I believe in a level playing field. It should not matter whether someone works in-house or elsewhere, or whether they work for Rio Tinto or Oxfam, for Bell Pottinger or CAFOD. The same set of rules should apply equally to all of them. I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman does not think that the rules should apply to all those who are paid—handsomely in some cases—to carry out this work.
I want to return to the point raised by the hon. Member for St Albans, and to take it slightly further. As I said to Ministers this morning, there was a case recently in which a Minister of the Crown met a third-party consultant—a commercial lobbyist, as I think they are called—to discuss a planning application in their constituency. The Government seem to define that as a private discussion. If that consultant had chosen to raise other issues at the meeting, that activity would not be covered by the Bill because the consultant would say, “I am meeting the Minister not in their role as a Minister of the Crown but in their role as a Member of Parliament. I just happened to raise a general issue of Government policy that might be of interest and over which the Minister might have some influence.” That would be ludicrous.
For that reason, if for no other, the rules should apply to all parliamentarians. Ministers of the Crown—whether in the House of Lords or the House of Commons—are all parliamentarians. Extending the rules would avoid any double standards. Many Members of Parliament are members, and chairs, of influential Select Committees. They have a greater amount of influence in shaping the early stages of Government policy than those who serve as Parliamentary Under-Secretaries of State. Anyone who has read Chris Mullin’s excellent book, “A View from the Foothills”, will remember the ceaseless slog of the life of an Under-Secretary. I see a Parliamentary Private Secretary smiling at that suggestion. Select Committee Chairs are hugely influential. Similarly, Members of Parliament who sit on Bill Committees help to shape our legislation. They are the people who should be protected from unscrupulous lobbyists, and if we did that we would provide the public with far greater confidence in the process. The rules have to apply to all those who exert influence.
The rules cannot only be about those who directly communicate with those in a position of power. In all of my eight years as a lobbyist, in the House and in consultancy, I met a Minister on two occasions, at most. I used to advise others on who in the Government, in Parliament and in the Scottish Parliament it was best to
go and see, on the correct issues on which to press them, and on what their arguments should be. The Bill does not cover any of the people who do that.
The Bill is so narrow that it does not even cover those consultants who sit in the room during meetings, because a person has to actually communicate with a Minister or permanent secretary in order to be covered. The consultant might have done all the preparatory work and the strategy, and we have all taken meetings that have been facilitated by the consultant, but they might not actually be in communication with the Minister or the permanent secretary. For example, if a consultant were to contact the diary secretary of the Leader of the House, that would still not be covered by the Bill.
This is a dreadful Bill. It is not worthy of further progress and I hope that the House will reject it and ask the Government to come back and do their homework correctly.
6.9 pm