Moral of the Patrick Mercer story: perhaps it is lobbyists who should be regulating MPs

A group of journalists go out to run a sting operation. They approach a public affairs firm (Insight Public Affairs) who turn them down as they viewed what they were asked to do as unethical. They also approach an MP, Partick Mercer, who by contrast said, ‘with pleasure’.

Perhaps the moral of the story is that we could do with public affairs firms regulating MPs… 🙂

More seriously, it does make a point about the problem of unregulated lobbyists. Once again, the problem hasn’t been with a firm signed up to the industry’s self-regulation system, but with people who are outside it. That self-regulation system causes plenty of debate on its own, but the biggest issue over-regulation in my view isn’t the state of the self-regulation, it’s those who fall outside the current system completely.

Note: I do and have worked for firms covered by the industry self-regulation system.