Lionel Zetter: Lobbying is legitimate

Lionel Zetter is an author and independent public affairs consultant. He is a former president of the CIPR and has given evidence to the Public Administration Select Committee and the Committe on Standards in Public Life. He is author of 'Lobbying - the art of political persuasion'.

Once again lobbying finds itself at the centre of a media storm, and once again the media's ire is misdirected.

Adam Werritty may have been lobbying, but that does not make him a lobbyist in the accepted sense of the term. As far as I am aware he has not a member of the CIPR, and his organisation is not signed up to the APPC or the PRCA. The fact that the media find it easy to hang the label 'lobbyist' around his neck does not make him a member of the industry which I - along with many others - am proud to work for. As in the previous 'cash for questions' and 'taxi for hire' affairs, the level of lobbyist involvement is minimal or non-existent.

I genuinely believe that lobbying is legitimate and an integral part of the democratic process. Lobbying has always gone on, going back to the days of Magna Carta and the drafting of the US constitution and beyond. Both of these documents guarantee the right to petition, and that is what lobbying is all about. Everyone has the right to lobby, and pretty well everybody does. Local people and voluntary organisations lobby through their councillors and MPs. Charities and NGOs lobby just as much as business - perhaps even more. Government's lobby each other, and they also lobby supra-national organisations such as the EU, UN and WTO.

Lionel Zetter: Gordon Brown handing the reins of power to David Cameron could be the ultimate "Hospital Pass"

Lionel Zetter is an author and freelance public affairs consultant who is also a director of ComRes and of the Enterprise Forum. His most recent book is Blueprint: The Politics, Principles and Personalities of the New Conservative Government, which was published in October.

I have long argued that when Tony Blair finally resigned he shipped Gordon Brown a blatant hospital pass*. The New Labour brand was badly tarnished by the Iraq War, the party’s poll rating was slipping, and the economic storm clouds were gathering.

Having said all that, if Blair to Brown was a horrendous hospital pass, Brown to Cameron could turn out to be the ultimate hospital pass. In 1997 Labour inherited a strong economy, with growth stretching back to the UK’s ejection from the Exchange Rate Mechanism in September 1992. The legacy which David Cameron and George Osborne will inherit in 2010 could not be more different, and in many ways could not be any worse.

Just in raw statistical terms the numbers are terrifying. In his April 2009 Budget, Chancellor Alistair Darling estimated that government borrowing this year would reach £175 billion. For those who cannot get their heads around figures of that magnitude, that means that the Government is currently borrowing £6,000 a second. In July 2009 the Office of National Statistics announced that the National Debt stood at £799 billion, and it is edging ever closer to the £1 trillion mark.

On top of this unfunded public pension liabilities are already in excess of £1 trillion, and there is off balance sheet borrowing of over £200 billion under the Private Finance Initiative. Finally, there are the huge liabilities which the Government was forced to take on in order to prevent a collapse of the banking system last year. All in all it is not surprising that the Institute for Fiscal Studies estimates that we will still be paying off this debt in 2032.

Some of the current Government’s recent problems illustrate to some degree the problems the Tories will face if elected next year. When Mr Brown and Mr Darling try to save a few tens of millions of pounds by cutting the TA training budget or restricting the tax relief on Childcare Vouchers, they are howled down and forced to retreat. Because of the nervousness of their own backbenchers, and because there is a general election around the corner, the Pre-Budget Report next week is unlikely to contain any significant proposals for spending cuts or tax rises.