Louise Haigh riles up lobbyists with war on UK ‘consultation culture’

LONDON — Andy Burnham’s top lieutenant is in a hurry to get things done — but lobbyists fear her plans to cut red tape will make law-making in Whitehall more exclusive. The British prime minister’s de facto deputy Louise Haigh launched an attack on the British state’s “consultation culture” last month. She claimed that Whitehall's established method of seeking input on policy plans has morphed from a “sensible mechanism” for gathering views into an “industry of dither and delay.” Haigh, the first secretary of state, has pledged to overhaul the process by running consultations on government plans only when there is a statutory requirement to do so — or where it would be “conspicuously unfair” not to do so.