The government should be grateful for its vaccine success and its majority, which are helping to damp down a scandal
There is nothing new about lobbying. The term is supposed to date back to the 19th century, when the US president Ulysses Grant was waylaid in the lobby of the Willard hotel, just down Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House, by people petitioning him for jobs.
Nor is there anything illegal, or even wrong, about it. MPs are constantly bombarded by lobbyists urging them to support everything from changes to building regulations to the size of the aid budget.
