Dinner in Honour of the British-American Parliamentary Group Exchange – Library of Congress, March 2022

“The Friendship of the British people with the people of the United States is deep and abiding” The Rt. Hon. Anthony Eden, MP, Leader of the House of Commons, 1944.

The British-American Parliamentary Group (BAPG) is an interparliamentary group for Members of both Houses of Parliament of the United Kingdom to promote closer relations and understanding with  Members of both Houses of Congress of the United States of America and other US political and leading figures.    Its Chair is the Prime Minister, its Joint Presidents are the Speaker of the House of Commons and the Lord Speaker and the Co-Vice Chair from the Commons are normally of Ministerial and Shadow Ministerial office.

The BAPG’s origins date back to 1937 when two back-bench Members of Parliament set up an all-party American committee to extend the knowledge of the United States within the British Parliament and elsewhere.   During the Second World War, the British Government started funding the Group.  The Group is now financed mainly by a grant from the House of Commons Commission and the House of Lords Commission and partly by members’ subscriptions.

The core of the BAPG’s programme is alternate Annual Conferences with the House of Representatives and with the Senate.