As I have often pointed out, the primary reason I started this blog is I believe the world is completely insane, and I like to be able to point out examples. While you might think I'd grow numb to it all, it turns out there are still things that can completely surprise me.

Take, for instance, this recent complaints I've been hearing where people literally complain about the idea the British government won't give them money to... lobby the British government.

Yes, that's right. People are upset at the idea of a government not paying them to try to lobby the government into changing its policies.



That's not actually how they put it, of course. The way they describe the issue makes things even worse. For instance, the Guardian recently ran an article whose headline was:

Scientists attack their 'muzzling' by government

With the tagline:

State-funded scientists could be prevented from lobbying for change in their field under Cabinet Office proposals

It begins:

Senior scientists have denounced a potential move to “muzzle” colleagues whose findings are disliked by the government. The proposal – announced by the Cabinet Office earlier this month – would block researchers who receive government grants from using their results to lobby for changes to laws or regulations. For example, an academic whose government-funded research showed that new regulations were proving particularly harmful to the homeless would not be able to call for policy change.

But look at what it says a little while later:

The row focuses on a new clause that the Cabinet Office wants inserted into all new and renewed grant agreements involving government money that would block recipients from using any of those funds for lobbying. It is the sweeping nature of this regulation that has alarmed academics.

Nothing about that says anyone is actually prohibited from lobbying the government. Nothing about it says anyone is prevented from using their findings to call for changes. All it says is they can't use the money given to them by the government to do so. That is, if they want to lobby the government, they need to do it on their own dime.

A sane person would likely consider that common sense. The government shouldn't be giving money to people so they can spend that money on trying to change government policy. Leaving aside the silliness of paying people to lobby yourself, the purpose of government grants isn't to fund lobbying. It certainly isn't to fund lobbying which could be used to campaign for more funding.

And yet, there are tons of people complaining about this. It's not just scientists either. Charities are complaining too. For an example, consider:

John Downie of the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations said: ” We fundamentally reject the notion that government funds should not be used to resource lobbying, campaigning or informing public policy. Voluntary organisations not only have a right to campaign and lobby government but a duty to do so.”

Now again, the government isn't stopping charities from lobbying anyone or campaigning for anything with this plan. All it's saying is people can't use money the government gave them to lobby the government. If they want to lobby the government, they just have to raise the money to pay for that themselves.

And yet, you will constantly see people like this John Downie conflating the idea people should be allowed to use government funding to lobby the government with the idea people should be allowed to lobby the government in general. They seem incapable of understanding that while of course people should be free to campaign for whatever they want, that doesn't mean the government should be footing the bill for it.

I don't know if this is due to some massive sense of entitlement, where some scientists and charities feel they deserve to be paid to try to change the minds of the peole who paid them, or if perhaps these people are just completely delusional. What I do know is taxpayers should not have to worry their taxes are being given to people who will use it to campaign to try to get control of more of the taxpayers' money.