United Kingdom: Developing lobbying regulation in an open government context

The Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning, and Trade Union Administration Act received Royal Assent and was enacted on 30 January 2014. Part 1 of the Act provides for a statutory register of lobbyists. The UK Government has stated that its aim is to commence the register in good time before the end of this Parliament in May 2015.This chapter illustrates the socio-political context within which recent UK lobbying legislation has been developed and describes the evolution and design of that regulation. It goes on to describe the key challenges that were encountered during the policy development process and summarises the core provisions for the statutory register of lobbyists.