Hello and welcome to this special episode of Inside Briefing, the podcast from the IFG. In these one-offs, we're taking a break from the day-to-day politics and Westminster to take a wider view of government. I'm Hannah White, acting director of the Institute for Government, and today we're going to be talking about the life cycle of the government minister.

What is it like to enter government, get up to speed in a job, perhaps be reshuffled or promoted, and inevitably eventually to lead government? I'm delighted to be joined by a great panel.

David Gork, former MP for South West Hertfordshire

and a minister under both David Cameron and Theresa May serving in the Treasury

and then as Secretary of State for work of pensions and for justice.

Hi David.

Hello, good of Murphy.

And Jim Murphy, formerly MP for East Renfreyshire, who held various ministerial positions under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, including Minister for Europe and at the end of the last Labour Government Secretary of State for Scotland.

Hi Jim.

Hi.

Hi.

And my colleague, Dr Catherine Haddon, who is a senior fellow at the IFG. Hi, Jim. Hi. And my colleague, Dr. Catherine Haddon, who is a senior fellow at the IFG.

Hi, Hannah. And Tim Durant, Associate Director, who leads our Ministers Reflects program.

Hi, great to be here. So, we're going to hear various former ministers talk about their experience of public office

drawing on our amazing archive of interviews called Ministers Reflect.

We'll be tracing their career from their first ministerial job to their last, hearing how that compares with Jim and David's experience and what all this means for government.

So let's get started. Of course, the first step to being a minister is being appointed.

Kath, can you tell us a bit first about how it all works behind the scenes?

How is it organised?

Yeah, so it basically all revolves around a whiteboard.

So for most ministers, they haven't got a clue.

There'll be all sorts of speculation.

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