One of the features of the modern world is the vast increase in lobbying that we have seen since the internet age dawned.

Time was, not long ago, when it was quite a complicated matter to write a letter to an official or a councillor or an MP. You had to get some paper and an envelope (even supposing that you had enough of these in stock), then employ either a pen or a typewriter, and finally look up the address, use or buy a postage stamp, and get the wretched thing to a postbox.

The result was that people tended to write such letters only when there was something about which they felt absolutely passionate or which affected them personally.

Now, of course, all this has changed. One can just press a few buttons on a keyboard and – hey presto! – the thing is despatched. The result has been not only an increase in the number of letters people write, but also the arrival on the scene of organisations devoted to organising large numbers of identical or near-identical emails in a massive campaign centrally generated and descending like rain in a rain storm on the intended recipient.

The first few times I experienced this it had quite an effect because the contrast with the slow pace of individual lobbying was so marked. But that novelty has now worn off and (I suspect in common with many others) I am now inured to this process and unless the communication contains a new argument or important new facts, it has very little effect except to annoy.

Ironically, I think the main effect of this transition to internet campaigning has been to make old-fashioned lobbying more effective.

The personal approach from an individual who has taken the trouble to write with their own thoughts about a subject of their own choosing which is not part of a mass campaign now stands out and demands more attention than it had before – so I suppose that there is at least a silver lining in the cloud of mass lobbying.