Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill

Debate between Gareth Thomas and Andy Sawford

Monday 9th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Thomas]

I rise to speak to the amendments tabled in the names of my right hon. and hon. Friends. Given the lack of time for debate that Ministers are allowing for this part of the Bill, let me rattle through the case for the amendments.

Amendment 3—the lead amendment in the group—is a probing amendment to explore why Ministers do not want the employer of a lobbyist to be revealed. We were led to believe that the motivation behind the Bill was to make the lobbying industry more transparent. Making it harder to understand who the employer of a person engaged in consultant lobbying is will hardly achieve that objective.

Let us take the example of the lobbying firm that has provided so much of the backdrop to debates on the Bill. If Crosby Textor suddenly decided that, after all, it is a firm of consultant lobbyists, the individuals working as consultant lobbyists for Crosby Textor would not, under the Bill, need to record by whom they are employed. Given the widespread concerns about what and who Crosby Textor lobbies for, it seems reasonable that the individual consultant lobbyists who work for Crosby Textor should reveal who employs them. The Opposition want transparency, and the Minister says she wants the same thing. We therefore want to hear more on why Ministers do not believe that revealing employers is required.

In speaking to amendment 4, I shall also refer to new clause 1 and amendment 42. Unless the Minister makes a dramatic speech, the Opposition will press amendment 4 to a Division. New clause 1, and amendments 4 and 42, require the establishment of a code of conduct. Such a code of conduct would be introduced after full consultation with all relevant stakeholders. It would have as its top line the need to avoid any inappropriate financial relations between registered persons and parliamentarians. It would also, of course, be available for parliamentary scrutiny.

The absence of a code of conduct from the Bill means there is currently no mechanism for removing or taking other sanctions against consultants who act in an unethical manner. Indeed, as the excellent Political and Constitutional Reform Committee has pointed out, if there is no code of conduct at the end of the Bill’s passage through both Houses, we will have the bizarre situation whereby the registrar can punish lateness in providing or submitting information, but cannot punish unethical behaviour. Arguably, the absence of a code of conduct means that some on the register will describe themselves as registered or approved without having to meet any minimum standards.

[Andy Sawford]

Given the role of the Association of Professional Political Consultants on standards within the industry, the bizarre consequence of the Bill could be that organisations that are self-regulated will be less regulated than they are currently.

[Mr Thomas]

I fear that my hon. Friend’s intervention strikes a chord. I will come on to some of the points made by the Association of Professional Political Consultants shortly. Gavin Devine, the chief executive of one of the big lobbying firms, says that

“there is a risk that the register will give a kitemark or endorsement to some who do not deserve it.”

I read the APPC code of conduct, to which my hon. Friend has just referred, with interest. One key element is that

“practitioners”—

lobbyists who have signed up to the code—

“must use reasonable endeavours to satisfy themselves of the truth and accuracy of all statements…by or on behalf of clients to institutions of government.”

I struggle to understand why Ministers would not want to ensure that all consultant lobbyists ensure their clients tell the truth to them. A code of conduct with such a provision, properly policed, would help to raise the bar—raise the standards—of the whole industry, rather than just those who subscribe to the APPC code.

Consultant lobbyists who sign up the APPC code are expected to be open in disclosing the identity of their clients and must not misrepresent their interests. Having a code of conduct with such a provision would help to ensure that Ministers and MPs would know who was trying to meet us and allow us to explore whether there were other motives for consultant lobbyists asking for information or advocating particular causes. It seems hardly unreasonable for such a basic standard of behaviour to be expected of all lobbyists covered by the legislation.

The APPC code requires practitioners to have a duty to advise their clients if they think they are about to commit illegal or unethical acts. They have a duty to refuse to act for such a client if the client persists. It is surely not unreasonable, and not too burdensome on the consultant lobbyist, to expect lobbyists to be able to abide by such a requirement in a code of conduct. Ministers need to explain why such reasonable requirements are so burdensome that they cannot be included in a code of conduct, or why they do not think we need to uphold, or ask consultant lobbyists to uphold, such basic standards of behaviour.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andy Sawford]

The discussion seems to be going against the grain of recent experience and, when it comes to regulation in the UK, what I think would enjoy cross-party support. In the case of organisations such as the Royal Pharmaceutical Society and many other health organisations, the regulatory role has been split from the membership role. The regulatory role has emphasised a code of conduct and enforcement of standards, whereas the representative membership role has been about advocating for the profession. The two roles are quite different. The voluntary side is about working together, mutual support, peer support and advocating for the role that a profession plays in public policy making; the regulatory role is about ensuring that we can have confidence in the standards of that industry.

[Mr Thomas]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. One way to have transparency and clarity and to minimise the burden of regulation for the industry would be to ensure that there is one clear code of conduct and therefore one clear set of principles that everybody has to sign up to in order to do business.

Another provision in the APPC code—one that seems eminently sensible, at least on the face of it—says that

“practitioners”—

that is, lobbyists—

“must not make misleading, exaggerated or extravagant claims to clients about”

what they can do for them. That is hardly an unreasonable or burdensome principle to have in a code of conduct either, so I ask again: why do Ministers not want such a basic principle covered in a clear code of conduct? The APPC code contains other suggestions that we might take forward, including the proposal that

“Political practitioners must not…Make any award or payment in money or in kind (including equity in a member firm)…to any member of…the National Assembly of Wales or the Northern Ireland Assembly or the Greater London Authority”.

As I understand the drafting of the Bill, Ministers have not gone so far as to cover those bodies. Perhaps the Minister can use her response to this debate as an opportunity to explain why a code of conduct should not cover those organisations as well.

Including such requirements or versions of them—I do not want to be prescriptive; there should be proper consultation with all stakeholders about what should be in a code of conduct—would help to raise the standards of the whole profession and, as a result, give the registrar the means to begin to challenge any poor behaviour in the industry that he or she might come across.

New clause 2 would help to ensure proper oversight and better public scrutiny of any potential conflicts of interest when senior roles are taken up in Government by people who were—or, indeed, perhaps still are—lobbyists. It would require the Government to disclose the names of any professional lobbyists who work for them, including those employed directly by the Government and those employed by the political parties that form the Government. The new clause would help to prevent a situation in which the country did not know definitively whether a lobbyist working at the heart of government for a political party, with access to the inner sanctums of No. 10 and No. 11, was at the same time lobbying on behalf of commercial interests such as big tobacco or the alcohol industry.

It is surely worth drawing the Committee’s attention to the scandal surrounding Lynton Crosby. The reason that that will not go away as an issue for the Conservatives is that the country does not know whether he is lobbying Ministers on behalf of any big commercial business groups here in the UK. New clause 2—coupled with other amendments to widen the definition of lobbying and to require an estimate of expenditure on lobbying activity—would help to tease out whether Mr Crosby was able to use his position working for the Conservative party to raise the concerns of other clients that he or his business might have.

The issues relating to Lynton Crosby raise the question of whether other lobbyists are employed, perhaps part time, to work for the Government while separately working for their clients to lobby Ministers, permanent secretaries, other senior civil servants or special advisers. New clause 2 is a sensible proposal that would help to make transparent the role of lobbyists who pass from an area of commercial life to become more actively engaged in public life as well.

Big tobacco appears to have successfully exerted considerable influence on Ministers recently. Similarly, minimum alcohol pricing seems to have been dropped as a major Government priority. The presence in the Conservative party of a lobbyist who has access to No. 10, who is notorious in other countries for his other interests and who will not, at first glance, be covered by the legislation does not help to ease people’s fears that Ministers are not being quite so straightforward in their professed commitment to transparency as they might be.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Thomas]

If Lynton Crosby is only doing a bit of analytical work on polling data, I would gently suggest that the Conservative party is paying rather a lot of money for that service. If the hon. Lady votes with us to ensure that new clause 2 becomes part of the Bill, I put it to her that when we form the next Government, as we surely will do, we will of course be covered by its provisions.

[Andy Sawford]

Let me clarify my interpretation of the debate on the amendments to which my hon. Friend is speaking. The general tone of the discussion from the Opposition Benches has been about the need to enhance transparency. There is no suggestion in the initiative that the organisations that might be encompassed by a proper regulatory code are engaged in something that is in any way wrong. I think that Opposition Members are therefore quite right to seek to broaden the provisions. I wonder whether Government Members do not protest too much and whether, in a sense, they have something to hide. There may be nothing wrong in the actions of Linton Crosby, but as far as the public are concerned—and I hope this is parliamentary, Sir Roger—it stinks. Nobody should have anything to fear from transparency if they are doing nothing wrong.

[Mr Thomas]

My hon. Friend makes the perfectly reasonable point that new clause 2 is an attempt to prevent the sort of concerns that have arisen, going wider than our Benches and our parties, about the role of Mr Crosby. New clause 2 seems to me to be a perfectly sensible provision to prevent any similar situation from happening in future.

New clause 7 is designed to make provision for professional lobbyists taking up employment in government. It deals with similar territory, albeit on a slightly different issue, to new clause 2. It would similarly deal with the potential conflicts of interest that can arise when a lobbyist seeks to take up a senior position in government. It is quite possible that someone with considerable skill and expertise who is working as a lobbyist at the moment might secure an offer to work as a senior civil servant. Such a person who has worked in a senior position in government before and has been seeking to widen their career profile might now successfully seek to return to a senior position in government. Having a system in place, which is what new clause 7 allows for, to check that there are no conflicts of interest around such employment is surely sensible and would help to build trust in the new appointment. Together with new clause 2, that new clause would allow the relevant Committee to probe whether there were any reasons to be concerned about any ongoing commercial lobbying interests that such a person might have. I say gently to Government Members that the new clause could have helped to prevent the ongoing concern about Mr Crosby’s role and his access within No. 10, so I commend it to the hon. Member for Truro and Falmouth (Sarah Newton), who intervened on me earlier.

The most appropriate Committee would perhaps be the excellent Political and Constitutional Reform Committee. It has a mix of cross-party talent among its membership and it could explore with the relevant individual whether there were any potential conflicts of interest and, if not, how the situation should be handled, leaving the individual free to go about their public role, with the worry and concern that something improper is somehow going on and is attached to them no longer being an issue.