Tory chairman in lobby storm cleared... but warned over business role

THE lobbying watchdog has warned the Tory chairman not to mix his public duties and business interests.

Ben Elliot was investigated over claims his luxury lifestyle service firm Quintessentially had arranged for its wealthy clients to have access to top politicians.

He has now been cleared by the Office of the Registrar of Consultant Lobbyists (ORCL) of acting as a lobbyist without being registered.

But it sent him a letter warning to keep his two roles separate. It is the latest in a series of examples this year of the closeness between senior Conservatives and the world of business.

He was advised ‘to be cautious about the possibility of engaging in consultant lobbying activity (perhaps unintentionally) by not making a clear enough distinction between his role as a director of Quintessentially and his other activities connected to government’.

A spokesman for Mr Elliot insisted: ‘The

‘Sending a clear message’

registrar has made clear that Quintessentially does not lobby government and therefore does not need to register as a lobbyist.’

But Labour Party chairman Anneliese Dodds said: ‘The lobbying regulator is sending a clear message… there cannot be one rule for high-ranking Conservatives and their chums and another rule for everyone else.’

Former chancellor Lord Hammond of Runnymede was cleared of breaking the lobbying rules yesterday. He had emailed a Treasury mandarin last year on behalf of a bank he was advising. But the ORCL concluded that ‘he has not been engaged in consultant lobbying activity’ on the grounds that his work for OakNorth did not primarily involve lobbying.

David Cameron – who set up the ORCL when he was prime minister – was also cleared of breaking the rules earlier this year. The watchdog found that as he had been an employee of controversial finance firm Greensill Capital, he had not needed to register himself as a consultant lobbyist.