Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Civil Service – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 22 July 1991.
Mr Tony Banks
, Newham North West
12:00,
22 July 1991
What a wretched and ungrateful response that is, from a Minister who owes a great deal to the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher), for all the promotions that he got out of her. When Ronald Reagan can get public funding in America for a library to house his comics, why cannot the former Prime Minister get enough money to set up her own foundation, the Margaret Thatcher Institute for the Promotion of Political Humility, or whatever it may be called? Why can she not have some extra staff to mop up the tears every time she bumps into one of the back-stabbers on the Conservative Benches, to push her eyeballs back in after one of those BBC interviews, or to switch off the polygraph after she has recorded her memoirs telling us the truth about the Belgrano and Westland? The Minister could do far more for one of the great political loonies of the century. When we are in control, we shall give her everything she deserves.
Ministers make up the Government and almost all are members of the House of Lords or the House of Commons. There are three main types of Minister. Departmental Ministers are in charge of Government Departments. The Government is divided into different Departments which have responsibilities for different areas. For example the Treasury is in charge of Government spending. Departmental Ministers in the Cabinet are generally called 'Secretary of State' but some have special titles such as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Ministers of State and Junior Ministers assist the ministers in charge of the department. They normally have responsibility for a particular area within the department and are sometimes given a title that reflects this - for example Minister of Transport.
