MP calls for lobbyists' register after undercover sting

MPs will be urged to back calls for a statutory register of commercial lobbyists with access to Parliament. It comes after undercover reporters taped executives from public affairs company Bell Pottinger boasting of their power to influence David Cameron. Labour MP John Cryer will introduce a Ten Minute Rule Bill demanding change. His party says ministers are "too close to corporate interests", but No 10 said no lobbying firm "has any say or influence over government policy". The government has said it plans to launch a consultation on statutory regulation of lobbying "quite soon", with legislation introduced next year, in the second session of Parliament. Reporters from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism secretly recorded Tim Collins, managing director of Bell Pottinger Public Affairs, claiming to have access to the prime minister and the Chancellor, George Osborne. Mr Collins, a former MP and director of communications for the Conservatives, also said he was close to Mr Cameron's policy adviser Steve Hilton and Downing Street chief of staff Ed Llewellyn. Very serious allegations' The Independent newspaper, which published the recordings, quoted him as saying: "I've been working with people like Steve Hilton, David Cameron, George Osborne for 20 years-plus. "There is not a problem getting the messages through." Mr Collins also reportedly claimed that Bell Pottinger had recently persuaded the prime minister to raise the matter of copyright infringement with Chinese premier Wen Jiabao on behalf of engineering firm Dyson. "He was doing it because we asked him to do it," he said. A Downing Street spokeswoman said: "Bell Pottinger nor any other lobbying firm has any say or influence over government policy." But Labour is calling for the government to make an urgent Commons statement on the issue of lobbying. The BBC News Channel's chief political correspondent Norman Smith said they were also expected to write to Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O'Donnell to ask him to investigate. Shadow Cabinet Office minister Jon Trickett said the investigation had raised "very serious allegations". "We have been calling on the government to implement a statutory register of lobbyists," he said. "We need reform to ensure that there is no question of the rich and powerful buying access to the prime minister and his advisers." The issue of lobbying came to the fore recently with concerns about access to former defence secretary Liam Fox via his friend Adam Werritty.