Political and Constitutional Reform CommitteeWritten evidence submitted by Mark Adams OBE
Introduction
1. My name is Mark Adams and I am a lobbyist. I have worked as a professional lobbyist since 1998, having been a senior civil servant before that, including six years in the Prime Minister’s Office, 10 Downing Street, under both Sir John Major and Tony Blair.
2. I am the Director of standup4lobbying, a campaign to promote the reputation of professional lobbying, which I established in January 2012. I write a daily blog on lobbying, which attracts a regular audience of around 200 daily readers. As I suspect it is not read by many machine tool operators in Glasgow, it is fair to assume that the majority of those reading it are involved in the debate about lobbying, plus of course my mother, Mrs Anne Bebbington.
3. I am the Chairman of an independent lobbying company, The Professional Lobbying Company. I previously worked as a lobbyist at four other companies. I am a former Deputy Chair of the Association of Professional Political Consultants. I was heavily involved in the work to establish the UK Public Affairs Council. I chaired a working party to devise a strategy for the establishment of UKPAC; then was Deputy Chairman, under Sir Philip Mawer, of the UKPAC Implementation Group. I have not been involved in UKPAC since its launch and have gone on record to criticise the way that the profession has handled the evolution of UKPAC.
Regulation of Lobbying
4. The lobbying profession has a key role in the democratic process. Lobbyists advise their organisations (if employed directly) or their clients (if employed by a consultancy) on how to influence government most persuasively. Concern has been expressed—in my view wrongly—that lobbyists can achieve undue influence over policy decisions. In the light of this, and because it is the right approach, I believe that it is important for the lobbying profession to be regulated effectively.
5. In my view, it is purely an empirical question whether regulation is more effective if it is carried out on a voluntary basis or on a statutory basis. As a general rule, I believe a system of regulation that participants choose to join is likely to be more effective than a system where participants have to be forced to take part. Therefore a clear and strong case must be made before a voluntary system is replaced with a statutory one.
6. Some have argued that lobbying “scandals” prove that self-regulation has failed. In practice, there have been very few cases of lobbyists being shown to have contravened the profession’s Code of Conduct (as laid down by the Association of Professional Political Consultants and the Public Relations Consultants Association). Occasional revelations in the media have been more often about the actions of politicians rather than lobbyists (although it is perhaps understandable that politicians are in denial about this). Where lobbyists are exposed in the media, it illustrates how difficult it is for them to avoid detection. It would be as ridiculous to suggest that because lobbyists occasionally behave inappropriately that self-regulation has failed, as it would be to suggest that because crime still happens the police have failed.
7. No system of regulation will be perfect and I remain to be convinced that statutory regulation will be any more effective than self-regulation. What I am convinced about, is that the Government’s proposals for a statutory register as set out in the consultation paper are considerably less effective than the current system of self-regulation.
Response to the Select Committee’s Questions
1. Does the Government’s consultation paper represent a balanced approach to the idea of a statutory register?
Does the paper present the evidence in a balanced way?
Are you confident that the issues covered are ones on which the Government has an open mind?
Is the Government clear wherever it has a preference for a particular option, and is this preference in each case a reasonable one?
8. The proposal is a nonsense. The consultation paper argues that it is necessary to have a statutory register of multi-client lobbying companies (but not of anyone else) because it is not clear when such companies meet ministers whom they are lobbying on behalf of. However, as the evidence of Tamasin Cave revealed, a very small number of meetings are with multi-client lobbying companies. Additionally the publication of a client list does not mean that the identity of the client represented in any specific meeting is revealed. A far more sensible mechanism to achieve the Government’s objective would be to require multi-client lobbying companies to reveal their client at the start of any meeting.
9. In meetings attended by the Minister, Mark Harper MP, he explained that the Government is concerned with meetings with MPs as well, not just ministers and that the register is needed for that. Again it would make more sense for the House authorities to agree that a register of MPs’ meetings, with appropriate exemptions to exclude meetings with constituents, should be introduced as a simpler solution to this problem.
10. Given how poorly argued the consultation paper is, there is a real suspicion that it is written simply to deliver a coalition agreement commitment, in turn building on an ill-considered Liberal Democrat manifesto commitment, even if it makes little sense. It is difficult to see the Government agreeing not to proceed, whatever the consultation reveals, when not to do so would break the coalition agreement.
11. It is in places difficult to understand the Government’s preference for the outcome. It does seem to be clear that the Government currently intends the proposals to apply principally to multi-client lobbying companies. This is a fundamental error. It will capture only a small proportion of the overall number of professional lobbyists and covers the very sector that is, by and large, already covered by the voluntary system in place.
2. Does the consultation paper contain the right questions?
Is each of the questions asked in a balanced way?
Are there any important questions that are not asked?
12. Any public policy development should involve a coherent and incisive analysis of the problem and the advance of a convincing public policy solution. Unfortunately the Government’s consultation on a statutory register does neither. It should ask what evidence there is of harm to the political system with the current system, as there is precious little evidence; and ask what will be achieved by the changes proposed. The Government claims that a number of individuals and Members of Parliament have written to express concern about the activities of lobbyists. However, they give no information on the scale of the representations, of the nature of these concerns and whether the concerns are in the slightest bit justified. I have made a Freedom of Information request to uncover elements of the evidence, but it is an area that I hope the Committee chooses to explore, should they invite the Minister to appear before them.
13. I feel I may be being a little naive, but an important question that does not seem to have been asked is what exactly is the problem that the Government is trying to solve? The Government cannot possibly justify a public policy intervention without answering this question and demonstrating that the scale of the problem justifies the response. The consultation paper spectacularly fails to do this.
3. Which lobbying contacts are of greatest legitimate public interest?
Does the consultation paper envisage the capture of appropriate information about these contacts, as opposed to other kinds of contact?
14. Contacts that public servants, including Members of Parliament, ministers and civil servants have with outside interests are of legitimate concern to the public to ensure that such decision makers are receiving a rounded set of representations. It would seem to be obvious that the way to achieve this is through a register of meetings by such people, already in place for ministers, rather than through a completely different (and largely irrelevant) mechanism. A register of lobbyists and their clients will obviously reveal precisely nothing about their contacts with public servants on behalf of their clients.
4. How should the Government deal in policy and practice with how it might be lobbied on the issue of a statutory register of lobbyists?
How open should the Government be about such lobbying contacts?
15. It seems reasonable for the Government to be carrying out the consultation, so long as they have some intention of paying any attention to the responses. Consistent with sensible government policy, the Government should be open about the representations they receive.
16. The critics of the so-called “lobbying industry” have suggested that, while their requests for meetings with the Government have been declined, the Government has met “representatives” of the industry. As I understand it, the Government declined to meet any of the representative bodies for the profession, namely the Association of Professional Political Consultants, the Chartered Institute of Public Relations and the Public Relations Consultants Association. Instead meetings were held with the independent element of the UK Public Affairs Council. It strikes me as entirely sensible for the Government to want to investigate whether UKPAC would be a suitable body to police a statutory register, subject to any changes in the governance structure that might be required. Therefore I think any meetings that the Government may have had with UKPAC—rather than with the representative bodies of the profession—are unlikely to have been meetings to consider representations from “the industry”.
5. How should the Government analyse the consultation responses, and seek to balance the weight of opposing argument?
17. I am always mystified by how governments weigh up responses to consultations. On the one hand, it appears to be some kind of plebiscite, where they compare the numbers in favour of a proposal with the numbers against. That rather encourages campaign groups to organise their members to submit essentially the same arguments many times over. Companies are increasingly adopting this tactic as well.
18. Instead, my rather naive view is that government should consider the strengths and weaknesses of the views and arguments that have been put forward and adjust their decisions accordingly. They should listen to views on what the problems are and what the potential solutions might be. Then the final outcome should be based on what most effectively achieves the public policy objective that emerges from the consultation.
6. Do you have any comments on how any proposals emerging from the consultation should be implemented?
19. I support what I understand to be the process that the Government intends to follow. Once the Government has considered the responses to the consultation, they intend to publish a White Paper and a draft Bill to implement any proposals that require primary legislation. I look forward to giving evidence to the Committee that will consider any draft legislation.
February 2012