Question: What sort of a campaign will Tony Blair need to win a euro referendum?

Jon Aarons: I think we're in a kind of phoney war at the moment and nobody's sure whether the campaign's already started or not. It would be generally welcome, I'm sure, for the sake of clarity, if the campaign were to be formally declared.

From a PR perspective, and my professional take on this as a corporate PR man, there is a huge amount of confusion around the issues and that confusion is being exacerbated. The public is confused about the merits of the single currency and that is being preyed upon by the organised forces on either side of the debate. It's just time to get on with it really.

People are increasingly bewildered as to whether the euro is something they should support or not.

I would like to see the government provide state funding for both sides. If Tony's confident of his argument then he should be prepared to see equal funding for both sides and win the argument on its merits. That would help us to get away from the whole notion that this is something that is funded out of the pockets of a few rich individuals or vested interests.

At the moment it's all about two camps and who's got the biggest war chest rather than who's got the most intellectually coherent argument.

I also think this summer is potentially the turning point. I guess that's why he's been biding his time. There are millions of Britons who are out in the continent this summer holding the euro in their hands. My money is on many of them, that perhaps were previously sceptical, coming back much warmer to the idea of the euro and that there's nothing to be afraid of.

Now's the time to go for it and let's have a totally equal, totally open and fair debate.

Question: What does Blair's message need to be?

Jon Aarons: The case for the euro is surely that we are de facto part of increasingly a single European economy and therefore it makes sense for us to have a single European currency. But there are strong arguments against that.

Question: Is Blair the right person to lead a "yes" campaign - voters could vote "no" as a mid-term snub?

Jon Aarons: This is the risk of all the political games that are being played at the moment with the issue: because it's dragging on it's now going to get caught up with mid-term blues. The issue should be kept out of the run of the mill yah-boo politics.

It's probably too late if he isn't the right person because Blair has identified himself with the 'yes' campaign. I think he should just get on with it. It seems to be a characteristic of Tony Blair that he does take his time getting round to the big decisions.

Question: What do you think of the campaigns we've had so far like anti-euro advert that featured a comedian impersonating Hitler?

Jon Aarons: There's been a lot of xenophobia. It's not only offensive; I think it's juvenile. It reduces the debate to a childishly simplistic level. It's preying on people's petty fears of the Nazi's who we defeated in war 60 years ago. For goodness sake, it's ancient history. Grow up and let's get into the real economic merits.

Question: Labour trumpeted its relationship with big business in 1997 as a success. Is it now a liability?

Jon Aarons: There was a certain amount of mischief making in the media about taking business people to Johannesburg. And, of course if there's any suggestion of any businessman going anywhere near a politician it's immediately characterised as some kind of sleaze story.

These people who are going to the summit are business people who have been, I think, involved in policy development on various government working parties so it's not just as if they're going along there to sell missiles or something.

The government has got itself a problem and I think one of the defining moments was the administration of Railtrack and the destruction of a lot of trust in the City that followed that action. There was a feeling that this was a government that could pull the rug from under your feet if you did business with them. It's at a time when the government has enormous plans that are heavily dependent on private sector investment and co-operation.

Private-public partnerships have been very much at the heart of the government's thinking on public service reform. If it starts to muck about with the good will of the private sector then it's going to get its fingers burnt.

On the other side of that there is a general longer-term issue about the anti-business culture that there is in political and media circles of what one might call the Westminster village.

I saw this when I was advising Andersen earlier this year when they got embroiled in sleaze allegations of cosying up to New Labour and allegedly giving them free advice over tax proposals and this sort of thing. We spent quite a lot of time having to unpick all that and prove that it wasn't true.

At the time one of the things I was struck by was that there was a certain sort of professional newspaper journalist absolutely salivating at the very prospect that a politician might be meeting with a businessperson. Or that political proposals that had profound implications for the economy might actually be tested by people with business expertise.

Question: How do politicians and business get round that?

Jon Aarons: I think it comes down to openness and transparency and explanation and good communication - which is what our profession is all about.

The government and some business people get themselves into difficulty over some of these issues when they are shrouded in secrecy and people skulk around and pretend that these kinds of contacts are not going on rather than being totally open.

Before the 1997 election I think there were a number of businesses that were consulted by Labour as it was coming into power for the first time in nearly 20 years. Blair had to put together a government of people that had no experience in running ministerial departments and was talking about some pretty radical policies that had not been tried before. It made absolute sense that in Opposition they were tested by business and economic experts given they didn't have access to the civil service's expertise.

Now they are in power they've got the civil service at their disposal but there's still a bad smell of burnt fingers around a lot of the contacts with business because of the way it's all tied up with having to solicit big donations to the Labour Party. That takes us into the murky area of sleaze.

Question: Is there an image problem for people who make big donations to political parties?

Jon Aarons: Yes I think there is. The evidence is clear that a lot of people in business are shying away from having anything to do with the government because they are conscious of the damage it can do to their company's reputation.

There are two issues. The public's perception, albeit unfair, of companies or individuals that make big donations doesn't help.

The other is the question 'is this a group of people you can trust with your money?'

Frankly, Labour has given itself a problem by not handling its customer care terribly well with its donors and not always being seen to give a good return on the investment people have made.

Question: Would it be a difficult job to sell the idea of state funding for political parties to the public?

Jon Aarons: I think it is a hard sell. But I think the time has come that it's absolutely essential. We've got ourselves into a bind over this whole area because with successive governments it's the same old story; that people of one thing in Opposition and as soon as they get into power they find that they rather like the infrastructure and resources that surround them. As a result certain issues, such as state funding and proportional representation, fall down the agenda.

State funding is clearly a more democratic solution than the current set up but it's very difficult to persuade a government to support the idea.

State funding is too easily characterised as something which is favoured by small parties that can't raise money. We've got this extraordinary situation where the government of the day that is still riding at an all-time high in the opinion polls has got itself into a financial crisis.

The real problem, I think, is the way the costs of elections have risen so drastically so that we're now into conducting them with American-style slickness and big resources. That means we're having to resort to American-style fundraising which doesn't sit easily in this country. Arguably it's time for the Americans to revisit this system too.

State funding has got to come but there is also the difficulty in persuading incumbent politicians that they should support it.

Question: So do you think there's a problem with politicians who benefit from the status quo?

Jon Aarons: Absolutely. For Labour the very strong force of opposition to it will be the trade unions of course. They will lose influence if state funding comes in. I think that's one reason why the Labour Party finds it so difficult to come out on one side of the argument or the other because they're ravaged by this internal debate.

I suppose the best chance of us having state funding is if the next Tory government were to introduce it. But I'm sure we're likely to see that by the time the next Tory government comes in it will have done so on the back of a return of popular good will and business funding so they will lose interest in the issue.

Question: You're set to go before the Wicks committee to discuss the role of spin doctors. What issues are you hoping to raise with MPs?

Jon Aarons: The approach we've adopted for this is to support our 150 members in the government information service.

There's been a lot of spinning about spinning and a lot of misrepresentation of a handful of badly behaving ministerial advisers.

The part we can play in our submission is to say that by and large the majority of communications professionals working in government are exactly that. They are professional and they abide by a strict code of conduct. There's a long tradition - a democratic necessity - that there is a free flow of information and communication in government.

The role of communication in a democracy is unarguable. And it's right that new policies should be properly explained and there should be managed consultations.

These days people are so strongly influenced by the media, particularly the broadcast media, means that you've got to have professional skills at your disposal to get the message across on policy debates.

The committee is looking at the proper role of special advisers. Some of those are our members because they want to be regarded as professional. They are angry and saddened that they've been tainted by one or two individuals. They are entitled to the same training and properly negotiated terms and conditions as the government information service.

Question: Was part of the Sixsmith-Moore row that Whitehall is suspicious of PR?

Jon Aarons: It's politics that was the problem. Politicians have always wanted to control the media. It's always been the way. In a democracy you want to influence public opinion and the media is the way to do it.

There is an inevitable tension between the civil service communication professionals and the political elements. That really isn't anything new; that tension has been there for many decades between elected politician and their personal appointees and the permanent civil service.

But there's certainly been a change, that's clear. I think at the heart of it is the fact that Labour had such a huge mountain to climb in Opposition to get to the point of winning the election in 1997. It built a communication machine that was absolutely formidable for an Opposition party. Peter Mandelson and Alastair Campbell were brilliant organisers and managers of that campaign.

I think the problem arose because when Labour came into power in the first term they continued to operate as if they were the Opposition. Rather than saying 'now we've got the civil service at our disposal as the government of the day' they started to regard it as something that was Tory property that was in some way entrenched.

Because the Conservatives had been there for 18 years it was taken as read that the people that had been working with that government therefore were tainted. There was an in-built suspicion of direct advisers to Tory ministers by the in-coming Labour ministers. They preferred to take advice from their own people that they were bringing in rather than to draw on the advice of the experienced civil service.

We saw a whole bunch of heads of information swept out of their jobs in a number of Whitehall departments and replaced by political appointees.

Martin Sixsmith was one of those people who were brought in by this government. He hadn't actually been around very long having been brought in from the BBC. There are people like him all over Whitehall at the moment that have been brought in from the media, particularly the broadcast media, with no background in the training or traditions of the civil service.

You could say that's a good thing and that the civil service needed a shake-up. I go along with it up to a point but I think that what it means is that these people do not recognise the same accountability structures. They don't owe any loyalty to the civil service as a body. They don't have that same kind of permanent vision of a role in government. They are very much geared to the government agenda.

At the same time you've got political appointees who are unaccountable, unelected people who were until the 90s only brought in to work on policy development. Labour's people had got used to being involved in media work in Opposition and simply carried on that work in government. So you've got this total tension between new arrivals in the civil service that expect to be in control and new party appointees in government who are used to being in control and they are up against each other. The ingredients of disaster were there around Stephen Byers from the moment those two people were working together. People can change and adapt and perhaps those two didn't adapt very well to the new scenario.

It hasn't gone pear-shaped in every government department but it's a source of tension.

There is a role for politicians and their immediate political appointees to have a view of how policy initiatives should be communicated.

There is, as Mike Granatt the head of the GIS has already told the committee, inevitably an overlap between the two roles and it's really a managerial issue for the minister to get the two working together.

Question: Is the row over government spin doctors likely to put off the best people from applying for PR jobs with Whitehall departments?

Jon Aarons: Yes, I think it does. You'd have to be a madman to want to step into Martin Sixsmith's shoes and that is a tragedy. Without naming names, I've met one or two people who are in senior communications roles in central government that have come straight across from the media. They are regarded as a 'catch' because they are famous faces from the telly or famous by-lines from the national press.

They have come in without a background as professional communicators. They are coming in from the media with a lot of naive ideas about the management of their post and the proper democratic accountability of their post.

I think Martin Sixsmith may not be the last that we get to hear about because there are still some tensions around the place.

I also think the best and most successful communicators are working in industry not in government and it's the old, old story. It's not just about PR people, incidentally.

There have been other attempts to bring business people into government - such as Lord Simon from BP and Archie Norman. It hasn't worked and you have to ask serious questions about how government today can develop its economic and business policies without proper input from business expertise because the whole culture of Westminster, of which the political media is part, militates against people with real hands-on business experience getting anywhere near government roles.

Any of the issues that this government is trying to get to grips with demand business experience.

One person who is right there at the moment is Alan Leighton of the Post Office. He's gone right into the maelstrom to sort out something that's still an arm of government to apply some business principles. You just have to look at his situation and what an enormous task it is. He's having to become an unelected politician and play political games whereas his skills lie in the management and turnaround of large business organisations.

There's a real challenge of bring the two worlds together and we've got to be more receptive in bringing business expertise into government.

Politicians and the media have got to face up to the fact that business people are wealth creators with successful track records. Of course there are bad apples and some people have been panicked by some of the antics they have heard about in the United States with Enron and WorldCom. It's quite wrong to characterise anybody in business as being a crook. There are fantastic success stories in business and highly intelligent people in the sector.

With the problems the country's got with the provision of public services we've got to understand that we need business expertise to solve them: whether it's London Underground or the NHS or education we need private expertise.