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Article: It's opening time for Westminster ? Let us in to the Westminster club Open to persuasion Just for the record, please Mr Blair
- Article from:
- The Independent (London, England)
- Article date:
- June 30, 1996
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 1996 The Independent - London. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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At his farewell reception earlier this year Chris Meyer spoke
about his interview for the job of John Major's press secretary.
Major had asked him what he knew about the "Lobby". Meyer, then a
press officer at the Foreign Office, told Major that the Lobby had
a "more pungent smell about it than diplomatic correspondents". To
which Major replied that it was "putrid".
For those not in the know, the "Lobby" is the collective term
for that select band of political correspondents who operate in and
around the Palace of Westminster, surviving on off-the-record
briefings and official nods and winks.
A Lobby correspondent at that Meyer reception told me the story
on so- called "Lobby terms", which ...