For the ramifications of our stories on the City's lobbying machine, you need simply browse through the rest of the website. Here is an item about how George Osborne is fighting Brussels for the right of bankers to pay themselves untenably large bonuses. There is the report on the admission by the Barclays chairman, Marcus Agius, about how watchdogs had only belatedly taken on the bank about its years of antisocial behaviour: the tax-dodging, the loophole-seeking, the contempt for the normal rules – after years of letting its millionaire executives go wild.
The Collins dictionary defines lobbying as attempting "to influence (legislators, etc) in the formulation of policy". Whether it is pay or taxes or market supervision, the City has had its say and got its way. Over and over again. The results are all around us and will have to be paid for in taxes, debt and damaged economic prospects for years to come.
The response from the lobbying industry to all this was the same on Tuesday as it has been for ages. "Lobbying is an absolutely integral part of the democratic process," wrote the Public Relations Consultants Association. Members of all industries and none must be entitled to make their views known to policymakers. The trouble with the City's influence is that it is so large and pervasive: there are 26 industry bodies and 38 public affairs organisations, and nearly one in every five lords has a direct interest in finance. If anything, the £93m lobbying budget quoted by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism is an understatement: it leaves off conferences, thinktank funding and much of the quotidian entertainment and lunching that goes into buttering up powerbrokers.
Just before becoming prime minister, David Cameron vowed to lessen the grip on the policymaking process exerted by lobbyists and their paymasters. "We don't know who is meeting whom," he declared in 2010. "We don't know whether any favours are being exchanged. We don't know which outside interests are wielding unhealthy influence." The truth of that statement has only been amplified through all the stories about Frédéric Michel and Jeremy Hunt, Adam Werrity and Liam Fox, and former Conservative treasurer Peter Cruddas and his demands for £250,000 donations in return for dinners with the prime minister.
Yet in office Mr Cameron has shown less resolve in tackling lobbyists' power. The lobby register that his coalition is currently consulting on would ignore whom lobbyists are meeting and why, and how much they are being bankrolled. It would leave off the vast majority of professionals engaged in lobbying work. The results of the consultation will be announced this month. Our stories this week must serve to toughen up the proposals.