The wisdom of cabbies

Now that the London election is over, cabbies have something to talk about other than the need to get rid of Ken. So when I decided to nip into a cab today the subject was whether governments have a natural shelf life and why they seem to run out of steam after eight or nine years in office. After all in many other walks of life people are only just starting to get into their career stride after that sort of period.

The taxi driver and I were trying to work out why - if this is indeed true - this might happen.

First, new governments have had a lot of time in opposition to think about what they want to do - and have time to plan how to hit the ground running. In government its much harder to find the time to think new thoughts - the day-to-day grind of government gets in the way. And increasing amounts of time have to be spent defending the record rather than thinking what to do next.

Second, while the quality of Cabinets probably gets better a couple of years into government with the sieving out of those who happened to be in the right place at the change and the chance to bring on new talent, over time there is quite a high rate of talent attrition - through death, disgrace, disagreement or disillusion - and the pool does not seem to regenerate.

Third, the link between the politicians and their advisers diminishes -- as the advisers either move into formal politics or into money-making - and the people providing advice are less close to the people they are advising.

Fourth, the people at the top - or some of them - probably just get tired. Government is a seven day a week business. The pressure is relentless. News this week that the new PM of Australia is causing mayhem in the public service by expecting them to match his 5.15 am starts does not necessarily bode well for his ability to do a John Howard and last for years. One reason why Ken Clarke seemed to keep his bounciness to the end was that he refused to do the Today programme before 8.10 and still went to Ronnie Scott's, Notts Forest and Trent Bridge and birding rather then be Chancellor 24.7.

And finally, events just catch up. The length of time that you can go on blaming the legacy has some limitations. Inevitable failures start to stack up and the positives get taken for granted. And people begin to forget why they chucked out the other lot....

The Americans save themselves the problem with term limits -- which in some cases has the bizarre effect of leaving the public wanting more. Its arguable that we should have term limits for Mayor. But term limits don't work in a Parliamentary system - so we seem to have moved from a one full term electoral cycle to a more natural twelve year cycle. At least that was what the cabbie thought.