Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a senior member of the British Cabinet. The office of the Deputy Prime Minister is not a permanent position, existing only at the discretion of the Prime Minister, who may appoint to other offices – such as First Secretary of State – to give seniority to a particular Cabinet Minister. The current Deputy Prime Minister is Nick Clegg, who was also appointed Lord President of the Council along with special responsibility for constitutional and political reform.

Unlike analogous offices in some other nations, including the United States Vice Presidency, a British deputy prime minister possesses no special powers as such, though they will always have particular responsibilities in government. They do not assume the duties and powers of the Prime Minister in the latter's absence or illness, such as the powers to seek a dissolution of parliament, appoint peers or brief the sovereign. They do not automatically succeed the Prime Minister, should the latter be incapacitated or resign from the leadership of his or her political party. In practice, however, the designation of someone to the role of Deputy Prime Minister may provide additional practical status within cabinet, enabling the exercise of de facto, if not de jure, power. In a coalition government, such as the current one between the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, the appointment of the leader of the smaller party (in the current case, Nick Clegg, leader of the Liberal Democrats) as Deputy Prime Minister is done to give that person more authority within the cabinet to enforce the coalition's agreed upon agenda. The Deputy Prime Minister usually deputises for the Prime Minister at official functions, such as Prime Minister's Questions.

Current officeholder

Many theories exist as to the absence of a formal post of Deputy Prime Minister in Britain's uncodified constitution. Theoretically the sovereign possesses the unrestricted right to choose someone to form a government following the death, resignation or dismissal of a Prime Minister. One argument made to justify the non-existence of a permanent deputy premiership is that such an office-holder would be seen as possessing a presumption of succession to the premiership, thereby effectively limiting the sovereign's right to choose a prime minister.

However, only two Deputy Prime Ministers have gone on to become Prime Minister. Clement Attlee won the 1945 general election and succeeded Winston Churchill after their coalition broke up but only after a two-month interval when Attlee was not a member of the government. Anthony Eden succeeded Churchill as Prime Minister not because he had been Deputy Prime Minister, but because he had long been seen as Churchill's heir apparent and natural successor. The intermittent existence of a Deputy Prime Minister has been on occasion so informal that there have been a number of occasions on which dispute has arisen as to whether or not the title has actually been conferred.

The position of Deputy Prime Minister is not recognised in UK law, so any post-holder must be given an additional title in order to have legal status and to be paid a salary. The present Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, was appointed Lord President of the Council, a ministerial title with few formal responsibilities, for this reason. On some occasions the post of First Secretary of State has been used; when John Prescott lost his departmental responsibilities in a reshuffle in 2005 he was given the office to enable him to retain a ministerial post, and Michael Heseltine was similarly appointed.

Residence and office

The current Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg maintains an office at the Cabinet Office headquarters, 70 Whitehall, which is linked to 10 Downing Street. The previous Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott, maintained his main office at 26 Whitehall.

Given that there is no constitutional office of Deputy Prime Minister, with the position being recreated on a case by case basis, the person who holds the post has no official residence. As a cabinet minister however they may have the use of a grace and favour London residence and country house. The London home of the current Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, has not yet been confirmed but he will share Chevening House with Foreign Secretary William Hague. His predecessor, John Prescott, had the use of a flat in Admiralty House and used Dorneywood as his country residence.

Choice

The Deputy Prime Ministership, where it exists, may bring with it practical influence depending on the status of the holder, rather than the status of the position.

Labour Party leader Clement Attlee held the post in the wartime coalition government led by Winston Churchill, and had general responsibility for domestic affairs, allowing Churchill to concentrate on the war. Rab Butler held the post in 1962/63 under Harold Macmillan, but was passed over for the premiership in favour of Alec Douglas-Home.

During the Labour Government 1964–1970, the office of First Secretary of State was preferred to that of Deputy Prime Minister. During the Heath and Wilson administrations of the 1970s, the title of Deputy Prime Minister was not formally used. In his Memoirs, Home Secretary Reginald Maudling describes himself as Deputy Prime Minister under Heath from 1970 to his resignation in 1972 over the Poulson affair. William Armstrong, head of the Civil Service, was also called Heath's Deputy Prime Minister. The Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, Ted Short, was Leader of the House of Commons from 1974 to 1976 and often thought of as Deputy Prime Minister; he was referred to as such in the citation for being made an Honorary Freeman of the City of Newcastle upon Tyne.

William Whitelaw was Margaret Thatcher's deputy from 1979–1988, a post he combined with that of Home Secretary in 1979–83 and Leader of the House of Lords after 1983. Sir Geoffrey Howe was given the title in 1989, on being removed from the post of Foreign Secretary. He resigned as Deputy Prime Minister in 1990, making a resignation speech that is widely thought to have hastened Thatcher's downfall. Thatcher's successor John Major did not appoint a Deputy Prime Minister until 1995, when Michael Heseltine was given the post.

John Prescott, who was elected Deputy Leader of the Labour Party in opposition, was appointed Deputy Prime Minister by Tony Blair in 1997, in addition to being Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions. In 2001 this "superdepartment" was split up, with Prescott being given his own Office of the Deputy Prime Minister with fewer specific responsibilities. In May 2006 the department was removed from the control of the Deputy Prime Minister and renamed as the Department for Communities and Local Government with Ruth Kelly as the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government.

When Gordon Brown became Prime Minister, he did not appoint a Deputy Prime Minister. However, in his third cabinet reshuffle in June 2009, Lord Mandelson was appointed as First Secretary of State effectively becoming the Deputy Prime Minister in all but name.

Following the 2010 general election, which returned a hung parliament, the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats agreed to form a coalition government. As leader of the smaller of the two parties in the coalition, Nick Clegg was appointed Deputy Prime Minister on the advice of the new Prime Minister, Conservative leader David Cameron.