Dillon can make the most of Junior Ministry

Now that Alan Dillon is a Junior Minister, and with less than a year before a General Election, he will be considering how best to make use of the role. Becoming Minister of State at the Department of Housing, with responsibility for planning and local government, is not exactly global news, but for a first time TD at an early stage of their career it is significant.

Leaving aside the particular individual, and separately from any question of party politics, how might a politician of any party best respond to such a promotion? A lot of people assume a Junior Minister has no power or influence, and so won’t be able to ‘deliver’. In truth, there are about five Junior Ministers in any government that really matter.

But even for the others, there are ways to make good use of such an appointment. I spoke with some people who have been Junior Ministers to try and find out what they are. Their advice – with a little of my own included – is what follows.

The first thing a wise newly-appointed Junior Minister will do is try and establish a good relationship with the senior minister. They are the powerful one and hold all the strings, so there is no point in fighting with them or trying to upstage them. On the other hand, if a rapport and a mutual understanding can be established, that can be leveraged in all sorts of positive ways. The Junior Minister can make themselves available to take business in the Dáil, or open an event, or meet a delegation, if the senior is too busy with other work, and that’s a smart way to build the relationship. It’s a careful balance though, as a new Minister also has to learn to say no more often than not. If they start attending events here there and everywhere from day one, any Minister can quickly become a busy fool.

Senior cabinet level ministers make all sorts of decisions about programmes, schemes, and the timing of bringing into effect measures set out in our laws, as well as a whole range of other things. This often technical work is at the very heart of government. Because a senior minister will have a wide range of areas and matters to cover, some of them might not get the attention they deserve or need because the Minister doesn’t have time or interest enough to prioritise them.

This is where a good relationship between colleagues could lead to some actual powers and designated roles for the junior one. A Junior Minister who has made themselves useful could ask the senior one to make what is known as a ‘Delegation Order’, passing over their powers in certain areas. Of course, no senior minister will voluntarily do this in respect of the most serious stuff, but they might well do it in respect of some relatively important stuff. And a Junior Minister with delegated powers is treated a lot more seriously than one without them.

Now, even with such powers transferred over, a newly-appointed Junior Minister is most unlikely to deliver anything of great significance with only months before an election. But a politician starting off in their career can still pick a few issues and try to make some positive progress on them. In the Department of Housing, for example, there will be all sorts of possibilities: schemes to support refurbishment, or urban decline, or something about the voting process, or Heritage or any number of areas in local government. If a busy Junior Minister got stuck into one of them – with encouragement and power from their senior minister – they could show clear momentum or deliver some small but not insignificant reform. It wouldn’t change the world, but what it would do is communicate to people in government and to those with ears to hear among the electorate, that you are a serious politician, learning the ropes, figuring out how to use power, and moving up the ladder in an effective way.

A Junior Minister sees and learns how the legislation the Dáil passes is turned into executive action, as well as how money is allocated and how things get blocked or delayed or advanced. They get the chance to learn their trade, taking government business in the Dáil chamber, understanding how the process of making policy and drafting legislation and organising schemes and programmes works. Any young politician worth their salt would jump at the chance to do that, even if it is only six months before an election – an election where their chances won’t be harmed one bit by being a newly made Junior Minister. And then, of course, after the election they are much better placed to take on a further role.

That’s all the positive stuff. There is some hard-nosed advice for Junior Ministers too. If you get to appoint an adviser, select someone who can close the door and tell you when you are being an eejit or when you are about to walk into a trap. Don’t make commitments that you can’t keep. Don’t over-claim or exaggerate your influence. Don’t lose the run of yourself entirely and go on the radio shouting about some group and demanding that they do X, Y, or Z – the kind of Scrappy-Do performance that will invite ridicule and not respect. And while respect no longer comes with the job, ridicule is the one thing a politician cannot survive. And whatever you do, don’t think that people calling you ‘Minister’ means you have made it. It is unrealistic to think like that, and equally unrealistic to think that the system will let you decide and announce on a wide range of things so close to an election where these matters will be tested before the people.

So, let’s return to the example of Alan Dillon. Assuming he takes all that advice on board, and has a good spell as a Junior Minister, this is how things could look, post-election: if Fine Gael were in government, he would be nailed on for an appointment to at least another Junior Ministry, where he would have a longer spell and opportunity to make a mark. If FG were in opposition, people would say that this newly re-elected TD, who went from unknown backbencher to strong performer on RTÉ to Fine Gael Chair to Junior Minister in one Dáil term, should be made a frontbench spokesperson in opposition. And on it would go from there.

For anyone who rolls their eyes at this as ‘climbing the greasy pole’, one can only roll eyes back. Being appointed a Junior Minister is a chance to burnish someone’s credentials as hard working and able and keen to get on and make a mark. What else should someone do? Stay still? Not try and advance? Not learn the ropes and then apply them to the benefit of their constituents? What other line of work or profession is there where people do not try to climb a pole, greasy or otherwise?

In the end, any Junior Minister must work hard, learn lots, take nothing for granted, and still remember where they’re from. When an election is on the horizon, a new Junior Minister must maintain focus on their constituency. In this particular case, that means about 15 miles in all directions from The Mall.