I have published another in my series of reforms that Labour could deliver with remarkably little expenditure of cash on the government's part this morning. In it, I argue that politics in the UK is blighted by the influence of big political donors, all of whom are seeking to influence how our politicians behave to advantage themselves. That influence is malign. We need clean politics and Labour could deliver that by ending large donations, for good.
The audio version of this video is here:
The transcript is:
If Labour wants to clean up politics, and I hope that it does, it could make another of the changes to the rules that apply in this country that it could alter as a new government at almost no cost to itself and the administration of government in the UK.
It could very simply say, we're going to end the ability of anyone, whether an individual or a company, to make a gift to a political party of more than £10,000 a year.
I believe that would be transformational with regard to our democracy.
We don't want a democracy that is manipulated for the benefit of donors in this country. We want clean politics. But when money, and I mean large amounts of money, comes into play, then that isn't possible.
This law has already been put into place, in effect, with regard to trade union donations.
Remember that no trade union can now make a donation to the Labour Party unless an individual member has agreed to make the payment, and none of them make a payment of more than £10,000 a year as a result.
But it doesn't apply to those people who've got their wealth from other sources than work, and who wish to make very large donations to a political party.
I think there should be a level playing field. If the amount that an individual can donate through their trade union is capped, and it effectively is by the amount that can be collected through their wages by that trade union to donate to Labour, then everybody else should be in roughly the same situation.
Now, as it is, I'm being very generous by putting the cap at £10,000 a year. It still means somebody could donate £50,000 over the life of a parliament. And to me, that's an unimaginable sum that I might want to give to any political party.
But for some people, it clearly isn't. But I want to stop the undue influence that donations of more than that sum might create. Because our politics needs to be clean. And it can't be unless we change our laws.
Come on Labour, let's do it.
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Whilst I agree wholeheartedly with what you suggest, may I propose one small addition?
The total donated over a Parliament (assumed to be 5 years) should not exceed the median household disposable income in the first year of that parliament.
Currently, £10k per annum amounts to considerably more than the 2023 value of £32,300. Suggesting that those who can afford this are still representing a very select group of people.
Donations to individuals should be restricted to one tenth of that. Here in Wales the pernicious effect of a large personal donation has effectively poisoned at least one political career.
Some interesting stuff here
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/dark-money-investigations/labour-conservative-party-donations-2023-spending-analysis/
I’m guessing this should also apply to personal donations to MPs and to candidates? Those ‘office’ expenses donations to various ministers. Or is it sufficient to have those logged in register of interests? (Another area that probably needs to be beefed up).
I would prefer the limit to be within the reach of ordinary people, but maybe that’s unrealistic until we accept that political parties should be publicly funded. Then there’s the issue of private companies masquerading as political parties…
Kim SJ raises the issue of private companies acting as political parties. Pardon my ignorance, but does registering as a private limited company exempt Reform UK from having to disclose donor contributions? If not, what advantage is there apart from the protection of Limited Liability?
As far as I know, very few. Except giving Farage absolute control.
Quite right too!
I think you are on the way to building a very long list of all the things Labour could do but won’t.
It will also be the list we should chisel on the gravestone of British democracy.
Speaking truth to power is always worthwhile
Absolutely Richard – this would be a core of any modification to the UK constitution.
And, as some have said on here, there should be strict limits – or an outright ban on donations to indivudal politicians.
Its unbelievable that our whole political system can be entirely bought upt and/or sold to the highest bidder.
Fossil fuels, food, pharma , nuclear , financial services – vested interests all with their claws into our politics.
But surely Richard – all Starmer’s Labour’s record over the last couple of years makes it highly unlikely.
You know damn well they won’t – dont you?
I doubt they will.
But we need to always bear in mind what they could do and hold them to account for their failures.
The devil would be in the details. What’s to stop a would-be over-generous donor from distributing a huge sum among an army of “ordinary people” who would each then forward their portion to the target party in accordance with the donor’s wishes? Done cleverly enough, it could be quite hard to detect.
I think we are pretty used to anti-avoidance rules now in tax
I am sure it could be done here
I would go further and completely ban donations from companies.
Parliament represents people not businesses, and donations should
only be allowed from individuals from their UK-taxable income/wealth.
Agreed. But only from those registered to vote. I would also set a lower limit and introduce State funding. Oh, dammit, there’s no money left on the credit card.
Ian Stevenson has already linked to a revealing series of investigations from Open Democracy. Their latest suggests that Labour will do nothing to reverse the dark money being channelled into Westminster, having been “love bombed” by lobbyists (some of the lobbyists are now in Parliament). Under Corbyn, Labour was largely financed by smaller donations from individual supporters wanting to make a difference and of course, the unions. Now the big donors from the Blair years, having withdrawn financial support, are suddenly back, along with a new set of oligarchs wanting to buy their preferred government.
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/dark-money-investigations/lovebombed-by-lobbyists-how-starmer-labour-became-the-party-of-big-business/
Not to be overlooked is the money sloshing about the All Party Parliamentary Groups (APPGs).
https://news.sky.com/story/westminster-accounts-the-next-big-scandal-informal-interest-groups-of-mps-are-little-known-by-the-public-yet-are-huge-business-12783075
There is a political choice to be made by Starmer’s Labour. Given they have already chosen to refocus Labour as the party of business and are comfortable acceptting large donations, monetary and in kind (office space, staff secondment etc), I hold out no hope of Starmer’s “changed” party, having a change of conscience.
Thank you and well said, Richard.
I must quibble, though.
British politicians are cheap. A US tech giant based in King’s Cross spent about 10,000 pounds on Labour politicians and saved itself a potential tax bill of three billion.
The £3bn could have been used to reduce child poverty.
For the curious – this article IDs the company & the connections to LINO.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jul/01/behold-londons-landscraper-googles-new-uk-hq-as-long-as-the-shard-is-tall
Note the pictures of Starmer, even then lining up to sell the country short.
Note how Google could afford to bring in “40,000 tonnes of soil will be transported to the rooftop garden” – corporate luxury – serf/prole poverty.
Vile: Google, Starmer, LINO. (& I don’t use Google – they won’t get a brass tack from me).
It’s nice to meet another Google refuseniks!