Westminster as the Institution of Last Resort for Pressure Group Activity - Essay Example

... ... ... 23 April To what extent is Westminster the of last resort for pressure group activity today? Since the times of William Wilberforce and Thomas Clarkson who led the Society for Effecting the Abolition of Slave Trade to a victory, namely the abolition of slave trade in 1807, British parliament witnessed the actions and activities of many, official and unofficial, pressure groups. Some theorists argue that due to the specifics of British political culture and system, alongside the fact that the government concentrates vast power in its hands, pressure groups in the UK tend to try to influence the government and senior members of the bureaucratic elite rather than Parliament. However, recent studies in this field show that parliamentary lobbying and pressure group activities are on the rise in the past two-three decades, both in the House of Commons and in the House of Lords. Moreover, both chambers of Parliament are viewed by pressure groups not only in the light of institutions of last resort but also as “access points” which play an important role in the entire process of influencing political and governmental decisions. Thus, during and after the rule of the Conservative governments of Margaret Thatcher, Parliament became more important for pressure groups not only as an institution of last resort but also as a place to express their views and to influence the overall decision making process. Traditionally, British MPs were depicted as the ’major channel of communication between the government and the governed’ (Wright 2000). On the other hand, the presence of a parliamentary government in the British political tradition means a form of government ’in which the executive is drawn from and is constitutionally responsible to the legislature’ (Rush 2005). In this respect, Rush explains, this is a government through parliament but not government by parliament (2005). Therefore, many theorists observed that in the UK the largest proportion of pressure group activities is focused towards senior government officials and ministers, in particular, the power-holders in the British system of government. On the other hand, Parliament possesses powerful tools to influence both cabinet ministers and legislation they are trying to pass through Westminster. In the case of legislation proposed by backbenchers themselves, the Parliament has the final word on bills; hence, it is really the institution of last resort to which pressure groups are turning. Moreover, UK Parliament has a monopoly to recruit cabinet ministers as opposed to the US where those seeking political posts could pursue their objectives also through a business, law or academic career as these circles promote cabinet ministers and president on a regular base (Jones et al. 2007). Having good positions and relations within Parliament means a pressure group is in a position to influence cabinet nominations and subsequent possible reshuffles of government in power. Such a positioning gives instruments, even based on personal contacts and societal affiliations, to pressure groups and networks to influence government policy through Westminster not only as institution of last resort but also on a permanent basis. On the other hand, pressure groups are not a homogenous entity and their affiliations with governmental bodies vary as do the targets of their activities: ’some enjoy close links with ministers and civil servants, while others target the legislature, or concentrate on influencing public opinion’ (Baggot 1995). In other words, some pressure groups will see Parliament as an institution of last resort, although it does not change the fact that the cabinet, in most cases, possesses all means of power necessary to adopt its policy decisions. It is more probable for an ’outsider’ pressure group, which is denied access to the government, to seek parliamentary support in order to achieve its goals as compared to an established ’insider’ group such as the British Medical Association (BMA). In the past, some pressure groups were insider groups to such an extent that for them no institution was of last resort in the sense that these groups influenced the entire political and governmental process. That was the case, until the 1990s, with the Labour party which originated from the trade unions and unions are still in control of 50% of the votes at the party’s national conference. In the first post-war decades, the leaders of the Trades Union Congress did not look at Westminster as an institution of last resort because they had direct access to ministerial offices and it was hard to differentiate between party and union policy. On the other hand, despite the strict distinction in the definitions of a political party and a pressure group introduced by theorists, UK Parliament enjoys the presence of such parties like the Ulster Unionists, Plaid Cymru and the Scottish Nationalists which can ’only hope to affect policy in Northern Ireland, Wales or Scotland by influencing the government or the Opposition’ (Williams 1998). These parties are very small and their chances to form a government lean to zero so they are practically pressure groups for which Parliament is an institution of last resort on many occasions. Another problem in analysing to what extent Westminster is an institution of last resort is the fact that many pressure groups ’operate quietly, invisibly and effectively on issues attracting little public attention’ (Baggot 1992), while others are in the spotlight defending widely advertised public causes. This ’very’ style of operation was always popular among pressure groups and ’their consultations with top decision-makers take place behind close doors, hidden from public scrutiny’ (Jones and Kavanagh 2003), except for the 1960s and 1970s, when representatives of business and trade unions alike were consulted prior to major legislative changes and even official statements, as described by Rob Baggot in his essay Pressure Groups and the British Political System: Change and Decline published in Two Decades in British Politics (1992: pp. 38-52). The times of the Conservative governments of Mrs. Thatcher and her New Right philosophy led to a situation when pressure groups were not only excluded from consultations, but were openly challenged and fought, as was the case with the trade unions and even the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), traditionally linked with the Conservative Party, complained about its inability to work with the government in 1981. Thus, not only ’producer’ pressure groups, like the Trades Union Congress (TUC) and CBI, but also smaller pressure groups to a greater extent were forced to turn to Parliament as an institution of last resort. As opposed to the philosophy of the New Right, the New Labour announced that it aims to restore the confidence of business in the government and CBI regained its status of an insider group after 1997, but some large companies like British Aerospace and ICI try to bypass not only CBI, but also Whitehall and are lobbying directly in Westminster in pursuit of their specific legislative interests (Peele 2004). On the other hand, the past several decades witnessed parliamentary majorities and pressure groups’ power to oppose government-brokered legislation waning. The Westminster model approach and party discipline associated with it were repeatedly overthrown in the last century and in the first decade of XXI century, but ’substantial backbench rebellions, fuelled by pressure-group lobbying in Parliament, have hardly dented the government’s majority in the vast majority of cases’ (Baggot 1992). A triumphant example of such a success is the case of the 1986 Shops Bill, when pressure groups persuaded The House of Commons to reject the bill at second reading. In this case, Parliament acted as an institution of last resort, because regardless of all efforts of pressure groups to change the stance of the government, it tried to push the bill through Parliament as a perfect illustration of how the Westminster model works, namely a political tradition of ’strong centralised government, run by strictly-disciplined parties… [where] the government is dominant, backed by majority in the House of Commons’ (Garnett and Lynch 2007). During and after Thatcher’s terms in office, pressure groups realised that Parliament could successfully play its original role of an institution of last resort when all other channels of communication and influencing are closed or exhausted. The House of Lords also attracted greater attention from pressure groups, partly because many peers are not affiliated with parties, thus are more persuadable for they do not have to obey party discipline. In his 1991 evidence to the House of Lords Select Committee, Michael Rush concluded that attention of pressure groups towards Parliament rose significantly in the post-war years and a study, conducted by The Study of Parliament Group, showed that only 4.3 per cent of pressure groups outside government and Parliament had no contacts with MPs and Parliament as a whole (Rush 1991). On the other hand, the survey showed that respondents place Parliament in the fourth place – trailing ministers, civil servants and media - when asked to rank institutions by influence on public policy. Predictably ministers and senior officials are seen as the most important players in the field of policy making, Rush concluded (1991). This does not prevent pressure groups from addressing Parliament when they seek publicity for their specific causes and problems and in such sense the House of Commons and, increasingly, the House of Lords, can act as institutions of last resort in terms of attracting government’s attention to particular problems raised by pressure groups. Moreover, although British political life witnessed the emergence of a new political class of professional MPs and peers in the recent decades, leading to a situation when most professional politicians specialise in one policy field or another, governments still ’need groups to formulate and implement those policies in a manner which reflects the complexity of the real world’ (John 2006). Hence, Parliament becomes the place where details of policy could, and should, be coined and polished, making both parliamentary chambers institutions of last resort for interested pressure groups; for details of legislation are often more important than the grand ideas behind them. In this respect, pressure groups tend to rely on Parliament as an institution of last resort in terms of details of government-proposed legislation and on many occasions backbenchers are able to put through amendments to bills, which result in laws reflecting the interests of various pressure groups. At the same time, ’the aims, methods and effectiveness of pressure groups are enormously affected by the context within which they act’ (Ray 1999); therefore, pressure groups suffer from the disciplined Westminster model and Parliament, even in its role of institution of last resort, sometimes is acting more according to party interests than public interests represented by some pressure groups. Thus, for some groups, which are not so well-connected in Westminster and Whitehall, Parliament is losing its statute of an institution of last resort and they turn to different pillars of power, namely media, to achieve their goals. However, this is just a concurrent approach and method to draw attention to a cause, because at the end of the day legislation must be adopted by Parliament and it has the final say on such matters. Another factor is the growing power of the European legislation and European Parliament, in particular, and the changing status of British ministers as officials who, by general agreement, ’should have the authority to govern and not to be unduly restricted from acting in the way they deem appropriate’ (Watts 2007). Politics and policy is ’about how societies seek to resolve conflicts’ (Rush 2005) and finding ways to capitalise on group interests and many, so far 27, European countries decided to reduce their sovereignty, transferring power to the institutions of the European Union – the European Commission and European Parliament. Despite the acceptance of such self-narrowed sovereignty, the House of Lords was very active in scrutinising EU legislation, Rush concludes in Parliament Today (2005), and pressure groups interested in EU legislation and its adoption in the UK were not only very active in lobbying in Westminster but often found that British Parliament is an institution of last resort in their efforts to influence Brussels or at least to attract attention for their views regarding European legislation. Meanwhile, a new ’species’ of pressure groups emerged, which rely more on Brussels than on Westminster to achieve their goals, realising that European Parliament evolves into institution which constantly withdraws functions from national parliaments, and that many traditional models are not working any more. Traditional British ’policy communities’, characterised by close interdependence between insider groups and government and legislature, as described by Watts in Pressure Groups, began to perish in many liberal democracies; however, the policy of the government, backed by Parliament, could not be operable without the co-operation of policy networks and pressure groups, some of them rooted back to Victorian times. Moreover, since the 1980s a trend of more intense parliamentary lobbying is observed, partly because the governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major were ’less receptive to many group campaigners, encouraging lobbyists to turn to MPs’ (Watts 2007), and this trend helped Parliament to regain its initial and core status of state institution of last resort. The development of the system of select committees also boosted the confidence of pressure groups in Parliament as a place worthwhile lobbying and encouraged various groups to seek parliamentary contacts at all levels and not only on ad hoc basis. Simultaneously, the House of Lords positions as an institution of last resort were strengthened and when the issue of abolition of fox hunting was in the spotlight, the Countryside Alliance discovered, also as a last resort, that its contacts in the House of Lords, could be very helpful due to the fact that many peers had a similar broad view on this subject. Other cases cemented pressure groups’ growing understanding that the upper chamber could also act as an institution of last resort because Lords are able, if they wish, to introduce amendments to bills, which ’are more likely to be accepted by the Commons when they are constructive’ (Watts 2007). Some theorists look at pressure groups lobbying in Westminster as groups whose efforts to influence government and other senior officials have failed and Samuel Finer in 1958 observed and formulated the law of inverse proportion: ’the closer and more exclusive a group’s relationship with the executive, the less use it will make of Parliament’ (cited by Baggot 1995). However, in many cases both insider and outsider groups have to rely on MPs as last resort; therefore, 86 per cent of insider groups reveal they maintain contacts with MPs on regular basis, while 67 per cent of outsider groups share this approach (Baggot 1995). An illustration of this approach is the Early Day Motion signed by 80 Tory MPs in 1983, after they received loads of letters from their constituents asking for protection of the Green Belt (Robinson 1992). The House of Commons acted as an institution of last resort and backbenchers urged the then-minister Patrick Jenkin that he will face opposition in Parliament. The efficiency of such parliamentary actions could be boosted by the fact that some groups like the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) ’have a membership that exceeds all the combined totals of Britain’s three major political parties (Peele 2004) and, especially when general elections are knocking on the door, Parliament will try to do its best as a last resort institution to address causes that draw public attention, hence to add in popularity. Moreover, in 2007 the Gordon Brown government published a Green Paper entitled The Governance of Britain, aimed to increase the role of Parliament in scrutinising public appointments and ’shift power from executive to Parliament and the public’ (Maer 2007), a constitutional reform, which, when complete, will allow pressure groups to turn to Parliament as an institution of last resort, as well as improve overall access to Parliament through relaxed petition procedures. It seems that the desire for such a constitutional reform is wide-spread after Opposition leader David Cameron also admitted: “The British system of government and politics needs real and lasting change. The country is too centralised, Parliament is too weak, Ministers do not give straight answers and people feel shut out of decision making.” (Maer 2007) Such statements enjoy warm response amid pressure groups and a future ’lasting change’ will transfer much of their lobbying energy and efforts from the government to Westminster. The more clever and more experienced among these groups always maintained at least a minimal level of parliamentary presence in case of emergency, and for reasons related to their understanding that ’electoral pendulum will swing back at some time’ (Baggot 1992), but under the new circumstances more groups will realise they have to invest time and efforts in contacts with Parliament. Moreover, pressure and interest groups are facing the same problems as governments: ’the uncomfortable fact that the boundaries of financial and commercial markets no longer coincide with political boundaries,’ former Greenpeace leader Chris Rose wrote in an article entitled Was That The Golden Age Of Pressure Groups ? (n.d.), hence they will have to adapt to a situation when the habitual tools of influencing points of power will not work and new power centres, such as Brussels, emerge and seize power from traditional institutions of last resort like Westminster. These developments gradually undermine the importance of national parliaments within the EU but, at this stage, not to such an extent as to force pressure groups relocate from London to Brussels, although some pressure groups receive funding directly from the EU. Peter John refers to Richardson and Jordan and their book Governing Under Pressure to conclude that ’[t]he British policy-making style is consensual and accommodatory to group demands’ (2006). Probably this was not true during the times of Thatcher’s government, which in the past two decades stimulated pressure groups to ’re-invent’ the original role of Parliament as an institution of last resort in a democracy. Moreover, pressure groups realised to no inconsiderable degree that Parliament is able to regain this power and at the same time exercise its day-to-day duties in such a manner as to be of mutual benefit for both sides, the governing and the governed. Works Cited Baggot, R. (1995). Pressure Groups Today. Politics Today Series. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Baggot, R. (1992). Pressure Groups and the British Political System: Change and Decline? In: Jones, B. and Robins, L. eds. Two Decades in British Politics. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Garnett, M. and Lynch, P. (2007). Exploring British Politics. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited. John, P. (2006). Analysing Public Policy. London: Continuum. Jones, B. and Kavanagh, D. (2003). British Politics Today. Politics Today Series. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Jones, B., Kavanagh, D., Moran, M., and Norton, P. (2007). Politics UK. 6th edn. Harlow: Pearson Longman. Maer, L. (2007). The Governance of Britain Green Paper. Research Paper Series. London: House of Commons Library. Peele, G. (2004). Governing the UK. 4th edn. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Ray, S. (1999). Modern Comparative Politics: Approaches, Methods and Issues. New Delhi: Prentice-Hall of India. Rush, M. (2005). Parliament Today. Politics Today Series. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Rush, M. (1991) Evidence on House of Lords Select Committees. Report of Session 1991-92. HL Paper 35-II, pp 250-252. [Online] Available from http://www.spg.org.uk/spgev09.htm#_1_2 [Accessed 18 April 2010] Robinson, M. (1992). The Greening of British Party Politics. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Watts, D. (2007). Pressure Groups. Politics Study Guides Series. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Williams, A. (1998). UK Government & Politics. 2nd edn. Oxford: Heinemann Educational Publishers. Wright, T. ed. (2000). The British Political Process: An Introduction. New York: Routledge. Read More