Tag Archives: anne sloman

So, what does a Special Adviser do?

Special advisers (or “spads” for short) tend to have a bad press. Alastair Campbell was a spad, as was Jo (“good day to bury bad news”) Moore; Andrew Blick’s book on the topic was called People Who Live in the Dark; and a contributor to a recent Lib Dem Voice exchange observed that “We made so many breaks with New Labour, why did we have to adopt their spad culture?”

Actually special advisers have a much longer history than that. One can trace their origins right back to Lloyd …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , , , , and | 18 Comments
Advert

Recent Comments

  • Edward marsh
    Thanks for the comment Jana. I’m not sure it’s “wrong” per say as the navy has a wide reach of maritime security responsibilities, many I outlined, the ...
  • James Hargrave
    A timely piece given current events. Chronic underinvestment in our energy resilience (especially gas) has left us very exposed, and assuming that isn't solved ...
  • Jana
    This article started well but the conclusion is wrong. Ukraine has successfully forced the surviving elements of the once mighty Russian Black Sea Fleet to retr...
  • cim
    "The Navy’s offensive capability today is also vital for hard diplomacy" Nice euphemism. Certainly puts a new spin on recent Lib Dem calls for "diplomatic ...
  • Simon Marlow
    @Laurence Cox. I'm one of 5M+ British Citizens who live abroad. You've made the same assumption that Ed Davey did back in March ..that a chunk of British citize...