The Lynskey tribunal was a British government inquiry, set up in October 1948 to investigate rumours of possible corruption in the Board of Trade. Under the chairmanship of a High Court judge, Sir George Lynskey, it sat in November and December 1948, hearing testimony from some sixty witnesses who included a number of government ministers and other high-ranking public servants. Much of the inquiry was centered on the relationship between the junior trade minister, John Belcher, and a self-styled business agent, Sidney Stanley, who claimed to have considerable influence in government circles which he was prepared to exercise on behalf of the business community. In its findings, published in January 1949, the tribunal found that Belcher, who admitted that he had accepted hospitality and smal