The Shadow Business Secretary, Jonathan Reynolds, has had another brush with the private sector paying for his parliamentary staff. It will be of no surprise to co-conspirators, that despite having previously pledged to ban every type of ‘dodgy lobbying’, he accepted a secondment of a lobbyist from the Lowick Group to become his parliamentary assistant. Labour have simultaneously been attacking the influence of lobbyists…

The Lowick Group lobby on behalf of fast fashion sweat shop giant BooHoo. BooHoo of course being notorious for forcing staff to work in dangerous conditions for illegal wages. The lobbyist in question was valued at £3,392.25 for 26 working days, which whilst a suspiciously low daily rate for a lobbyist, is much more than Boohoo pay their workers…

The executive at Lowick Group that took this secondment is Lucas Patrick-Short, a former staffer for the Neo-Conservative Henry Jackson Society. Guido questions whether or not the influence of the HJS has made it’s way to the dizzy heights of the Shadow Business policy desk…