As scandal-hit CBI faces a members’ exodus, do we need a replacement?
I f one big company quits, there’ll be an avalanche. So said one senior business figure at the start of this week about the crisis engulfing the CBI. The prediction was accurate. Aviva, a big insurer, was first to resign from the lobby group on Friday morning. Phoenix, a fellow FTSE 100 insurer, quickly followed. By mid-afternoon, it was hard to keep up.
Not all stances took the form of a straightforward Aviva-style resignation “with immediate effect”. Some involved a “suspension” or “pausing” of activities with the CBI, leaving the door open for a return. Even within the latter category, however, one could detect weakening loyalty. The big four auditing firm PwC said it saw value in an organisation that represented UK business, and the issues that mattered most to business as a whole – but did not say specifically that the organisation had to be the CBI.
That points to a debate that has been bubbling in the background over the past fortnight. If the CBI did not exist, would it be necessary to create something that performed its role? And, given the deepening crisis, would it be better to get on with the job of reinvention or replacement now?
The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) is the UK’s most prominent business lobbying organisation. It is a not-for-profit organisation founded by royal charter in 1965, after a merger of older employer bodies.
It claims “unrivalled” access to government. It also claims to have the biggest number of policy specialists outside of Whitehall, the seat of the British government, in order to support its 190,000 business members, which are the chief source of its income. Its total income was £25m in 2021, of which £22m was from membership fees.
Its membership is composed of direct
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