PG methods - insider and outsider

4 insider methods

1. Working with ministers and civil servants

2. Working w/Plmt

3. Working with parties

4. Working with devolved/other institutions

3 reasons those inside consult groups

1. Need specialised knowledge

2. Want cooperation from the groups as they’re often important

3. Need to gauge reaction on proposed policies

Working with ministers and civil servants - objectives

• Get inside early thinking to sway it in your favour

Working with ministers and civil servants - important element

• Away from the media and the public

Working with ministers and civil servants - efficacy

• Low

• Power now moving to Plmt and devolved assemblies

Working with Plmt - important element

• More scrutinised by public and media

Working with Plmt - accessibility

• Smaller majority govts - 2010-19 - had more rebellious MPs

  • Made Plmt a good place for pressure groups to try and act

Working with Plmt - 4 aspects

1. Amendments to legislation by pressuring MPs/Peers

2. Influencing MPs/Peers voting on a bill

3. Drafting Private Members Bills

4. Contributing to departmental reports

Working with Plmt - success of amending legislation

• Unsuccessful if opposed by govt

Working with Plmt - success of influencing voting

• Often low as parties will already have a way they want their MPs to vote

Working with Plmt - success of Private Members’ Bills

• Often on moral issues so no party line

Recent Private Members’ Bill influenced by a group

• Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

• Influenced by Dignity in Dying group

Working with Plmt - success of departmental reports

• Post-2010 increasing importance of departmental select committees

  • Pressure groups give evidence and try and influence reports

Recent departmental report and group involved

• 2020 - Education Select Committee

• Runnymede Trust gave evidence about concerns about bias against W/C/EM students for CAGs

• Gained widespread media attention

Working with parties - 2 things it involves

1. Money

• Labour receives lots of money from trade unions

• Conservatives receive lots of money from individuals and businesses

2. Physical proximity

• Labour are now friends with financial groups/lobbyists like TheCityUK who worked closely with Tulip Saddiq to formulate policies

4 trade unions that donate six-figures to Labour

1. GMB

2. UNISON

3. Unite

4. USDAW

Starmer’s Labour pressure group link

• TheCityUK

  • Thanked publicly by Tulip SAaddiq for helping to forumlate Labour’s policies for the financial and professional services sector

Working with parties - 2 elements of efficacy

1. Relies on party coming to power and sticking to promises/commitments (we see you Sir Starmer…)

2. Working with one party can push away others

Working with devolved institutions

• Increased post-1998 devolution in 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 and N.🇮🇪

• CBI and Trades Union Congress has offices in 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 and 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 as well as London

Working with other instutitons — 🇪🇺

• Groups focused activities from domestic politics → 🇪🇺

  • European institutions use close engagement with afffected interests before making decisions

• CBI and British Retail Consortium had offices in Brussels

• TUC had European officer in Brussels

4 outsider methods

1. Public engagement

2. Civil disobedience

3. Social media

4. Courts

Public engagement — aim

• Force gov’t to listen by pushing issues up the agenda using public support

  • Make gov’t change for fear of electoral consequences

3 strategies of public engagement

1. Petitions

2. Marches

3. Demonstrations

Marches — example

• 2003 🇮🇶 War

  • Stop the War Coalition march was the biggest in 🇬🇧 history

Civil disobedience — 3 examples of Just Stop Oil civil disobedience

1. Soup thrown at Van Gogh’s 🌻🖼️

2. Closing M25

3. Throwing orange confetti onto the court at Wimbledon (stopped play)

Civil disobedience — key issue

• Seen as ‘mob rule’ of gov’t were to change policies

  • Would encourage more future direct action

End of JSO

• Just Stop Just Stop Oil group was formed

• Ended campaigning in 2025 after gov’t decided to ban drilling in N.🌊

Social media — example

• Marcus Rashford’s #EndChildFoodPoverty campaign

• Aimed to pressure gov’t into extending FSM to summer holidays via food vouchers

Number of #EndChildFoodPoverty petition signatures

1.1m

Courts

• Use judicial review to challenge gov’t policy on grounds it has exceeded/breached legal powers

Courts — example

• 2022 — 💚☮ and ClientEarth challenged gov’t over climate policy

  • Ruled gov’ts initial Net 0 strategy unlawful as lacked detain re meeting emissions reduction targets thus breaching 2008 Climate Change Act

• 2024 — gov’t produced revised plan — Carbon Budget Delivery Plan — again ruled unlawful