If ever there was a reason to introduce transparency regulations for lobbyists now, it's this. Lord Mandelson has teamed up with some of his mates and this week launched a lobbying agency.
She claims that 'we list all sponsors on our website and in our annual reports' and the funding of the Network is 'openly declared'.
In fact, Disney does not publicly disclose how much money her company gets from Pfizer, GSK or Merck or the rest of the corporate interests that bankroll her operation.
This raises questions over how closely the research produced by the Stockholm Network correlates to the commercial interests of its sponsors.
With just under a week to go to end of the voting for the EU Worst Lobbying Award, some of the nominees have started receiving visits from the infamous Brussels “Lobby-Cleaner”.
To see how the Lobby Cleaner team gets on with a visit to the lobby group, BUSINESSEUROPE, watch the video:
And to see how the Lobby Cleaner team try and attend a hedge fund industry event watch this one:
Gerard Murphy's 'The Year of Disappearances, Political Killings in Cork, 1921-1922’, published by Gill & Macmillan on 29 October 2010, purportedly examines the period of the so-called ‘Cork Republic’ during 1921-22. Murphy alleges that the Cork IRA killed and ‘disappeared’ sometimes-uninvolved Cork Protestants, including teenagers, in the final phase of the 1919-21 Irish War of Independence (WoI)[1] and its aftermath. This is a controversial thesis and part of a debate whose parameters have been much publicised and discussed for over a decade.[2]
INTRODUCTION
Before tackling the book, it is necessary to give a brief historical introduction for those unfamiliar with this period in Irish history and/or with the context within which a debate on sectarianism in Irish history is taking place.
Originally published British Medical Journal, 13 November 2010.
Earlier this month, UK health secretary Andrew Lansley announced that the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) would be stripped of its power to halt the purchase of drugs not considered cost effective for the NHS. He argued that the new system would be one where the “price of a drug will be determined by its assessed value”.
The Stockholm Network, a pan-European think tank network, agreed with the proposed change to NICE’s remit. In a press release its chief executive, Helen Disney, argued that the move showed that, “even at a time of austerity, the British public does not want or accept rationed healthcare”.
The network, which produces research for “market-oriented policy ideas in Europe”, has long had NICE within its sights.
In 2007 it raised similar concerns, arguing that: “A decision to prioritise a less therapeutically effective medicine because of cost-based considerations over an effective, but more expensive, medicine could lead to some serious political, social and moral dilemmas”.
Secret internal company documents from the oil giant Shell show that in the immediate aftermath of the execution of the Nigerian activist and writer Ken Saro-Wiwa it adopted a PR strategy of cosying up to key BBC editors and singling out NGOs that it hoped to "sway".
The documents offer a previously hidden insight into efforts by the company to deflect the PR storm that engulfed it after the Nigerian activist was hanged by the country's military government. Shell faced accusations that it had colluded with the government over the activists' deaths.
There is an easy way for a mediocre politician to grab headlines: upset the Israel lobby. Karel de Gucht, the European commissioner for trade, discovered this to his cost in September when asked about Middle East “peace” talks on the Flemish radio station VRT.
Deviating from the official EU script, de Gucht rated the chances of the Obama administration resolving the Israel-Palestine conflict as extremely low. After describing the Zionist lobby as the “best organised” in US politics and inferring that it was a major obstacle to progress, he expressed a view about how Jews in general perceive Israel. “There is indeed a belief – it’s difficult to describe it otherwise – among most Jews that they are right,” he said. “And a belief is something that’s difficult to counter with rational arguments.”
Clearly, these comments lacked nuance and someone in de Gucht’s position should be wary of making blanket statements about an entire religious or ethnic group. But did they actually betoken hostility to Jews or, as The Wall Street Journal claimed, constitute an “anti-Semitic riff”?
One consequence of de Gucht’s remarks is that they highlighted how the Israel lobby is a force not only on Capitol Hill, but in Brussels, too, and that it is attempting to stifle debate about Israel’s sadistic treatment of the Palestinian people.
David Morrison, 3rd November 2010 The negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians are equivalent to allowing a thief to negotiate with his victim about the amount of stolen goods he is going to give back, while he keeps his boot on the victim’s throat.
Direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians began in early September. President Abbas was opposed to direct negotiations without Israel calling a halt to settlement construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. But, he came under great pressure from President Obama to do so and reluctantly gave in.
The Road Map
In May 2003, Israel agreed to freeze all settlement activity prior to the start of negotiations, when it accepted the Road Map (aka “a performance-based roadmap to a permanent two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict”) [1].
Drawn up by the Bush Administration, it is the internationally accepted framework for negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, endorsed by the Security Council in resolution 1515 [2]. The EU and the Quartet (the US, the EU, Russia and the UN Secretary-General) have regularly called upon both sides to fulfil their obligations under the Road Map (see, for example, a recent Quartet statement of 21 September 2010 [3]).
Political opponents Ian Paisley and Martin McGuiness were confirmed as First Minister and Deputy First Minister of a new executive in May 2007, closing yet another chapter in Northern Ireland’s troubled history. A dramatic realignment of politics had brought these irreconcilable enemies together and the media played a significant role in persuading the public to accept this startling change. The Propaganda of Peace places their role in a broad cultural context and examines a range of factual and fictional representations, from journalism and public museum exhibitions to film, television drama and situation comedy. The authors propose a distinctive theoretical and methodological approach to analyzing the role of such representations in communicating what they call ‘the propaganda of peace’. They go on to explore whether it simply promotes conflict transformation or if it actually underwrites the abandonment of a politically engaged public sphere at the very moment when debates about neo-liberalism, financial meltdown and social and economic inequality make it most necessary?
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If ever there was a reason to introduce transparency regulations for lobbyists now, it's this. Lord Mandelson has teamed up with some of his mates and this week launched a lobbying agency. 
Steven Harkins, Melissa Jones, David Miller 
David Cronin, 6th November 2010
