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

Lord Armstrong of Ilminster Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2013 Lords Chamber

It would be good to go wide rather than narrow, so my heart is closer to amendments such as that of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, than it is to the Bill as originally drafted. It is an uneasy mix and it does not quite work.

[Lord Armstrong of Ilminster (CB)]

My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, I was a Permanent Secretary for some 10 years and, unlike him, was a civil servant. I do not remember in that period ever being lobbied as a Permanent Secretary, but of course lobbying went on among the grades immediately below mine. This debate has therefore shown that these matters must be the subject of a new amendment on Report that resolves the various difficulties that have been mentioned.

I was attracted by the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, which referred to senior civil servants and special advisers. It probably needs to go further. Amendment 33 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, goes wider than it needs to in its references to “Ministers or officials” and then to civil servants; however, that is for her to discuss. I very much hope that this issue will be looked at and that the definition will be widened. It need not go beyond including a senior civil servant, as defined by the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010, because any lobbyist would think that lobbying below that level was a waste of time, and it is therefore not likely to happen.