Thank you.
Maybe I’m missing something, but I still don’t see what makes it functionally different from the Assembly beyond the ability to restrict or expand who may join it.
I think we’ve threadjacked enough, so if you do want to know more about the history and purpose of great councils then you’re more than welcome to message me.
Back to the topic of ministerial staffs, I agree with Pronoun (and restate my earlier point) that nothing keeps you from having a staff for your own ministry. If you think that’s the way to go for your projects then by all means have at it. Either it’ll fail and we’ll have learned something, or it’ll succeed and it could be a model for other ministries.
I concede this point, although I think more can be done to get that point across. The goal should always be to have new people joining the upper government, while maintaining a population of experienced government officials. Those new people aren’t going to know what they can or can’t do unless someone tells them, they ask (which I don’t consider likely, but that’s just based on myself), or they read it somewhere.
If you’re saying more can be done to inform ministers what they’re actually empowered to do… uh, if there’s something unclear in our laws, then you can propose legislation or ask a legal question to clarify it, but I’m not sure why we’d be expecting the Assembly to educate ministers on how to do their job…
If you’re saying more can be done to inform citizens that they can apply for staff positions, there’s nothing stopping you from also advertising that application process once you create it for your ministry…?
I mean, you can’t expect people to know things they’ve never been told. If you put a algebra 2 student into a calculus class, they need to be taught before they can do the job. That’s what I meant by staff helping people rise in the government, they’re learning how to be a Minister for that role.
In the days of running for Minister, it was also a way of showing that you’re qualified for the role. I suppose it still is
I agree with this, I just don’t think that having open applications for staff-level positions is the way to go. I’m partial to minister identifying talent and reaching out to people who could be good options for project managers or deputy ministers, establishing a mentor relationship with them and helping them grow as future government leaders. You can’t do that as effectively if your focus is simply on giving people jobs even when (a) there may not be as many jobs, and (b) those people might not even know what they like doing, and simply applied for because they could.
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I generally agree with Kris and Pronoun about the desirability of having standing Ministry staffs. However, I wanted to quickly address this —
I think that’s an area the PM can improve the guidance they give to their Ministers, rather than a flaw of the system itself. If I was PM, I’d want to identify an agenda for each Ministry for the term, pick the Minister for it, and then identify with the Minister any potential other staff based on the jobs we need performed (including potentially saying “I’m not sure who should do X, let’s ask for open nominations”).
I’ve gotten a lot of great feedback from everyone so far, I am curious to hear a lower government/non government perspective on the matter though to round things out
I’m curious about the rationale for doing away with ambassadors. I think I see the arguments on both sides of the general debate over ministry staff, but ambassadors strike me as slightly different. For one thing, there is a consistent and relatively well defined task. And even if most of that task list is simply updating and briefly interacting with our friends and allies, it at least seems like a way for folks interested in FA to start building a bit of experience outside the military context. I assume these issues have all been canvassed already, but just wondering what the arguments on the other side were.
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I honestly wasn’t even aware we ever had ambassadors, but it seems strange not to.
Also, even if we don’t list a specific way for Ministers to build a staffing group, if we haven’t already, I feel as though we should put the right to have staff into the law.
Well…it might already be there, perhaps. See here for perhaps a more detailed discussion of that issue than you were probably looking for.
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I don’t mean this in an accusing manner, but why?
I mean, I’m coming from the American standpoint of writing it down lest it be taken away.
And anyway, I feel that it would be more proper than the Peime Minister granting Ministers the power to have staff, since that’s pretty silly as well as being a strange position for the government to be in.
I’m still confused about why you keep approaching this from the position that ministers can’t have a staff unless explicitly given that authority, either by the PM or by law.
I just don’t see why not. I mean, if the power is granted by the pm alone, all it takes is a PM who doesn’t like the idea of staff