Political parties - party funding Flashcards
Political party funding methods
- Collective membership subscriptions
- Fundraising events, conferences, fetes, festivals, dinners
- Donations from supporters,
- Raising loans from banks + wealthy individuals
- Self-financing of candidates for office
- Up to £2 million per party is available in grants from the electoral commission
Why is part funding controversial
- Income of parties varies considerably, bigger parties have the advantage
- Funding by large donors (individuals and companies) from abroad are illegal, many donors give secretive and uncountable influence
- Some donations verge on being corrupt, some expect honours like peerage in HoC or knighted (lord ashcroft + piggate)
- Party membership declining so parties rely more heavily on wealthy individuals donations
Ashcroft and piggate
- Lord Ashcroft was a large supporter of the conservatives, he had donated around £10 million before dropping support in 2013 because of conflict with David Cameron over giving Ashcroft a senior government role
- Lord Ashcroft published a book titled ‘call me dave’ where he claims cameron had sexual relations with a pig while at an initiation ceremony for an oxford university dining society.
Examples of wealth indivduals donations
- Lord Morris - £1,580,000 to labour
- Lord Bamford - £ 2,770,000 to conservatives
Proposal measures to balance party functions
- Impose restrictions on size of individual donations (system used in the USA). In order to be effective the cap would have to be low
- Impose tighter restrictions on allowed party spending. Would make large scale funding futile
- Restrict donations to individuals, outlaw donations from business, pressure groups and trade unions
- Replace all funding for parties with state grants funded by general taxation
Phillips report 2007
- Came after Blairs cash for honours scandal (2006)
- Recommended state funding based on vote share/membership funding because of a lack of faith in parliament
- It was meant to:
- End corruption
- End hidden forms of influence
- Reduce huge financial advantages
Issues with the phillips report
- Taxpayers would be forced to pay for someone they don’t agree with - BNP for example
- How would funding be distributed
- Parties may become dependant on the state - “servants of the state”
- Excessive regulation of funding
What is short money
taxpayer funding of opposition parties in the HoC (introduced 1975)
What is cranbourne money
providing financial assistance to the opposition and second largest opposition in the HoC. (Introduced oct 1956)
MPs saleries
- Basic annual salary for an MP form 1st April 2024 is £91,346 from general taxation
- In addition MPs are able to claim allowances cover costs of employing staff, running office, maintaining constituency or london residence
How funding has been balanced
- PPERA 200 act - set up electoral commission to monitor spending, the amount of a party can spend was limited to £30,000
- Must declare any donations over £5000 to the commission and not accept donations from abroad
Electoral comission
In the UK, the Electoral Commission is the national election commission, created in 2001 as a result of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. It is an independent agency that regulates party and election finance and sets standards for how elections should be run.
