Lobbying Transparency (In-house Lobbyists) Bill [HL]
House of Lords · Lords Chamber · 3 Jul 2026 · 27 speeches · Official Report
Second Reading
Moved by
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
That the Bill be read a second time.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
My Lords, I should make it clear at the outset that I am pro-lobbying-how could I not be, given how much I have done in my time? It has been particularly helpful in the Lords. We do not have constituents to inform us of what needs doing, or not doing, by a Government, so it is good that those with a particular interest or knowledge make their way to Westminster, bringing their lived experience and the legitimate needs of their sector, company or beneficiaries to us and into the public forum-into our actual or metaphorical Peers’ Lobby. We have seen laws be changed for the better by effective lobbying. The NSPCC and children’s charities helped achieve the Domestic Abuse Act 2021. The British Lung Foundation’s work on banning smoking in cars carrying children led to the Smoke-free (Private Vehicles) Regulations 2015. Pressure on Ministers by the Samaritans and others helped create the Online Safety Act 2023. The British Heart Foundation and family groups provided the momentum for the Organ Donation (Deemed Consent) Act 2019. Meanwhile, the ABI and other bodies wisely used their access to help rewrite the National Security Act 2023 in order to ensure that the foreign influence registration scheme was fit for purpose. The RAC’s meeting with a Minister about headlight glare resulted in a change of approach to this problem. The Royal Osteoporosis Society will continue to meet Ministers to ensure that they keep their promise to make fracture liaison services available nationwide by...
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter of Kentish Town, on her success in the Private Members’ Bill ballot. Although the Official Opposition cannot support the Bill in its current form, it is a very interesting Bill which seeks to address one of the most important issues in any free democratic society-transparency. In the interests of transparency, eyebrows were raised when Peers received an email from Inflect Partners, a strategic communications and public affairs consultancy. The email said: “I am writing on behalf of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) to share a short briefing and to ask whether you would consider speaking in support of Baroness Hayter’s Lobbying Transparency (In-house Lobbyists) Bill at the Second Reading debate on Friday 3 July”. There is some irony in a lobbying email being issued to support a Bill on lobbying. Does the Chartered Institute of Public Relations stand to gain from this Bill? Perhaps the noble Baroness can illuminate us. Although the Bill is very short, its effect is very broad. The noble Baroness is correct that the current registration rules under the 2014 Act cover just a small number of the activities that could be termed lobbying. There are just 240 registered consultant lobbyists in the country. The Office of the Registrar of Consultant Lobbyists employs just three staff members in addition to the registrar. The 2014 Act was never meant to be comprehensive. The Bill before us, though it may be...
My Lords, I am very pleased to contribute to today’s debate and it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness. Like many Members, I occasionally show visitors, including Americans, around the House. I take them to Central Lobby and I say, “Here it is. It is a place; it is a noun. Of course, it is also a verb. It is the place where people come to meet their Members of Parliament, as they have every right to do”. There is nothing wrong with lobbying: it is an integral part of our system of parliament and government, and indeed all Members of Parliament themselves-including humble Back-Benchers on the Government’s side in this House-are lobbying and lobbyists. The dangers begin to emerge only when financial benefit arises and when money is involved. I want to concentrate on the benefits of lobbying for influence, which goes on all the time. This is a Bill about transparency and accountability, which I would like to think are two principles that commend themselves to all sides of this House. I mentioned Americans, and tomorrow is of course the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and the foundation of the United States. I quote one of the most famous justices of the American Supreme Court, Mr Justice Brandeis: “Sunlight is … the best of disinfectants”. This phrase remains very relevant when discussing the subject of the Bill. My noble friend has argued that the rules, as they currently are under the 2014 Act, leave a large loophole and that the Bill provides the...
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Viscount, Lord Stansgate. I was much entertained by his speech. He, along with the Bill’s proposer, rightly said that this is not about trying to restrict lobbying activity; rather, it is about trying to introduce transparency in lobbying activity. We want to see lobbying take place. I am reminded that Benjamin Franklin’s major contribution to the Declaration of Independence during the American Revolutionary War was, of course, as a lobbyist in London and Paris. So, lobbying can play an essential part in creating democracy as well as in sustaining it. I declare an interest: I am a director of a company that is on the register of consultant lobbyists, in recent times principally only because it acts as a secretariat to development forums and contacts housing and planning Ministers in that context. I am also an adviser to a company in Brussels that is on the EU transparency register. I will come back to the comparison between those two registers. I also declare an interest in that I was the Minister responsible for the 2014 legislation under the coalition Government, and had the benefit of being supported in that task in the other place by the then deputy leader of that House, Tom Brake, who is now the distinguished director of Unlock Democracy and is, I suspect, a supporter of this Bill. It may surprise the Bill’s proposer that I support in principle what she is attempting to do. I will, I am afraid, irritate her by saying...
Baroness Carberry of Muswell Hill
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lady Hayter on bringing forward this Bill, and I agree with every single word of her introduction. Going back to first principles, I agree that lobbying is a useful part of democracy. Like many Members of this House, I have done my fair share of lobbying-possibly more than my fair share-meeting Ministers over many decades to talk about issues that concerned organisations I represented. That is a legitimate type of democratic participation and it is a good thing, because decision-making benefits when decision-makers hear from a very wide range of voices. However, lobbying is widely regarded as a bit dodgy, a bit grubby and a bit suspicious. In many cases, people who hold those views are right, as some of the well-publicised scandals we have seen testify. We all meet people in our daily lives who suspect that a privileged few are getting an unfair chance to shape government decisions behind closed doors. The basis of the Bill is the contention that too much is left hidden from view, and it is not too lofty to say that the Bill can help build more public confidence in our democratic institutions, because it introduces more transparency to who is trying to influence Ministers and senior decision-makers, and on whose behalf. Greater openness would strengthen confidence in government. Our current system just is not rational. As things stand, two lobbyists could walk tomorrow into the same ministerial meeting and talk about the same issues....
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, on this excellent Bill, enabling us to have a crucial discussion about transparency. We have a huge problem with public trust in government. Just 27% of the population trust the national Government. There is very good evidence that transparency is one of the key drivers of trust. Others have already referred to Transparency International research showing that the current lobbying register covers, at most, 4% of those engaged in lobbying activity. I do not think that, if you went out on the street and surveyed 100 people, many people would know that figure, but there is a strong and rightful sense that a lot of murky things happen here in Westminster, and that damages trust. However, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, said when introducing the Bill, a lot of lobbying is positive and we need to keep that sense when it is lobbying in the public interest: by NGOs and campaign groups, patient or consumer groups, or communities affected by proposed developments. However, most lobbying is not in the public interest but for private interests, such as that by big oil and gas, big tobacco-and boy did we see some shameless examples of big tobacco lobbying in the recent Tobacco and Vapes Bill-big supermarkets, big developers and big finance, including, of course, the City of London Corporation, whose special access I am addressing in other areas. It is worth saying that it is up to the Government to decide who to meet, who to...
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter of Kentish Town, on bringing forward the Bill. I understand why she has done so, but I want to make a more general point about what effect the Bill might have. One of the big problems we have had over many years has been the growing gap between government and business. We need to make sure that there is a greater understanding among people who are making economic decisions in government about what the business community needs in order to advance the economy and achieve what Governments talk about all the time, which is economic growth. I therefore ask myself how the Bill would work in practice and what effect it might have on the relationships between government and business. I have in mind a very pro-business, proactive Government, who want to break down the barriers between business and government, and want Ministers to be out there understanding what motivates businesses and what they need to get on with their job of growing businesses, creating jobs and so on. I imagine a Chancellor of the Exchequer or a business Minister at a conference. He or she is working the room and talking to different business leaders, and a chief executive of a housebuilding company explains that he is sitting on various pockets of land and would like to develop them but the planning regulations, tax system and so on need to be changed. Does that person become an in-house consultant when he has that conversation with the Minister? Imagine...
My Lords, I agree with a great deal of what has been said by a number of speakers, which has the advantage that I will be able to shorten my contribution to today’s debate. This is a modest Bill that seeks to improve an Act that is not up to the task of enhancing the transparency of lobbying. The 2014 Act was fundamentally flawed. Its name bore no relation to its contents. I moved an amendment to change the Long Title that would have replaced “transparency of lobbying” with “registration of lobbyists”. The measure did not enhance transparency of the substance of lobbying; it required the registration of lobbyists-or rather, as we have heard, certain lobbyists. It was notable as much for who was not required to register as for who was. If we are going to stick with the 2014 Act then it makes sense to extend its scope so that the register lives up to its name. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, moved an amendment then to include in-house lobbyists and was supported by many other noble Lords. For her, it is unfinished business. I urge the Minister to go further. The 2014 Act was a missed opportunity. There was no statutory code of conduct and no stipulation of the principles that should govern that conduct. We could have put ourselves on a par with other nations in embracing best practice, ensuring that representations made to the Government, Ministers, civil servants and advisers were put in the public domain. I moved an amendment when the Bill was being considered in 2013 to...
I congratulate my noble friend Lady Hayter of Kentish Town on her success in the ballot for Private Members’ Bills-I have asked her to advise me on my future selection of lottery numbers-and on her compelling introduction to this important and overdue Bill. Like my noble friend and other speakers, I believe that lobbying is an essential and potentially productive component in the communication between government and business, consumer groups and other constituencies. Governments should not determine policy or propose legislation in a vacuum but rather do so, as far as possible, after considered and thoughtful interaction with all interested parties. The quality of that interaction is directly related to the transparency of the conversations that the Government have, to enable everyone, from legislators to the public, to form a view as to how the balance has been struck between the arguments and the interests of different parties. The Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Act 2014, amid its many other more overtly partisan measures, attempted to increase the transparency with which lobbying was conducted. But this start was fundamentally flawed, with a statutory register set up, as we have heard, only in respect of external consultants and not in-house lobbyists. Without disrespect to the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, this was demonstrably a wrong call by the then coalition Government, even though arguments were made at the time that other...
My Lords, I warmly welcome the Bill introduced by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter. I congratulate her on bringing this important measure before the House and seeking to bring the United Kingdom more closely into line with jurisdictions including Scotland, Canada and others, all of which have adopted broader approaches to lobbying transparency. I also welcome the words of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, and support his proposals. The principle behind the Bill is straightforward: if consultant lobbyists are required to disclose their activities, there is no convincing reason why large organisations with substantial in-house lobbying operations should not be subject to a comparable transparency requirement. Greater transparency strengthens public confidence, improves accountability and increasingly serves our national security interests. I therefore strongly support both the purpose and direction of this Bill. However, registration is only the beginning. Transparency has real value only if the information disclosed is examined, understood and, where appropriate, acted on. A register should not simply be a repository of information; it should be a tool that enables government and Parliament to identify patterns of influence, assess potential risks and ensure that lobbying is conducted openly and responsibly. The foreign influence registration scheme provides a useful illustration. Although it serves a different purpose from the lobbying regime before us, it demonstrates that...
My Lords, I am pleased to add my support to my noble friend Lady Hayter of Kentish Town. We need more lobbying transparency in the Lords. We have been here before. My noble friend encouraged me to table a Private Member’s Bill on this topic back in 2016. I remind the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, that we managed to get it through. The noble Lord contributed significantly, with many amendments. I look forward to seeing him do that again, and to him giving support to try to get this Bill on to the statute book. We had the Second Reading of my Bill on 9 September 2016. It endeavoured to build on the Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Act 2014, which had its deficiencies. It is very important indeed, in the light of what happened with Covid, that we are back on this topic. I am not going to speak at great length. If anybody wants any great justification from me for supporting this, I suggest they look at the Hansard for 2016, which I have recently refreshed myself on. I read many of the speeches again. The case is compelling and I believe that we have heard a general movement towards support for the Bill as this debate has proceeded, even though the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, was rather more strident in her opposition than her counterpart was back in 2016. I hope that she will be prepared to move her ground a little bit, because change is needed. Transparency is needed. We need to build that trust. The House of Lords is certainly out of...
My Lords, it is a pleasure to be in the Chamber discussing a piece of legislation on a Friday morning; it is a bit of a change from the atmosphere of the Colosseum that we have been used to on Friday mornings this year. Nevertheless, the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, has struck a chord. There is clearly a broad consensus. The previous speaker was perhaps a little harsh on the Opposition; I think the principle is accepted, as opposed to the minutiae. We all look forward to getting to Committee, when we can get down to the detail. The big thing that has happened in the past 12 years since the current arrangements were introduced is that not only has the technology changed but the whole structure of government and access to government has changed. We have had an exponential growth in spads. Of course, these people are now the recipients of a lot of lobbying. The Government themselves-as we have all done in bringing forward legislation-actively seek consultation as part of our process. The noble Viscount, Lord Stansgate, and others have pointed to some of the anomalies, and they may not be included in the current legislation. VAT is one thing; it does not make sense. Of course we do not wish to get into a hugely bureaucratic process, but what is perfectly obvious is that what we have today is not doing it. We need look no further than this House itself, where, unfortunately, some Members have found themselves falling foul of our own procedures and there is scepticism in the...
My Lords, I welcome the opportunity to speak in the gap. I did not put my name down to speak because I was at a Madonna concert last night and I was not absolutely certain that I would be available. That is relevant, in that I was a guest of a major company. That company was Grindr, and the question about lobbying is relevant in terms of the actions of major companies. I noticed a number of noble Lords’ response to my presence at the gig last night; it looked like jealousy. The important thing about this welcome Bill from the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, is that it raises questions about how people lobby now. We have heard a lot of contributions about how circumstances have changed, particularly concerning those people who are paid but do not, at the moment, have to declare the fact that they are actually lobbying. One of the groups that comes to mind is lawyers. Lawyers will claim client confidentiality or say that it is a peripheral interest, but if they are paid to represent a particular view or to advise in relation to a particular issue, it is appropriate that major law firms-or small law firms, for that matter-should be obliged to disclose what they are doing in the same way that others who will be affected by the noble Baroness’s Bill should be required to disclose their actions. In conclusion, I agree with the questions that the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, raised about some of the implications of the Bill, because it is easy to pass a piece of legislation and think,...
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Shinkwin, is hoping to take part remotely, but he has been having audio problems. It appears that the problems have not been resolved, therefore I call the noble Lord, Lord Pack.
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, on winning the legislative lottery. I too am envious of her luck and thank her for choosing this focused but important topic. I used to work for a consultancy firm and some of that work involved lobbying, so I have personal experience of being subject to the regulatory regime that we are talking about. It is perhaps no surprise, therefore, that I share the view that others have expressed about the benefits that good, reputable lobbying can bring in fostering useful dialogue and a useful exchange of information and expertise that can inform and, therefore, improve decision-making. However, as the noble Viscount, Lord Stansgate, said, sunlight is the best disinfectant. There absolutely are aspects of lobbying to be concerned or nervous about, but the best way of protecting the good, genuinely beneficial side of lobbying is a strong dose of sunlight to distinguish that from other activities and behaviour. I will talk a little more about the light-touch nature of the current set-up in a moment, as that has come up in some of the speeches this morning, but first, it is worth highlighting just how back-to-front the situation we have ended up in is. We had a bit of a history lesson as to how we have ended up where we are, but it is a very odd, back-to-front situation. Normally when we talk about regulation, we do it on the basis that the larger, the more powerful, the richer you are, the more important it is to be regulated....
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to be able to speak in support of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, twice in the same week. I do so today because I start from the premise that transparency is inherently a good thing. Transparency in lobbying is not only a good thing; it is crucial, because transparency engenders and underpins trust in individuals, in the decision-making system and in the policy-influencing process informing it. The noble Baroness’s Bill makes sense because transparency makes sense. The fact that this modest Bill addresses an omission from the Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Act 2014 makes the measures within it both logical and necessary-necessary because, as we have already heard, while consultant lobbyists comprise around 20% of those who lobby, they are currently the only group the register covers. In other words, the vast majority are not on the register. They need to be. I speak as someone who was privileged to spend 95% of his career before coming to the House as an in-house lobbyist for some of the UK’s best household names in the charity sector. In fact, it was through working for charities such as RNID, Macmillan Cancer Relief, as it then was, Cancer Research UK and the Royal British Legion that I came to really appreciate the value of your Lordships’ House. On Monday of next week, the latest Armed Forces Bill, which this time focuses on the Armed Forces covenant, will receive its Second Reading. That...
My Lords, this has been a thought-provoking debate, with excellent contributions from all sides of the House. Private Members’ Bills are so often a good way to start a debate on a topic that otherwise would not be discussed in so much detail. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayter of Kentish Town, has certainly achieved that with this Bill. The Bill has provoked an interesting debate on the important balance between transparency-which, like other noble Lords across the Chamber, we strongly support-and administrative burdens, particularly those on small businesses. Ministers rely on open and frank conversations with stakeholders, whether they be businesses or charities. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, has been very clear that she is not opposed to that. Our concern is that this Bill, by placing an administrative and financial burden-as my noble friend Lord Hayward also highlighted-on organisations that engage with Ministers, could disincentivise those open and frank channels of discussions that Ministers rely on. Furthermore, we are concerned about the unintended consequences. My noble friend Lady Finn gave the example of a pub landlord who might have to register following a conversation with a visiting Minister. My noble friend Lord Sherbourne spoke eloquently about the impact of the Bill on the relationship between government and the business community and gave a number of examples where there could rightly be some confusion. I would like to give two further scenarios for the...
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent
My Lords, first, I thank my noble friend Lady Hayter for bringing forward this Bill and facilitating such a thought-provoking debate on such an important topic. I find myself in the very unusual position, for a Lords Minister, of actually speaking from the Dispatch Box on a policy area that I am in theory responsible for, so we will see how well this goes. My noble friend Lady Hayter has campaigned with admirable vigour on this issue over many years. Indeed, many of the issues raised across your Lordships’ House today were highlighted with foresight by my noble friend in Opposition during the passage of the lobbying Act 12 years ago. Along with the active campaigning of the noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, and my noble friend Lord Brooke, I think it is fair to say that there is considered to be unfinished business in this area. As we have heard, this Bill would transform the register of consultant lobbyists into to a broader register of all lobbyists, including in-house lobbyists working on behalf of their employer, engager or principal. In doing so, it would significantly expand the 2014 Act’s prohibition on consultant lobbying unless registered and the associated civil and criminal penalties scheme. When considering the question of transparency around lobbying, we should note that it is the Government’s own publication of Ministers’ and senior officials’ meetings that has carried the weight of our transparency obligations on lobbying over many years. This dataset is...
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
My Lords, I do not know what flatters me most. I think it is the noble Lord, Lord Hayward, moving from Madonna to myself-which I think is the biggest vote of confidence I have ever had from anyone. I am delighted by those who have come today. I do not know whether I would call the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, one of the “guilty men” for having put through a Bill I think we now agree was perhaps a little too modest. In fact, even the Bill today is being called too modest. The noble Lords, Lord Norton and Lord Pack, and my noble friend Lord Brooke, all called it modest, which is a good start from where we go. I thank the Minister, my noble friend Lady Anderson. She said this is unfinished business. I am going to take that as a very positive statement that she is promising the Government will do a little more-because what we all know is that it is time for change. I am not going to try to answer all the points she has so nicely dealt with, but it is important to note the breadth of support we have had. The noble Baroness, Lady Helic, also pointed not just to transparency but to the responsibility of lobbying: that it should be in the public interest. The noble Lord, Lord Shinkwin, also expressed how transparency itself can enhance trust, which my noble friend Lady Carberry also said. I think we all agree that lobbying is good and we do not want it to be in any way diminished by this. However, there is issue of sunlight, which I mentioned, and my noble friend Lord Stansgate...
I thank the noble Baroness for giving way. I find it rather disappointing that she is conflating today’s debate with a debate we had yesterday on political party funding, when I raised some serious concerns about the asymmetry of the Government’s approach. I did not necessarily want to go any further on the size or otherwise of donations, but I do not think it is relevant to the conversation today and why that was a disappointment.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
The issue is whether we want greater trust in democracy. That is what the Bill is about. The idea that we start putting technical and administrative difficulties-
I thank the noble Baroness again for giving way. If we are talking about trust in democracy, the point I was making yesterday was that if the Government of the day inflict substantial damage on opposition parties in terms of political party funding, that will call into question trust in democracy.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town
I disagreed with what the noble Baroness was saying yesterday, but we do not need to go into the details of that. The point I am trying to make is that the Bill is about the core issue of enhancing trust in democracy, rather than constantly being concerned with how to get there, the cost or the administration. It may be too modest a Bill and it may not be the right Bill, but we are talking about enhancing trust in democracy. It is a shame that that attitude of the Official Opposition, whom the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, is speaking on behalf of, is all about the problems and not the great steps forward we could make. I think that most people who spoke today were in favour of the Bill’s direction of travel, which is that we should not just regulate or register 5% of lobbying, as now, but move towards the other 95%. I think that is what we all want to achieve. I hope my noble friend the Minister will move more speedily than perhaps sometimes happens in government, for understandable reasons, and that we will soon move forward on this. For the moment, I beg to move.
Bill read a second time and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.