It was through the lobby, the quaintly named channel of political machinations at Westminster, that the saga of Peter Mandelson and the Hinduja passport ebbed and flowed. The lobby was briefed daily about who said what to whom and when and where. It was the lobby that disseminated the information to the public through the media. At one stage, the Times noted, "the lobby was in full cry". It had been given incorrect information by no less a mortal than the mighty Downing Street spokesman, Alastair Campbell. Mr Campbell blamed Mr. Mandleson and virtually accused him of telling, as the Sun put it, "a porky". The lobby had been misled and Peter had to go.
Unholy association
In early monastic days, the lobby was simply a cloister. In more recent times it has become an unholy association of political correspondents at Westminster, governed by arcane, unwritten rules and ritualistic pomposity. At least that is how it was when I was a member for a dozen or so years in the last millennium. Membership was open only to those correspondents who worked for British daily papers and broadcasting organisations. (Alien journalists got briefings from lesser beings at the Foreign Office.)
The full-blown native lobby correspondent had the same run of the Palace of Westminster as MPs and peers but had to observe certain niceties. Only MPS were allowed to tread the sacred ground of the Inner Lobby, which leads into the debating chamber. But lobby correspondents could go there provided they pretended to be invisible. One could not approach an MP, even to bid him the time of day. But an MP could approach a correspondent and talk to him, thereby restoring him to visibility and volubility.
Spin-doctors were still in their nappies in those days and briefings were given by real, live ministers. However, it took considerable skill and experience to find out where a briefing was to be held. No one outside the lobby could be told that a briefing was to be given, so a card with the letter B (or P or Z depending on the code of the week) with the time would appear mysteriously on the notice board. Feet would discreetly go to a certain room where a minister would ramble on about the trivia of the day.
Daily ritual
Nowadays the lobby troops publicly into Downing Street to be briefed by the spin-doctor on duty, but the result remains the same: only information favourable to the government of the day emerges. The daily ritual also extends to Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition. More hush-hush briefings, and only information unfavourable to the government of the day emerges.
In my day at least, lobby correspondents were expected to act in an honourable manner towards each other and to the members of the House; but decorum was not always observed. A story rejected (stupidly) by one's own paper could occasionally find its way to another publication in exchange for a few pieces of silver. Once I got a tip-off from the Ulster Unionist MP for Fermanagh and South Tyrone, Col Robert Grosvenor (later the fifth Duke of Westminster), about an establishment being operated under the auspices of the Foreign Office to provide secure relaxation for statesmen from Middle East oil-producing countries after a hard day's round of government offices. Col Robert knew his stuff: he was parliamentary private secretary to the Foreign Secretary of the day. My own paper, being of a puritanical outlook, professed no interest in the bizarre hospitality practices of the Foreign Office.
I passed the story on to the news desk of the (now defunct) News Chronicle and it appeared on the front page the following morning.
The lobby correspondent of the News Chronicle, Ian Trethowan (later director-general of the BBC - the lobby loves to name-drop), was far from pleased. I should have passed the story directly to him, he contended, not to his news desk. He promptly reported me to the lobby committee for behaviour un becoming a gentleman and lobby correspondent.
Tape recorder
Before action could be taken, my misdemeanour was drowned by the imaginative and pioneering action of another correspondent. A tape recorder, a new-fangled device, was found secreted under the very table round which the front bench of the Labour Party (then in opposition) was meeting in its committee rooms in the Commons. The Labour Party, being the Labour Party, at first suspected that one of its own MPs was responsible.
Inquiries were made, MPs and officials were questioned and eventually the trail led unerringly to the lobby. Derek Marks, the burly correspondent of the Daily Express, was found to be the transgressor. Great was the fury of the lobby. Derek was expelled forever from the Palace of Westminster and had to return to the wasteland of Fleet Street.
A few weeks later, his legendary proprietor, Lord Beaverbrook, appointed him editor of the Daily Express. The lobby was not amused.