Oral question asked in the House of Commons, by Julian Lewis (Conservative). It was answered on Tuesday, 6 December 2005 on behalf of the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.

Patronage

Question: Does the Minister recall that before the general election we had a separate Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, both at great public expense that was not revealed until after the election was over? Now that it is no longer required to pay so much money to someone to run a general election campaign, does the Minister accept that it is likely that the Prime Minister will use his patronage to appoint new Ministers to the Duchy of Lancaster and the Cabinet Office rather more slowly than my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron) will use his powers of patronage to appoint an entire new Front-Bench team?

Answer: The hon. Member for New Forest, East (Dr. Lewis) has made that point on numerous occasions. The Cabinet Office continues to work on the agenda of better regulation, civil contingencies, transformation in Government public services, and modernisation, regardless of how many Ministers are in the Cabinet Office. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner), as ever, offers good advice from a sedentary position as regards the use of public finances for political purposes. There has been a vast increase in the amount of Short money used for the Conservative Opposition, spent entirely ineffectively, unaccountably and with no discernible outcome. In future, we should cast a more careful eye over the way in which taxpayers' money is used to subsidise unpopular political parties.

Secondary information