The Gagging Bill is to be delayed for 5 weeks so that Ministers can “consult widely all of the interested parties, members of this House and the many others outside”. This is very good news, the “Transparency of Lobbying, Non-party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill 2013-14” is a theme I have dedicated several blogs to. A previous posting can be found here. The real problem is that despite ending lobbying, being identified by David Cameron as a high priority in early 2010, the first draft of this legislation was published in July 2013 just before MPs took their long holiday and without any wider consultation. Due to the recess, the timescale for the Bills completion was far too short for meaningful scrutiny within Parliament or indeed outside of it. Lobbying is always much more attractive to members of a Government than it is to opposition MPs and electors. The end result addresses only a small part of the lobbying activities that have brought Parliament into disrepute, and attempts in a very crude and chaotic way to implicate charities and trade unions in the same sort of activity as those who lobby for commercial gain and have the resources to ensure their voices get to the top table of every relevant discussion.

The Government has agreed to a 5 week recess to the 2nd part of the Bill, the part that relates to charities, and the element that I am most concerned about. Having taken 38 months from the General Election to publish the draft Bill, with all of the resources available to this Government, they have graciously given the diverse charitable sector across the UK 25 days to help rescue this dogs breakfast. The Minister who is guiding this through Parliament is Andrew Lansley who coined the phrase ‘no change about me, without me’ when guiding the health reforms through Parliament, sadly he has forgotten this catchy little phrase since. The health reforms coincidentally also got delayed because of similarly underdeveloped aspects which GPs and patients were concerned about.

Charities are constantly being invited to speak to Governments and indeed Parliament as a whole, providing advice and views that will shape policy. This activity goes on at the request of Parliamentarians every year. The impact of this Bill is that Charities will be nervous of visiting Parliament and speaking to MPs in the 12 months prior to an election for fear of being caught within the current proposals. These suggest that charities that engage with party political discussions in the year of an election need to account for themselves and the money spent on ‘lobbying’ in case this is seen to influence election outcomes. Although this Government has made a commitment to a fixed term Government, the charities are the ones that would be affected if the Government did decide to dissolve the Government early and catch out charities debating issues with Ministers or Shadow Ministers.  One Government department that specialises in engaging with charities, the Office for Civil Society might well find that its letters, calls & emails remain unanswered by nervous charities in the fourth year of any Parliament. What about the Royal British Legion at Armistice day 2014, will they feel their engagement with the Government is likely to bring them under scrutiny. What about local MPs visiting charities and inviting them to Parliament in the year before an election? The easy approach to all of this is to remove the 2nd part of this Bill, relying on the charitable legislation that already prevents charities from political campaigning, and has been shown to work reasonably well.

We have 5 weeks during which time the larger charities and networks of smaller charities will attempt to help the Government avoid this impending car crash of a law. In the meantime what about local charities, many of which may be affected in a different way? Will they be nervous about allowing MPs to visit them and make reference to them during the final year of any Parliament? What about local Churches Together groups that historically organise husting events during general election campaigns? I know that at least one in Sussex has already raised concerns about continuing this tradition if the Bill becomes Law! In my own work for Churches Together in Sussex I am aware of some of the interactions between the 16 Sussex MPs and local Churches, these are usually welcomed by both MPs and the Churches. We have five weeks in which Ministers will be consulting MPs, this gives time for all MPs to do something honourable and consult with local charities, something few in Sussex bothered to do over the Summer recess. Many of these MPs have already voted for the Bill in its current shape, they owe it to local charities to explain their actions and hopefully to listen to their constituents. A total of 304 MPs voted for the Bill in its current format. In Sussex two did not do so, Caroline Lucas who voted against and Stephen Lloyd who abstained. Stephen is MP for Eastbourne and Patron of a national charity that could easily be caught up in the nonsense of this legislation. The 14 Sussex MPs who chose to vote for the third reading of the Bill were: Greg Barker, Peter Bottomley, Nick Gibb, Charles Hendry, Nick Herbert, Simon Kirby, Tim Loughton, Francis Maude, Amber Rudd, Henry Smith, Nicholas Soames, Andrew Tyrie and Mike Weatherley all of whom are Conservatives along with Norman Baker who is a Lib Dem. I will be contacting these asking them to take the time to ensure that charities they have links with are able to understand their reasons for supporting this Bill. This legislation will become law just as charities may need to seriously consider if they can afford to speak to their MPs in the twelve month run up to May 2015. The current 5 week grace period may be the best chance these MPs will have to speak to groups they claim to support before the opportunity is lost for over a year, by which time some of these MPs may need to look for new roles!