The prime minister will need a \u201cmuch larger\u201d economic team in No.10 for his government to deliver an effective growth strategy, a new report warns.<\/p>\n
The Institute for Government report, authored by Giles Wilkes, a senior fellow at the think tank, calls for No.10 to have a fully staffed economic function of 20 or more employees helping the prime minister to set the growth strategy.<\/p>\n
The report,\u00a0 published in partnership with Imperial College London, says the team should have\u00a0a variety of skills and backgrounds and should be a mixture of political and official \u2013 \u201cTreasury experts, people with familiarity with the party, sector and policy specialists\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no science to saying what the right number of such staff is, but it is much more than is currently normal,\u201d the report says.<\/p>\n
The prime minister, Keir Starmer, has described economic growth as the government’s number one priority and\u00a0committed to\u00a0be the fastest growing country in the G7. The\u00a0UK’s growth (1.4% in 2025) is currently below the US and\u00a0Canada and above the rest of the G7 (France, Germany, Japan and Italy), according to the International Monetary Fund.<\/p>\n
Wilkes\u2019 report,\u00a0How the centre of government can design better growth policy, says the\u00a0ambition to raise UK GDP growth is “important, difficult \u2013 and entirely achievable” and argues the government already “has a steady understanding of policies it should pursue, one that it shares with most of its predecessors”.<\/p>\n
It says the puzzle is “why it has so often proven difficult to follow through on what is needed” and argues\u00a0that “the organisation of the leadership of government holds many of the answers”.<\/p>\n
Wilkes notes that in recent years, \u201cit has not been unusual to hear of the…economically qualified staff in support of the prime minister numbering just two or three, forcing No.10 to rely on help from the Treasury\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is much fewer than any department might have in its strategic function,\u201d it adds.<\/p>\n
By comparison, the report says \u201cit is normal for the White House to have three top academics supported by more than 20 economically trained staff\u201d, while the German chancellor has around 900 staff to help in setting and managing the strategic direction of governments, \u201cof which a few dozen may be economically focused\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhatever limits are preventing the prime minister having exactly the staff needed, be they pay rules, space constraints or artificial rules about adviser numbers, they should be discarded entirely,\u201d the report says.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are extremely consequential jobs, and the team should have all the resources it needs to have the candidates it wants.\u201d<\/p>\n
The team will \u201cneed to be of sufficient seniority to be able to stand up to the powerful politicians around them, including the prime minister himself\u201d, the report adds.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe people staffing this function need more than just skill or experience \u2013 they must possess the kind of heft that can stand up to the other pressures that will inevitably be pushing the prime minister in directions away from the economic strategy.\u201d<\/p>\n
The report notes that No.10 last year “set about reinvigorating its economic and political staff, installing a new principal private secretary from the Treasury, a chief economic adviser and a leading politician, Darren Jones, into the new position of chief secretary to the prime minister”. It says the intent behind these moves is “welcome, but it should be only a start”.<\/p>\n
The report makes a series of recommendations for No.10, including “ruthless prioritisation” of time and effort and looking to institutions\u00a0and science\u00a0for examples of success. However, it argues that “for the growth agenda, the other insights of this report would have little value if the No.10 team lacks the clout to keep the government in line with the prime minister\u2019s priorities”.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose against the idea that the prime minister needs more support will observe that for centuries the prime minister could call on the Treasury if he or she wanted economic advice, and that a small, diligent Policy Unit can commission advice from other departments for other kinds of analysis.<\/p>\n
\u201cHowever, relying on other departments puts the prime minister in a poor position to provide challenge to the view elsewhere in government, rather than just to take lines from them. Ultimately, if economic skills are insufficiently strong outside the Treasury, the finance ministry will set direction by default, even if it does not actively seek this influence.\u201d<\/p>\n
The paper also warns that the absence of a proper strategy function in No.10 \u201cwill not simply mean the Treasury taking over, reluctantly or not, but the predominance of other, worse instincts of Downing Street\u201d.<\/p>\n
It quotes an official who said, \u201cif you do not have a proper strategy function then that space gets filled by comms\u201d, and argues this \u201chowever necessary, tends to be the very opposite of strategic\u201d.<\/p>\n
The report is not the first to call for a stronger No.10 team. The IfG’s\u00a0Commission on the Centre of Government in 2024 called for a new Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, and said it should have an economics and finance function led by a \u201cheavyweight adviser to the prime minister\u201d and supported by both official and political expertise.<\/p>\n