Parliament

Abstract

Parliament has conventionally been regarded as a route used to influence the decision-making process by outsider groups who lack good contacts with civil servants, but insider groups would appear to be even more active than outsider groups in terms of a range of different types of contact with Parliament. (Judge 1990a, p. 36). ‘This suggests that, apart from their closer governmental links, insider groups are generally more active than outsider groups.’ (Judge 1990a, p. 35) Although cause groups can sometimes attain their objectives through the passage of a private member’s bill, sectional groups can also make effective use of parliamentary contacts. Bruce-Gardyne (1986, pp. 152–3) recalls what happened when, as a minister, he was presented with a complex scheme designed to enable horse traders to escape VAT:

I was vastly unimpressed, until I was accosted by one of my senior colleagues in the corridors of Westminster. ‘I hear’, he told me in a voice full of menace, that ‘you’re being bloody-minded about our horse-trading scheme. Well forget it. It was all fixed up with your predecessor, and I can assure you that if you muck it around, we’ll make your life a misery.’ I had second thoughts.