Phil Brickell

I am always willing to learn from comparative analysis of what works elsewhere, including in other jurisdictions across the United Kingdom. The Government have it in their power to bring about a culture shift, and the time to do so is now. Not all of the EIC’s recommendations require primary legislation. There is recommendation 8, which is that the Government simply refuse to meet any organisation seeking to lobby them unless that organisation is on the lobbying register. Recommendation 10 on having one digital repository for transparency releases is a simple fix. How about recommendation 13, which is that transparency releases include informal communication channels, including the likes of WhatsApp? If we are to address the deficiencies in our system, I urge the Government to find time to overhaul the register of consultant lobbyists so that we have a truly representative register that closes the loopholes I have mentioned, that empowers the regulator to levy significant fines for systemic offences of the registration requirement, that is properly resourced, and that documents interactions between the Government and organisations in sufficient detail that it serves as more than a mere box-ticking exercise. Let me turn to MPs’ outside employment, colloquially known as second jobs. This Government pledged in the 2024 manifesto that they would “task the Modernisation Committee to take forward urgent work on the restrictions that need to be put in place to prevent MPs from taking up roles that stop them serving their constituents and the country.” In November 2024, my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell) tasked the Committee on Standards to look at how “to conduct further work into how changes to the rules on outside interests and employment might be implemented”. The Standards Committee opened its inquiry on 8 January 2025 and took oral evidence in public through to July 2025, yet—more than a year later—no report has been published, and no recommendations have been forthcoming, and no action has been taken in Government due to this delay. Despite my writing to the Standards Committee requesting an update, I have yet to receive a substantive response. Having advised—for the good part of more than a decade, in my old job before being elected to this place —on conflicts of interest, and on outside employment and related matters, I have been incredibly patient and so have other Members of this House. The Standards Committee has a broad remit and does good work, but after almost 24 months of waiting for a report, after my mentioning this matter previously in the House and after writing to the Standards Committee, there seems to have been no progress. I said in Westminster Hall more than four months ago that this House is moving at a glacial speed. My fear is that the glaciers will have melted by the time the report is published. The lack of progress is simply not good enough.