Political Funding Watch

Electoral Commission To Investigate Ashcroft Donations

2009-02-22T20:02:00.003Z

The BBC reports that the millions of pounds in donations by Belize-based tax-exile Michael Ashcroft to the Conservative party are to be investigated.

It's a start, but when oh when are we going to get a strict limit on the funding going into marginal seats, for the entire electoral cycle, not just at election time.

Parties and Elections Bill going nowhere!

2009-01-08T10:25:00.001Z

News from Liberal Democrat MP David Howarth, is not exactly encouraging.

It seems that the attempts by he and his colleagues to get more substantial reforms have been quashed by the Labour Government (not suprising given how much J.K. Rowling recently gave them) and the Conservatives who cannot resist maintaining the privileges of wealth:

When the Bill was discussed in Committee, over 200 amendments were tabled. Only nine of these related to reform of donations and spending limits, and they were all tabled by the Liberal Democrats. And it gets worse: the government's decision to push these nine amendments to the back of the agenda and the Conservatives' time-wasting over dozens of nitpicking alterations colluded to ensure that our amendments were not even reached.

It seems to me that if we want to see real progress on this issue, then we're going to have to get out on the streets and campaign about it. In my view, the place to start is outside every Sainsbury's store.

The Political Parties and Elections Bill - "tinkering"

2008-10-21T14:08:00.001+01:00

For anyone watching this area, which unfortunately not many of the mainstream media are, there is a bill going through parliament.

I have to say that I support my local MP's stance on this, which is that the bill is tinkering, when full reform is needed.

What's the point of having had the Hayden Philips Review, to then go ahead and fail to reform funding.

As David Howarth rightly points out, there is a crisis of confidence, not just in financial markets, but also in our democracy. The government should ask the people what to do on this one.

Perhaps this is a subject for a referendum!

A Magic Million from Hogwarts!

2008-10-12T12:54:00.001+01:00

The dodgy geezer who gave £2m to the LibDems and is now on trial for fraud must be wishing he had New Labour's luck.

Impressed by the good intentions of Labour on child poverty, which haven't yet seen anything other than a worsening child poverty rate, the billionaire author of Harry Potter has donated a couple of days of her income to the Labour party, in the form of a £1m donation.

For the Labour Party, it's a shame she's not matched David Sainsbury and given a more sizeable share of her annual income. 10% of her income would have more than paid off New Labour's £18m debt!

Dispatches on Channel4: Cameron's Money Men

2008-09-30T12:00:00.001+01:00

This episode of Dispatches digs into how David Cameron has raised £50m in 2 and a half years from some very wealthy individuals.

If you have £50k a year to give, you can join the Leader's Group. There's some pretty dodgy sounding individuals!

Unions and big donors continue to prop up political spending "arms race"

2008-08-29T19:50:00.001+01:00

A BBC report, doing a little bit more than just updating their report from 3 months earlier, indicates that the big money continues to come in from a small number of big donors for the big parties.

They add that David Sainsbury has (apparently, I can't be bothered to check if they're accurate yet) converted a £2m loan to a donation (they needed it to pay their staff bills).

Were the BBC actually doing a job as journalists, perhaps they would at least try to answer a simple question: "Why?"

Why is David Sainsbury continuing to prop them up? What's in it for him? Perhaps they threatened to give the Competition Commissions some teeth against the supermarkets monopoly.

They might even, just possibly ask another question: "Why has the government not acted on the (Sir Hayden) Philips Review?"

It's no wonder the government is so quiet on reform when the BBC doesn't actually bother to ask a single serious question, or even link to the Philips Review.

Govt to put a lid on Ashcroft's millions of target seat spending

2008-08-01T22:42:00.001+01:00

BBC NEWS | Politics | Cash curbs 'to be pushed through'

The BBC report that the the government has announced that it will push through the Party Funding Bill, despite concerns from the Electoral Commission.

In the debate on the 10th June 2008, Jack Straw announced that he will "aim to introduce legislation as soon as parliamentary time allows".

The further comments by Jack Straw repeatedly refer to the Liberal Democrat and Labour support for the recommendations of the Hayden Phillips proposals, and that the loophole exploited by Mr (sometimes called Lord) Ashworth, was that the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, accidentally got rid of the "1983 trigger" which all wanted kept (and presumably affects this issue).

Danny Alexander points asks "only by imposing stringent caps on donations and expenditure during and
between elections can we achieve the fair, transparent and sustainable
outcome that is needed to rebuild public trust in the political process?"

Perhaps, just perhaps, there is hope that by the next general election, we may have some sense in how political parties are funded!

"You call this democracy!" - Workshop on political funding, voting and centralisation at Climate Camp 3-11th Aug

2008-06-05T14:15:00.002+01:00

Some great news: Political Funding Watch has teamed up with Republic to put on a workshop at Climate Camp, at 4:30pm on Wednesday 6th August.

Democratic reform has never come easy. There are always vested interests who gain from the status quo.

In the past, direct action has been at the core of campaigning for democratic reforms.

Now, perhaps the stakes are much bigger, which is why we ask the question "What is the role of our poor democracy in climate chaos?".

Full details are as follows:
Day: Wednesday
Time: 16.30-18.30
Space: Space E. Politics/ Campaigns/ Issues
Directions: See here

Speaker/Facilitators:
• Neale Upstone - Political Funding Watch
• Graham Smith - Republic

Sometimes fighting against climate chaos can seem like hitting our heads against a brick wall. This session looks at some of those bricks, how they are held in place, and how we might remove them.

We aim to do justice to some or all of the follow-ing areas, with speakers and group discussion:

• Political Funding – Do your votes cost less at Sainsbury's? Who bankrolls the big parties and why?
• The Voting System – Not much more than a third of our population voted for the current government, and yet they have absolute power. Can proportional representation help?
• The Peers and the Queen – Would an elected head of state and an elected second chamber help?
• Centralised Government - Britain has the sec-ond (to Malta) most centralised government in Europe. How might things look if Whitehall gave people more control over their local af-fairs?
• The Media - The drive for profits in the global media has lead to a drastic reduction in real journalism and the rise of PR in it's place. How do we overcome the “Flat Earth” news?

Draft Queen's Speech "kicks funding reform into long grass"

2008-05-27T22:33:00.002+01:00

While errors by the BBC may have given cause for hope, Gordon Brown's statement giving a draft legislative programme has left us no hope yet for funding reform.

His proposals seem to be an attempt to shift the burden of blame on to local government. He is proposing to introduce legislation to make local government, police and the health service more accountable, while leaving the big problem, the huge machinery of central government and unelected quangos, untouched.

Pointing out the absence of anything on party finances, the president of Unlock Democracy, Peter Facey, said that reforms had "been kicked into the long grass".

Is it not time that we started dropping banners from the roofs of polling stations prior to by-elections?

Perhaps they should say "future crime scene" and point out just how the bribery works.

£2.7bn on 10p tax bribe vs. £25m to end the worst bribes of all

2008-05-27T21:30:00.002+01:00

It's worth noting that in the Sir Hayden Philips review of party funding, it was suggested that a cap on donations would be offset by additional public funding of £20m to £25m, distributed in proportion to public support for the parties.

Now that we've just seen £2.7 billion (!) of public money pumped into a failed attempt to bribe those of us on high and middle incomes, it does seem that £25m, at less than one-hundredth of the cost, would be a good deal for buying us our votes back.

What remains to be seen, is when we'll actually see some changes!

Jan-March 2008 finances: Tories get most and Labour still most in debt

2008-05-27T21:15:00.002+01:00

Reading the BBC's latest report on declared party donations, it seems as though it is indeed business as usual, including parties being late getting their paperwork in.

In the latest round of compulsory declaration of large donations, the past trends seem to be continuing, with the big funding coming in to the 'big two': The conservatives got a whopping £4.2 million and Labour £3 million.

Party	Donations Jan - Mar	Balance end Mar
Cons	£4.2m	-£12m
Lab	£3.0m	-£17.8m
LibDem	£0.47m	-£1.1m

When you consider that this was before the local elections and the Crewe and Nantwich by-election, then it seems that no party is in a healthy state.

It seems that Labour have improved on their Dec 2006 position, but both the Tories, and LibDems have less money than back then. Until the Electoral Commission publish the Dec 2007 accounts figures, which the large parties should have submitted by 31st March, we'll not know for sure, as they could easily have cash on hand, as well as outstanding loans.

A notable point to consider is how disproportionate these figures are compared to the votes cast in the May elections, where Labour got 24%, the LibDems 25% and the Conservatives 44%.

If the same £8.1m had been divided up by share of the vote, which is effectively the idea in proposed reforms of party funding, then the funds raised would be:

Party	Vote	Income (diff)
Cons	44%	£3.56m (-£0.64m)
Lab	24%	£1.95m (-£1.05m)
LibDem	25%	£2.03m (+£1.56m)

Lord Ashcroft

2008-05-02T17:34:00.004+01:00

Having recently been told of a Tory MP that sometimes refers to Lord Ashcroft's Party instead of "The Conservatives", I realise that I ought to do some coverage on him.

For now, I'll just settle with a link so that others can have a read. The Guardian did this piece last November: Ashcroft: new questions about his peerage, his tax and his home

A Picture That Says It All

2008-04-24T12:46:00.003+01:00

Lording it in Tax Exile

2008-03-19T09:01:00.002Z

So, let's have a look at another recent big donor.

On 27th November 2007, Lord Irvine Laidlaw, gave the Conservative Party £2,990,582.20. Firstly, I do wonder how it came to be this figure. Was it such a hoot, that he just wrote some random figures on a cheque? Did he really write out "Two million, nine hundred and ninety thousand, five hundred and eighty two pounds and twenty pence"? Now that's what I'd call a big check - it'd need to be!

So who is he. Well, if you check on Wikipedia, you won't find much, but you will find the links to the Sunday Times article about his "failure to return to Britain for tax purposes", as promised before he became a Lord.

Good donations cost less (?) at Sainsbury's

2008-03-19T01:09:00.000Z

Puzzle #1: Lord (David) Sainsbury (of Turville), as he's somehow (sometimes) come to be called, is known for having handed some loose change to the Labour Party. How much is it?

Answer: Let's go take a look at the Electoral Commission Register. A quick search for donors who have more than £250,000 in loose change gives us the following results (searching back to 2001):

Lord Sainsbury	13/01/02	£ 2,000,000
Lord Sainsbury of Turville	01/03/03	£ 2,500,000
Lord David Sainsbury of Turville	10/03/05	£ 2,000,000
Lord David Sainsbury	10/09/07	£ 2,000,000

And... why does he donate in so many variations of his 'title'? It's so bizarre, that you could be forgiven for being a little suspicious. Then again, £8.5m is quite a bit of loose change to be giving to anyone, don't you think?

And next, we might just have a look at the big donors elsewhere, but before that, shall we dwell on how your average Mr Sainsbury might just have a vested interest in this sort of donation?

Another bit of checking around, and we find that on 16th Nov 2007, Lord David of Turville held 6.3% of Sainsbury's shares. That's 6.3% of 1.7billion shares, with a 2007 dividend per share of 9.75pence. Yes, he owns over a hundred million shares that in 2007 paid him a dividend totalling £10.3m. Does he have a vested interest in the supermarkets continuing to make huge profits? You bet he does!

Iit doesn't matter if you're not Tesco, because they're all making a huge profit, so long as no one comes along and says "Hey, you're killing our communities, our local economies, and our environment, and we're going to put an end to it!"

Well if that is the case, I doubt if there's a Labour minister who's going to tell his party they just lost a donor who can be relied on for over a million pounds every year!

On balance...

2008-03-19T00:46:00.000Z

Having just had the budget, and seen that UK plc is going even further into the red (and that's with PFI funding and Northern Rock excluded), I thought I might check on how UK democracy plc is doing.

A little googling, and I soon found that the Electoral Commission has a "Statement of Accounts" page, listing every political party registered in the UK.

A look at a few of these turned up some illuminating results. At the end of 2006, the following was the league table:

Party	£
LibDem	1,514,460
Green	171,000
Loonies	1,245
Respect	(12,045)
Cons	(9,011,000)
Lab	(24,863,000)

(Loonies = Official Monster Raving Looney Party, if you hadn't guessed!)

Mmm... Does this really mean that the Official Monster Raving Looney Party would be better at balancing the books, or just that they can't promise someone a peerage in exchange for the loan of the odd million quid!

It's alright guv... we're good for it... you can trust us.

I don't think so!