Ministerial Advisers: How Ministers Shape Their Conduct – A Study of Ministers and Advisers in the Rudd Government

Abstract

Ministerial advisers have become part of the standard advisory arrangements in Westminster governments, yet there is disagreement about their roles and behaviour. In Australia, some academic work has considered their involvement in scandals like the 2001 children overboard affair and the 1993 sports rorts controversy. However, the focus on exceptional events means advisers’ everyday roles and conduct have not been given sufficient weight and those conclusions are therefore distorted. This paper finds that ministers exert a dominant influence over their advisers’ behaviour and that advisers continue to see themselves as agents of their ministers. Based on interviews with four Rudd government ministers and their advisers, the research shows advisers have strong norms of behaviour and that formal and informal accountability mechanisms operate to constrain their conduct. Advisers are not ‘out of control’ or operating in a ‘black hole of accountability’ as often claimed