The British government was plunged into a damage-limitation exercise yesterday, after a lobbyist at the centre of allegations that overseas business clients had been promised access to Ministers was suspended from his job and dismissed as a columnist by a British newspaper.
As the Conservatives attempted to draw comparisons with the "cash-for-questions" affair that paralysed Mr Major's government in the months before last year's election, the Chancellor, Mr Gordon Brown, fired off a blunt letter to his opposite number, Mr Francis Maude, telling him he had "failed to produce" any evidence that details of his Mansion House speech and statement on public spending had been leaked.
The leader of the House of Commons, Ms Ann Taylor, is considering whether to launch an investigation into the allegations, which were made in the Observer newspaper. As Labour challenged the Observer to produce evidence of the allegations, the political lobbyists, GPC Market Access, suspended its director, Mr Derek Draper, a former adviser to the Minister Without Portfolio, Mr Peter Mandelson, and immediately launched an investigation.
Within hours, the editor of the Express, Ms Rosie Boycott, announced that Mr Draper, who is on holiday in Italy, had been sacked from his weekly political column, sub-titled "Inside the Mind of New Labour". It was alleged at the weekend that Mr Draper had sent copies of his column to his former boss, Mr Mandelson, for approval. However, Mr Mandelson's office said he rarely had a chance to read them.
As the row rumbled on, Downing Street was forced to come to the aid of one of its policy advisers, Mr Roger Liddle, amid claims that he offered to try and set up meetings between businessmen and government ministers. Mr Liddle, who was the cofounder of the lobbyist group, Prima Europe, which merged with GPC Market Access six months ago, was introduced to a US businessman acting for the Observer, by Mr Draper, and allegedly boasted of his important contacts in government.
In what could prove an embarrassing episode for the government, Mr Liddle was quoted as saying: "Whenever you are ready, just tell me what you want, who you want to meet and Derek and I will make the call for you."
Rejecting Tory demands for his suspension, Mr Blair's official spokesman confirmed that a discussion had taken place with Mr Liddle, but "he has not been suspended, nor will he be." He said lobbyists often had an inflated idea of their importance: "Often they will talk a good game, but when you analyse it, they have far less influence than they say." Two other political lobbyists have been caught up in the row. Mr Ben Lucas, a former adviser to the Home Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, is said to have claimed his firm (Lawson, Lucas, Mendel sohn) knew details of the Chancellor's Mansion House speech before publication, although LLM has denied seeing an advance copy.
The second lobbyist is Mr Karl Milner, a former assistant to Mr Brown, who is alleged to have leaked a Commons select committee report.