which held power until 2010. Cabinet committee meetings (including all ministers) are held monthly. In both committees, the majority of issues are reviewed and scheduled before the actual meeting itself. Ministries do not participate equally in the preparation of cabinet meetings.

Policy preparation tends to take place in cabinet committees (regeringsudvalg) involving a smaller number of ministers. Since 2001, there have been five to six such cabinet committees. Currently the following standing cabinet committees exist: the coordination committee (chaired by the prime minister), the economy committee (chaired by the finance minister), the security committee (chaired by the prime minister), the appointments committee (chaired by the prime minister), the committee concerning the European Council and greater foreign and security questions (chaired by the prime minister) and the foreign policy committee (chaired by the foreign minister).
This system has been strengthened under the most recent liberal-conservative government, and there are parallel committees of high-level civil servants.

Cabinet committees (onderraad) involve a separate meeting of the Council of Ministers chaired by the prime minister. Ministers directly or indirectly involved with the topic of discussion participate in these meetings. Each committee has a coordinating minister responsible for relevant input and prepared documents. Discussion and negotiations focus on issues not resolved by prior administrative coordination and consultation. If the committee fails to reach a decision, the matter is pushed up to the Council of Ministers. The Balkenende IV cabinet had six standing cabinet committees: International and European Affairs; Economics, Knowledge and Innovation; Social Coherence; Safety and Legal Order; and Administration, Government and Public Services. In addition, the Balkenende IV cabinet had another committee of six ministers involved in various aspects of financial and socioeconomic policy. Given the elaborate process of consultations and negotiations, few issues are likely to have escaped attention and discussion before reaching the Council of Ministers.

There has been no substantial change relative to the SGI 2009 report. The practice of meetings between the prime minister, his staff and core political ministers remains in force. Beforehand, junior ministers (known as secretaries of state) meet with PMO officials in order to prepare the agenda. These meetings serve to define the government’s agenda, and are used to assess the political dimensions of outstanding proposals. If anything, these meetings have become more relevant under the new Sócrates government. As it no longer has a parliamentary majority, the government is obliged to negotiate policy with opposition parties. The meetings of the government’s inner core serve to define the strategy of negotiation with the opposition, with little input from the Council of Ministers as a whole.

Cabinet committees exist at the discretion of the prime minister, and it is the prime minister who decides on their composition. In the past, the existence and composition of cabinet committees was secret, and decision-making by them was used to bypass opposition in the full cabinet; more recently, decision-making in cabinet committees has been part of a general move to more informal forms of government with a strong prime minister at the center. At present, some 45 cabinet committees exist, and their purposes and composition are publicly known. Cabinet committees thus play an important role in the United Kingdom. What is decided by an influential cabinet committee will tend to be agreed to (sometimes with little or no discussion) by the full cabinet.

Compared to cabinets in parliamentary system, the president’s cabinet – although an advisory body – plays a relatively limited role in policy-making. This does not mean that there is no preparation of top-level (i.e., involving the president) decision-making meetings. Rather, these advisory processes are structured differently for each president and vary as well from one policy measure to another. The relevant meetings may be chaired by a cabinet member or a high-level White House staffer; this depends largely on the particular personnel and their relations with the president. Under recent presidents, these meetings have been arranged by the president’s closest aides in the White House, although Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner spearheaded the financial system reform. Within the context of the U.S. presidential system, the issue is whether presidential advisory processes, however structured, effectively filter out or settle issues so that the president can focus on strategic policy debates. As long as the president supports the process, the answer to this question is yes, as is the case with President Obama. In contrast, President Clinton often engaged in massively detailed and wide- ranging policy discussions, demonstrating that this is a matter of personal preference.

Cabinet committees have both the legal and de facto power to prepare cabinet meetings in such a way as to allow the cabinet to focus on vital issues. The de facto power to sort out issues before they go to cabinet belongs to senior officials in the PMO and PCO, not to cabinet committees. Still, this allows the cabinet to focus on strategic policy issues.

Although numerous – and sometimes institutionalized – interministerial councils and committees exist, they usually are not used to prepare legislation. Instead, they intervene at a somewhat late stage of the decision process. French governments are less collegial and strongly hierarchical; the prime minister (or the president) acts as arbiter and tends to centralize dossiers. This leads to a lack of collegiality and of “horizontal” coordination deplored by some inside actors, and individual ministers may be tempted to seek prime ministerial or presidential arbitration rather than compromise with their colleagues.

In a strict sense there are no cabinet committees, and the cabinet has to rely entirely on the work of the different ministries or inter-ministerial groups, if more than one department is concerned. Generally cabinet meetings are well-organized and only bills that have been accepted informally are presented to the cabinet. Moreover, bills have to be scrutinized by experts at the finance ministry.

Mexico does not have a single cabinet as such, but rather four separate cabinets (economic, political, social and security), which play roles that might in other countries be played by cabinet committees. As a curiosity, the cabinet as such is not mentioned in the Mexican Constitution, though ministers (“secretaries”) are. The idea of plural cabinets with relatively few members is itself a kind of filtering process, in the sense that cabinet ministers normally attend meetings only in areas related to their specialties. The full cabinet rarely meets, while meetings of the various subcabinet groups are frequent.

Apart from the weekly cabinet meeting, Spain’s only cabinet committee composed exclusively of ministers is the so-called Foreign Policy Council (Consejo de Política Exterior) which meets no more than twice a year. This council is governed by royal decrees 1412/2000 and 1389/2007.
Similarly, there is not a strong tradition of ministerial committees (composed of several ministers and individual non-cabinet members such as secretaries of state), in the Spanish administration. With the exception of the Committee for Economic Affairs, no other committee meets regularly or helps to prepare the Council of Ministers meetings. From 2004 to 2009, only other two committees existed, but since April 17, 2009 (and according to the Royal Decree 639/2009), there are in theory eight specialized ones (known formally as Comisiones Delegadas del Gobierno). These ministerial committees respectively deal with economic affairs, emergency situations, relations with autonomous regions, scientific research and technological development, immigration, climate change, gender equality, and development aid. Until December 2010, a ministerial Committee for the Spanish Presidency of the EU also existed.
The ministerial Committee for Economic Affairs normally meets on Thursdays to review and schedule economic or budgetary interministerial coordination. This committee is chaired by the minister for economy and finance (who is also second deputy prime minister). The other members of this committee are five ministers with responsibilities in economic areas (including territorial policy, infrastructure, employment and immigration, industry and trade, and environment and agriculture), the secretaries of state for economy, finance and budgeting, and the civil service, and the director of the PM’s Private Office. A representative from the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and the secretary of state for the European Union are also summoned when EU issues are discussed. This committee effectively filters out or settles issues a day before the cabinet meeting, but only discusses economic issues.

Cabinet committees have traditionally played an important filtering role in Hungarian policy-making. The Gyurcsány government further strengthened the role of cabinet committees by setting up two cabinet committees with strong powers - the Committee for State Reform and the Development Policy Steering Board - in 2006. With the transition from the Gyurcsány to the Bajnai government, the role of cabinet committees declined. The number of standing cabinet committees was reduced to three (Economic Cabinet Committee, National Security Cabinet Committee, Social Policy Cabinet Committee), and their coordinating function declined.

Some policy matters require de jure scrutiny by a cabinet committee or even the explicit consent of a plurality of ministers. More significant is that a number of important issues are de facto dealt with through consultations among a few ministers (and their ministerial cabinets) before being brought to the Council of Ministers, or are sent to this type of proceeding after preliminary discussion in the council. However, it cannot be said that there is a systematic filtering process by cabinet committees composed of ministers. A filtering process of a more bureaucratic nature is performed in the “pre-consiglio,” where the heads of the legislative offices of all the ministries meet a few days before each cabinet meeting.

The cabinet plays a relatively small role in the political process, as all important issues are discussed bilaterally between the Blue House and the relevant ministry. Committees are either permanent, such as the National Security Council, or created at need in response to a particular issue. Most experts believe that coordination between ministers is too weak, although the Blue House is playing an increasingly active role in ensuring cooperation.

Cabinet committees have traditionally played an important role in the preparation of cabinet meetings in Slovakia. Under the Fico government, their importance declined. Instead, the coalition council, the prime minister and the minister of finance took on more important roles in the process of interministerial coordination.

There are no permanent cabinet or ministerial committees in the Austrian system. From case to case, ministers representing different ministries confronted with a specific challenge may form an ad hoc-committee.

In the Czech Republic, a large number of ministerial committees exist, some on a permanent, some on a temporary basis. The most important permanent committees are the Council for National Security, the Council for Legislation and the Committee for the European Union. The last of these, with 17 ministers and two others as members, focuses on issues related to EU membership. In the period examined, this committee prepared the ground for the Czech presidency of the EU Council in the first half of 2009. The committees discuss and approve policy documents, thereby filtering out issues and saving time in cabinet meetings. However, they are not formally and systematically involved in the preparation of cabinet meetings.

The cabinet played only a minor role in the policy-making process of the grand coalition (which governed until October 2009). This is true too of the new government. As a rule of thumb, the cabinet functions as an institution that formally ratifies decisions on policy issues that have been settled in other venues. It only rarely discusses policy issues, though in day-to-day work the line ministries will briefly present their proposals, and the cabinet will accept them. All conflicts have already been settled before issues come to the cabinet agenda.
Cabinet or ministerial committees do not filter out or settle issues so that the cabinet may concentrate on strategic policy issues. The cabinet and cabinet committees play no important role in political decision-making. The main agency is the so-called coalition committee, which meets regularly at least once a month for coalition talks or can be convened at the request of any of the coalition partners. It consists of the chancellor, the deputy chancellor, the chairpersons of the parliamentary groups (in the case of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, the first deputy chairperson also attends) and the party chairpersons, if they are not already included. In some rare cases, the cabinet will meet for a weekend to discuss contested policy matters or try to bring about consensus in cases of substantial conflict.

There are very few cabinet committees that prepare cabinet meetings. For some issues, the prime minister or the government as a whole can establish ministerial committees. A Budget Committee and some ad hoc committees do prepare items for cabinet meetings, but the majority of items on cabinet meeting agendas are prepared by ministers. Often, two or more ministers coordinate and consult with one another in the course of their preparations for cabinet meetings. The aftermath of the 2008 economic collapse led to more and broader cooperation between ministers, particularly between the prime minister, the minister of finance and the minister of commerce. However, this was a temporary arrangement intended to coordinate the cabinet’s immediate reactions to the economic crisis. In early 2010, four different ministerial committees were established aimed at coordinating issues that overlapped between two or more ministries’ policy areas. It has been suggested that clearer rules and laws be enacted in this area, especially concerning the formal status of the meetings and their proceedings. The report of the Special Investigation Commission (SIC) exposed a remarkable lack of coordination within the government before the crisis, including the discovery of meetings at which no minutes were taken, leaving the participants and ultimately the public in doubt as to what was said and decided at those meetings.

Ireland does not have a well developed or highly institutionalized system of cabinet committees. To the extent that they are used, this takes place on an ad hoc basis.
However, Oireachtas (parliamentary) committees play an increasingly important role in parliamentary business. They can receive submissions and hear evidence from interested parties or groups, discuss and draft proposals for legislative change, print and publish minutes of evidence and related documents, and require attendance by ministers to discuss current policies and proposals for legislation.

Cabinet committees have been utilized primarily by coalition governments, but even the single-party government of the Justice and Development Party has established some committees composed of ministers and experts or bureaucrats when an important and common issue is under consideration. A good example of this is the interministerial anti-terror commission, which convenes under the leadership of the minister of interior affairs, with the participation of senior officials from the ministries of Foreign Affairs and Justice, as well as other security departments. However, in the Turkish governmental system, such committees are in fact rare both in single-party and coalition governments.

Following the government reform in 2001, government committees were established in a number of important fields, in which coordination among ministries with de facto overlapping jurisdictions plays an important role. The most important among these is the Council for Economic and Fiscal Policy (CEFP), headed by the prime minister. However, in two respects, this is not a “ministerial committee” in the strict sense of the definition used in this section. First, it has only an advisory function. Second, individuals from the private sector – two academics and two business representatives in the current configuration – are included. This can increase the impact of such a council, but it also means that it is somewhat aloof from concrete political processes.
In order to break the dependence of the cabinet on the national bureaucracy, the new DPJ-led government abolished the administrative vice-ministers’ meeting. Its high-level coordination role has been given instead to a cabinet-level committee in charge of discussing key issues ahead of cabinet meetings, the members of which change depending on the issue at hand. Measures approved by this committee are then submitted for cabinet approval.

The role of cabinet committees in inter-ministerial coordination has declined. Unlike its predecessor, the Tusk government has not set up temporary interministerial committees. Moreover, in January 2009, one of the three standing cabinet committees, the Committee for European Integration, established in 1996 with a view to fostering EU accession and mproving policy coordination in EU affairs, was abolished.

Greece’s government has cabinet committees, but their function is not relevant to preparing cabinet meetings. Such meetings are prepared by the PMO, which is in charge of setting the agenda of meetings, and by another government organ called the General Secretariat of the Government. This latter group is often staffed by lawyers and administrative officials who take care of procedural and legal aspects rather than the substance of the meetings’ agenda.
The existing cabinet committees have other functions. For instance, there is a cabinet committee which in charge of defense issues, including matters such as selecting and promoting the leadership of the armed forces. The title of this committee is the Government’s Council for National Defense, and it is a political institution that monitors the armed forces, in effect affirming the elected government’s control over the army.
Other cabinet committees are formed in an ad hoc fashion, for tasks such as supervising and coordinating Greece’s economic policy.

Not surprisingly, given the small number of ministries, there are no cabinet committees. But there is much coordination, delegation and communication at the lower level of the federal government. Every minister is in a sense already a “ministerial committee,” representing the coordination of a large number of cooperating departmental units.

There is little use of formal cabinet committees. The whole cabinet meets several times a week and generally works together as a full-cabinet committee.
The coalition partners have created a special subcommittee in the cabinet that coordinates issues in difficult and sensitive issues.

In Sweden, the Cabinet is the final institution of appeal on a wide range of matters. Since all Cabinet decisions must be made “in pleno”, this means that the Cabinet decides on more than 100,000 issues annually. All matters that are subject to Cabinet decisions are meticulously prepared in order to ensure swift decision-making. However, most of this work is not done by committees but by individual civil servants or groups of political appointees. There are no standing cabinet committees or ministerial committees in the Swedish CGO.