Political Parties (PP 2.1) Flashcards
What is a political party?
A party is a political organisation with members.
What is the left-wing, and name three (generally) left-wing parties?
Left-wing politics typically advocates for greater social equality, public ownership or regulation of key services, and progressive taxation.
> Strengthening the welfare state
> Supporting trade unions
> Addressing issues like income inequality
> Climate change
> Workers’ rights
Labour Party, Green Party, SNP
What is the right-wing, and name three (generally) right-wing parties?
Right-wing politics often emphasises free-market economics, individual responsibility, and a smaller role for the state.
> Reducing taxes
> Limiting welfare
> Promoting national sovereignty
> Maintaining traditional values.
Conservatives, Reform/UKIP, DUP
What are some left-wing beliefs?
- High taxation, especially of the rich
- Redistribution of wealth
- State-run services and industry
- Socially progessive
- Equality, diversity, multiculturalism
- Rehabilitation of criminals
- Collective provision
- Sceptical of capitalism
What are some right-wing beliefs?
- Patriotism, nationalist, tradition
- Low taxation and low state spending
- Personal freedoms and individualism
- Free market, supporters of capitalism
- Increased military spending
- Privatisation
- Hierarchal society (upholds inequality)
- Family, religion
- Defence of existing order
As of the 2024 election, how many parties were there registered?
394
What are the key features of a political party?
- Party members will have similar views, but there are likely to be a very broad range of views
> Often a great deal of political conflict within parties. - Aim of a party is to exercise power at some level in the areas where they operate (this might be national, regional or local).
> Parties will seek to stand in elections to gain representation with the ultimate aim of gaining governmental power. - An organisation that has an existence beyond its leaders.
> An organisation which selects candidates for elections and develops policies for which that party stands.
> There is, however, a tendency for parties to be dominated by their leaders.
What is the main purpose of parties in our political system?
To turn voters’ political preferences into governments.
How many parties have seats in the House of Commons (2024)?
13 parties
What is the problem with political parties being largely based on their elected representatives, in terms of the influence of members?
- Party members have had slightly more power recently (for example, they have a role in selecting the party leader) but have very little say in deciding policy.
> Long struggle in the Labour Party by its members to have more say on policy, and they have more say on policy and a clearer role in selecting their leader than Conservative members do (although as leader Keir Starmer has asserted his control over the Labour Party)
> Conservative Party have recently given more power
What are the only parties that have been in power since 1945?
Labour and the Conservatives (plus the LibDems; coalition government with Conservatives from 2010 to 2015.)
Who controls the devolved government in Wales?
Labour (since its inception); often needs the support of Plaid Cymru
Who controls the devolved government in Scotland?
The SNP (in 2024, in coalition with the Scottish Greens)
What are the Northern Irish parties with seats in the House of Commons?
- DUP
- UUP
- SDLP
- Alliance
- Traditional Unionist
> Sinn Fein also wins seats but does not take them up
Name two examples of a ‘minor party’ having a huge impact on UK politics.
- UKIP only ever won one seat in elections to the Westminster parliament
> 12.6% vote share (third biggest in 2015)
> 2016 Brexit Referendum - Reform (only won five seats)
> 14.3% vote share (third biggest in 2024)
> Took a large number of votes from the Conservatives adding to their devastating losses.
What is a single-party government, and give one recent example?
- Most governments formed in Britain are single party governments
> Power is exercised by the leaders of one political party.
> Usually on the basis of that party having a majority (more than 50%) of the seats.
What is a coalition government, and give one example?
- A coalition government is where two or more parties share power in government.
> The only recent coalition government in the UK has been that between the Conservative and the LibDems from 2010 to 2015.
What is a minority government, and give one recent example?
- A minority government is when a party rules without a majority in the House of Commons.
> A government needs to win key votes in the House of Commons
> 2017 Conservatives (317 seats, 8 short of a majority)
Between the 2017 and 2019 general elections the Conservative government ruled as a minority government. In the 2017 election they won 317 seats, 8 short of a majority. It secured a confidence and supply agreement with a party from Northern Ireland (the DUP) to ensure it won these key votes
What is a confidence and supply agreement, and give a recent example?
A confidence and supply agreement is where a minority government promises a smaller party influence over policy in exchange for support in confidence motions (voting for confidence to rule) and supply motions (allows the government to collect tax)
> If they lose them, the government must resign
> 2017 confdience and supply agreement between the Conservatives and DUP
What are the main features of a political party?
- Parties make policy.
- Act as a form of political participation
> May represent a section of society. - Select candidates and campaign in elections locally.
- Source of political leaders.
- Contest elections; democratic choice
What is an argument for the view that parties make policy, in connection to the Labour Party?
The Labour Party has an annual conference that votes on and thus decides policy.
What is an argument against the view that parties make policy, in connection to the Labour Party?
- The Labour Party C onference 2024 voted to reverse the Labour government’s decision to means-test pensioners’ winter fuel payment.
> In 2022 it voted for proportional representation for elections to the House of Commons, a £15 per hour minimum wage and the replacement of the House of Lords with an elected chamber - However, the party both in opposition and now in government have not adopted any of these policies. > Even in the Labour Party there is no real sense that the party makes policy, rather the leadership in Parliament makes that policy.
What is an argument against the view that parties make policy, in connection to the Conservative Party?
Conservative leaders often rely on their own staff for policy.
> Boris Johnson was highly reliant on his Chief of Staff, Dominic Cummings, and even forced one of his Chancellors of the Exchequer to resign (Sajid Javid) since he wanted economic policy decided by his own advisers.
> Liz Truss did not look to the Conservative Party as a source of policy. Rather than the Conservative Party, she looked to right-wing think tanks as a source of policy, particularly Policy Exchange.
What are some arguments for the view that parties are a form of political participation, in relation with the Labour Party?
- For many years, the Labour Party could be seen as representing the working class.
> Formed by the trade unions, and these trade unions had a major part in the policy making decisions in the Labour Party.
> Inthe 1950s, the Labour Party had over 1 million individual members and anywhere up to another 10 million who were members of Labour affiliated trade unions.
What are some arguments for the view that parties are a form of political participation, in relation with the Conservative Party?
- The Conservative Party had a large membership, peaking at over 2 million in the 1950s.
What are some arguments against the view that parties are a form of political participation, in relation with the Labour Party?
- Labour Party members had no role in electing their leader until the 1980s
- The Labour Party’s membership slumped to a similar level in the 2010s but recovered to more than 500,000 when Corbyn was elected. The latest figures (August 2024) show Labour having 370,000 members.
- Even the recent peak in Labour Party members is only around 1% of the population
What are some arguments against the view that parties are a form of political participation, in relation with the Conservative Party?
- Conservative members had no role in electing their leader until 2005.
- Membership of the Conservative Party (November 2024) is 132,000, less than 1% of the population.
Thus, parties do not reflect the population as a whole. If they are a form of political participation, they may pull parties to the extremes of politics away from the centre where most voters are.
What are some arguments for parties being good for representative democracy?
- Central to how our representative democracy functions. Voters know very little about the individual candidates who stand in election, but they will know something about the parties which the candidates are in.
- When voters vote in a general election they are not only voting for an MP, but they are also voting for the leader of that party to become the Prime Minister. Without parties, that function would be weakened with non-party MPs going off to the House of Commons and selecting who they want to run the
country without the voters having any say. - Political parties are central to how the process of parliamentary government operates.
What are some arguments against parties being good for representative democracy?
- The leadership of the government party dominates Parliament which, via the party whips and other methods.
> This means that the government is effectively an “elective dictatorship”. - To vote for a party’s candidate means to accept the manifesto of the party on which they are standing. Parties can at best only approximately match the views of voters (especially under FPTP)
- There is no need for an MP to stay in the party they were in when elected as an MP.
> For example, in 2022 the Conservative, Christian Wakeford, “crossed the floor” to join Labour
What is a pressure group?
A group that tries to influence public policy in the interest of a particular cause.
What are some similarities between parties and pressure groups?
- They are both membership-based political organisations.
- Both parties and pressure groups can be considered part of a healthy functioning democracy.
- May represent a section of society (sectional) or a broad range of society (causal)
What are some differences between parties (-) and pressure groups (>)?
- Primary goal of a party is to exercise political power by winning elections
> Primary goal of a pressure group is to influence government policy and decision-making - Stands candidates in elections and runs for seats
> Does not stand candidates in elections (typically)
What do political parties need party funding for?
- A full-time professional staff developing policy
- Resources to communicate to the public
- Select and train candidates
- Run election campaigns
Who was the biggest spender in the 2019 election campaign, and what was the combined amount spent in 2019?
Conservatives (£16.5 million)
> Total of approximately £50 million
What is the largest problem with party funding?
- The amount of money that a party spends on elections has some impact on the result, so parties being funded unequally is a matter of concern
Why do the Conservatives have an advantage in party funding over Labour and other smaller parties?
- Conservatvies cosistently have more money, relying on a smaller number of richer donors
> Labour is at a disadvantage as it recieves less funding; reliant on a larger number of smaller donations (can vary, as Lord David Sainsbury gave the party £16 million under Blair)
> Other parties can recieve large donations (i.e. Sainsbury giving £8 million to the LibDems; LibDems have usually struggled to match other parties spending)
What are the six main sources of party funding?
Membership fees
Donations from supporters
Fundraising
Corporate donations
Trade Unions (for Labour)
Public money
How do parties benefit from membership fees, and give one specific recent example?
- Important source of funding for many parties.
> Became a major source of funding for the Labour Party under Corbyn, under his leadership the party membership grew rapidly to over 564,000 bringing in a great deal of money for the party. The membership has fallen by 200,000 since then, causing the Labour Party financial problems.
Why are membership fees a problem, and give a specific example?
It is a source of funds that cannot be relied on.
> Party membership has fallen consistently for many years, and at times the membership of both Labour and the Conservatives has fallen to around 130,000.
How do parties benefit from donations from supporters?
- All parties take donations from supporters (both members and non-members).
> Having rich supporters is very useful.
> Particularly useful for the Conservative Party, UKIP and Reform; particularly reliant on large donations. - Other parties receive less large individual donations (although Lord David Sainsbury has given large donation to both Labour and the LibDems, and in 2024 Dale Vince gave the Labour Party £5m).
Why are donations from supporters problematic, and give an example from the Johnson era?
- Should rich people be able to influence democracy in this way?
- The people who give large donations to a party might want something in return.
> One Conservative Party donor (Peter Cruddas) donated over £3m to the Conservative Party an received a seat in the House of Lords from Johnson.
How do parties benefit from fundraising?
- Fundraising events are only useful if you have a reasonable number of rich supporters and thus, they are only major sources of funding for the Conservatives.
> Many of these involve auctions; auction prizes have included “access to ministers” which has been very controversial.
Why is fundraising problematic, in relation to Conservative party scandals?
Fundraising has led to the “cash for access” scandal in the Conservative Party.
> Donors bid large amounts in these auctions for meeting with ministers, therefore giving them access to those in political power; thus, those who give these amounts are buying influence.
> According to the website “Open Democracy”, donors in this group (many of whom are billionaires) gave the Conservative Party more than £130 million from 2010-2019.
How do parties benefit from corporate donations?
It is also common for companies to make political donations.
> Nearly all of these go to the Conservatives.
Why are corporate donations problematic?
Donations to political parties are only legal if they are made by UK citizens.
> However, these rules can be circumvented if donations are instead made by a company.
How does Labour benefit from trade unions?
- Members pay a “political levy” to their trade union (they can choose not to) and some of this money can be donated to the Labour Party.
> Unite, which in the past has given the Labour Party around £5m a year, cut this back to £1m (2022-).
> Under Corbyn, up to 90% of Labour’s funding came from the unions, but under Starmer this has been cut back to less than 60% (creating a financial crisis in the Labour Party).
> In return the trade unions have a voice in the Labour Party; represented at Labour Party Conference where they have half the votes
> Members of trade unions have a vote in Labour leadership elections.
Why are trade unions problematic?
It can be argued that Labour is too reliant on trade unions.
Why has party funding been controversial?
- It does not create a level playing field.
> In particular, it allows the Conservative Party to be much better off than all the other parties. - People giving large donations to parties may expect something in return.
- Can be overly-reliant on a certain income stream
What did the 2000 Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act introduce, in terms of reform?
- Individual donations could only be made by UK citizens whose names were on the electoral register.
- Placed a limit on the amount that can be spent by a candidate in an election campaign in an individual constituency (currently around £30,000, it varies depending on the size and type of seat).
- A party must produce accounts of what it spent during the election period.
- Set up the Electoral Commission, an independent body to oversee elections and party finance
> Political parties must submit accounts to the Electoral Commission detailing its income.
> If the donation is above £7,500 the party must tell the Electoral Commission the source of the donation, and this is published by the Electoral Commission.
What was the aim of the 2000 Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act?
Make donations more transparent.
What did the 2000 Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act not introduce?
- There is no limit on how much a party can spend on its national campaign
What are four possible measures to further restrict party funding?
- Placing a cap on the size of donations
- Placing restrictions on party spending
- Only allowing donations by individuals
- State funding
What is the rationale behind placing a cap on the size of donations?
Placing a relatively low cap on the size of donations that is legally allowed would level the playing field.
What is the rationale behind placing restrictions on party spending?
By putting a limit on how much parties can spend, the benefit of heavy funding of the major parties would be limited.
What is the rationale behind only allowing donations by individuals?
To stop donations from corporations, trade unions and other organisations.
What is an argument for placing a cap on the size of donations?
By setting a cap at £500 or lower, parties with a few rich supporters would no longer have an advantage. It would mean that parties would need a wide basis of support in society to be successful, and would have to work hard to maintain such a basis of support
What is an argument for placing restrictions on party funding?
There are already local limits on spending in a constituency that stops richer parties having too much of an advantage and these areas. Most parties have to rely on local volunteers for most campaigning. If national campaigning were limited too this would be fairer.
What is an argument for only allowing donations by individuals?
This would stop corporations and trade unions being able to influence politics. These are organisations, not individuals. Giving money to a party should be an individual choice – democracy is for people not organisations.
What is an argument against placing a cap on the size of donations?
This would impact most strongly on the Conservative Party and thus could be seen as an unfair attack on one major party.
What is an argument against placing restrictions on party funding?
This would be difficult to enforce. A rich party could campaign before the election period started, and thus gain an advantage.
What is an argument against only allowing donations by individuals?
This would only impact the Labour party (the rich people who own companies would just give their own money). It would be very damaging to Labour.
What are the two current forms of state funding?
- Short Money
- Electoral Commission Policy Development Grants
What is Short Money?
- Money paid to all the parties with seats in the House of Commons, except the governing party.
> Opposition parties receive “Short Money” (named after Ted Short who introduced it) to help them in their role of scrutinising the government in the House of Commons.
> The amount of money a party gets depends on the number of MPs they have.
This money can only be spent on research and help for the opposition parties carrying out their role in Parliament.
What are Electoral Commission Policy Development Grants?
- All parties that have two or more seats in the House of Commons receive a Policy Development Grant from the Electoral Commission.
> A relatively small grant to allow parties to prepare an election manifesto.
> A party that has seats across the UK will receive around £500k, with parties that only organise in part of the UK (e.g. Scotland) less.
What were the two reports on party funding between 2006 and 2007, and what was the governments decision on them?
2006 House of Commons Constitutional Affairs Committee
> Proposed a cap on donations, a cap on spending and introduction of state funding
> Rejected
2007 Philips Report (governmental report)
> Proposed a cap on donations, a limit on spending, and further state funding
> Rejected
What are some arguments for state funding?
- Would make Parliament more diverse.
- Would end the dependence of political parties on wealthy donors and firms.
- Secure public funding for long-term growth
- Labour to become more independent from the trade unions
- Would encourage them to campaign in all seats to increase the party vote and not just in the key marginals.
- Much easier to limit the spending on elections
What are some arguments against state funding?
- People will object to their taxes going to parties that they do not support, especially extremist parties.
- Firms, interest groups and wealthy individuals are able to get access to politicians anyway, whether or not they donate to parties.
- If there is secure public funding then parties may feel less need to recruit members and reach out to various groups in society for support.
- Increased calls for the regulation
- Some party spending goes on advertising, attacks on other parties and ‘spinning’ stories and these are, by and large, not activities that enhance democracy.
