2.1 Political Parties Flashcards
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What are political parties?
- associations of people who hold similar political views and seek to promote those views
- seek to gain govt power at local, regional and national levels
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Describe the membership of political parties
- Most have hierarchy and formal membership including leader, activists and followers
- United by broad ideology, but contain factions
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Functions of Political Parties
- Policy formulation
- Recruitment and training of leaders
- Represent political ideologies and ideas (e.g. Martin Bell)
- Organisation of govt (at local, regional or national level) OR call existing govt to account
- Educate public
- Participation and mobilisation
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Describe the current state of party funding
- Parties have seen decline in membership and thus subscription fees
- Parties increasingly reliant from individuals, corporations and trade union - accusations of political parties effectively buying influence and power
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List examples of cronyism (money buying power)
- Tony Blair with Sir Bernie Ecclestone (£1m donation)
- Lebvedev
- cash for honours scandal
- Mohammed Mansour
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Describe Green Party funding
Reject conditional donations from companies as want to represent individuals
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Describe supermarket funding
- Tescos donates to Con
- Sainsbury’s to Lab/LD
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Describe current funding rules
- Have to have be elector to donate (have to be UK citizen) - students often get this point mixed up
- PPERA 2000 (updated 2009)
- trade union members have to ‘opt in’ from 2016
- Candidate spending in short campaign: fixed £11,390 + same allowance per regsiterered voter as long campaign
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Describe PPERA 2000 (updated 2009)
- Established Electoral Commission to oversee laws relating to party finance with an aim to improve transparency
- parties must submit audited annual accounts
- published details of party spending during elections
- all donations in excess of £7,500 must be declared by Commission - made available to public scrutiny
- increased ‘short money’, though Cons cut it by 19% in in 2015
- written in era before social media, needs updating
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List ways parties are funded in the UK
- Membership fees - collapse for Con and SNP, surge for Greens
- Donations
- Grants - limited amount of public money made available to parties (‘short money’ and ‘cranborne money’)
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Describe donations to Con and Lab
- Trade union funding almost exclusively directed towards Labour
- Conservatives by major business backers (finance, insurance and real estate)
- Accusations this exerts undue influence over process of policy development
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Describe ‘short money’
- Help opposition parties in HoC with Parliamentary duties
- not for election/campaigning expenses
- proportional to seats
- cut by 19% in 2015
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Describe ‘cranborne money’
similar scheme for HoL for ‘short money’
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Describe the Policy Development Grant Fund
- Electoral Commission has £2m from UK Parliament
- allocates to parties with at least 2 sitting MPs, to develop policies including election manifestos
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Describe funding in the 2019 GE
- Total donations: 63% Con, Lab 18% (81% total)
- Individuals’ donations: 71% Con vs 6% Lab
- Corporations made up 30% of Con funding
- top 50 donors donated £35.5m, £24.9m of which to Con, £3.6m from Lord Bamford (JCB)
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Describe trade union funding the the 2019 GE
- Trade Unions made up 93% of Lab donations
- with healthier stream of membership fees (due to increased membership)
- also due to declining donations from individuals
- UNITE donated £3m to Lab - evidence of corruption is weak
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How has Keir Starmer diversified Lab party funding?
Reached out to corporate funding to diversify from trade union reliance (e.g. £3m UNITE 2019)
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How could a reformed party funding system potentially system work?
- allocated on party membership or electoral success in various elections (local, devolved, national)
- remove unfair advantage from corporate backing
- ultimately enable greater voter choice
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What are the limits of a reformed party funding system?
- if reflects past electoral performance Lab/Con would receive unfair advantage (esp incumbent)
- entrench two-party dominance
- leaves minor parties further behind
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Why may a reformed party funding system be unpopular with the public?
- Right of individual of freedom of expression to support whichever political cause/party they wish
- would lead to state funding of extremist parties (e.g. BNP)
- requires higher general taxation
- inflamed by expenses scandals
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To what extent should parties be state funded?
P1: Reduce party reliance on donors -more responsive to public vs reduce party links to wider society i.e. elitism - search for fund-raising leads to parties reaching out beyond their core base to range of interests and groups
P2: Healthier party system vs reinforce two-party dominant system - entrench two-party dominance and reduce pluralism
P3: Transparency - democratic deficit and record-low trust in politics vs unpopular with public
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List some recent examples of significant donations
- Egyptian businessman Mohammed Mansour (Con) - £5m - becomes senior Con Treasurer and knighted
- Autoglass founder Gary Lubner (Lab) - £5m
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How have political parties changed in recent times?
Parties have become more:
- centrally-organised
- media-based
- focussed on running expensive media campaigns
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To what extent is a manifesto effective in democracy?
P1: provide mandate and legitimacy - coalition agreement fully acheived vs change in PM mid-term - Rishi Sunak/John Swinney have no mandate (no one voted for him), Liz Truss fracking
P2: Active participation and public scruitiny- voters consent election time, aggregates demands and ideas into policy programme, makes policies legitimate (e.g. get Brexit done) vs manifesto commitments not always kept - LD Coalition e.g. tuition fees, whole manifesto rarely implemented
P3: Accountable to parliament - strong opposition and backbenchers ensure this vs economic and other exceptional events contradict with party commitments - mean that parliament may not hold party to account (e.g. Lab Brexit policy change)
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Describe recent changes in party funding
- Each party can spend max £54,010 for each constituency that they contest in regulated period
- If contest all 632 GB seats, can spend £34m
- Increased threshold from £30k to £54k (80%) in Nov 2023 due to inflation
Only applies for short campaign
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How much can parties spend in the long campaign (before Parliament is dissolved)
- fixed sum of £40,220 per constituency
- 8p allowance per registered voter in urban seat
- 12p allowance per registered voter in rural seat
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Outline the different stages of party campaigning
- Regulated period - 365 days before polling day
- Long campaign - kicks in once Parliament has been sitting for 55 months
- Short campaign - kicks in once Parliament dissolved
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Oultine the maximum spending in each campaign period
- Short: £11,370 + allowance per registered elector
- Long: £40,220 + allowance per registered elector
- Regulated: £54k
