How to start saving Britain in ten minutes

The work begins
Subject: No time to lose
Date: Friday, 7 May 2010 14:28
From: David Cameron
To: Sir Gus O’Donnell, Cabinet Secretary

Dear Gus,

The Queen has just invited me to form a government. I’m sending this on by BlackBerry in the car, because there is a degree of urgency. Our country has been badly broken by 13 years of bad government. There is, literally, not a moment to lose in fixing it. The Queen has asked me to govern for up to five years, and mentioned to me that her father saw our country win a world war in six years. Her point: that five years is plenty to save our nation. That is precisely what I intend to do.

I may not have won the majority that I had hoped for. But I do not need legislation to achieve most of my reform plans: I can do this by email. I don’t see why we need to have endless meetings, when a simple instruction can suffice. I will not tolerate over-complication: anyone who attempts this will be removed.

Under Labour, the average minister lasted 14 months in the job: the Civil service could, and did, stall on reform they did not want to implement. Under the Conservatives, this will not be tolerated.

Yesterday, I won a mandate from nine million people for an agenda that I will implement as a matter of urgency. I will expect it to be treated as such by every department under your command. Anyone who stalls, or fails to make the requisite progress, will be moved.

One final point. In 1981, Oliver Letwin was drafted in to No. 10 by Keith Joseph to introduce what is now Michael Gove’s plans for school liberalisation. They were talked out of this by the Civil Service, who introduced 101 reasons why it could not be enacted.