Cleaning Up Politics



State funding of politics is nothing new because we already spend significant sums in making the wheels go round in our system of democracy at every level between local council elections and elections to the European Parliament.

So the big question is not whether the state should fund the political system, but what is it worth to get 'big money' out of politics?

49p is the answer that Alice Thomson has come up with in this opinion piece for The Times and that would seem a reasonable price to me.

Because it would put an end to the present rotten system in which wealthy individuals and unrepresentative trade unions wield far too much influence over the Labour Party and the Conservatives, in particular.       

State funding will save politicians from scandal

By Alice Thomson - The Times


There’s nothing wrong with fêting luvvies at No 10. It’s the balls and bashes for party donors that are the real problem

Party – /’pa:ti/ noun
1 a formally constituted political group that contests elections and attempts to form or take part in a government
2 a social gathering, celebration, festivity for invited guests, typically involving eating, drinking and entertaining

When parties hold parties there are always problems, particularly when they involve actors, celebrities, champagne, Daleks and the Tardis. The outcry. Why should our ministers schmooze up to Katherine Jenkins, Wallace and Gromit and Bruce Forsyth this week? (Benedict Cumberbatch didn’t come, presumably because he prefers to address TUC rallies.)

But there is nothing wrong with prime ministers inviting luvvies for a drink. They are part of a successful £71 billion-a-year creative industry. Other professions have been fêted and actors should be too for their part in resuscitating Britain.

In fact, the parties we ought to be scrutinising are the other knees-ups — the fundraisers. Tonight the Tories go to the ball with financiers and property developers at the Hurlingham Club in Fulham (dress: glamorous) and next week Labour is holding a bash at the Roundhouse for North London socialites, with tables selling at £15,000.

In the next year the Tories, Lib Dems and Labour need to raise enough to pay for their election campaigns. It’s not enough to have a manifesto and candidates, they need money to have any chance of winning. Instead of focusing on ideas, they are wasting time and energy on entertaining rich, potential donors.

In the post-Thatcher era of pragmatic politics these people rarely hand over cash merely as a gesture of support, they expect something in return — whether a stiff invitation, a bauble in the honours’ list or a chance to promote their own causes. As one long-standing peer explained: “It’s appears to be cheaper to get into the Lords than buy a new combine harvester and it reaps more returns.”

Party funding is a depressing affair that causes politicians endless grief — from Labour’s union barons to the City fat cats promised privileged access for lining the Tory purse and the Lib Dem donor convicted of fraud. Cash for peerages, cash for access, cash for questions: it turns everyone off politics.

As membership sinks so low that more people are signing up to the Caravan Club than the three main parties, the chairmen and treasurers now rely on increasingly few sources wielding disproportionate power.

The Tories are on a fundraising roll. Donors who are terrified at the thought of a Labour government introducing a mansion tax on their residences are happy to dig into their wallets at the auction in return for a weekend in Barbados, a shoot or a chance to meet the chancellor or prime minister. In the first three months of this year they raised £6.6 million with £5 million coming from 36 donors.

Ed Miliband has the unions, who not only helped him to beat his brother, but have provided £8 out of every £10 raised since he became leader. Only this week Len McCluskey, the Unite leader, told him to “bring home the bacon for working people”, promising further funding on top of the £12 million it has already donated, and boasting of “more union-backed candidates than for a generation”. This mustn’t turn into cash for candidates.

Meanwhile the Liberal Democrats are relying on Lord Palumbo of Southwark, not only to help them with their election strategy and loan them the Ministry of Sound for their shindigs, but to help to bankroll them along with the Lib Dem peer and property developer Rumi Verjee.

The parties spent £10 million less during the 2010 election than in 2005 (£31.1 million compared with £41.7 million) thanks to fewer poster campaigns and free publicity from the leadership debates.

There are shelves of unimplemented reports in Whitehall on funding reform. Sir Christopher Kelly’s solution put forward earlier this parliament has the most merit. He wanted to cut spending limits and cap donations but supplement them with public funding. Parties would then be forced to concentrate on increasing grassroots support. The Tories did this with great success at Newark last month, producing their first by election victory while in government for 25 years.

But the parties still won’t bring up state funding. Ministers and MPs, scarred by the expenses scandal, are worried that voters will recoil at having to pay more for the antics of this venal lot.

They should find the courage to make their case. Last week it was reported that the Queen costs each taxpayer 56p a year — in return we don’t have to worry that she is wining and dining people for a stash of cash to keep the show on the road.

Even if taxpayers had paid all of each party’s expenses at the last election, it would have cost each adult only 49p. For a few pence a year, you could be sure that your politicians were not wasting their time cosying up to demanding donors and unions, they could concentrate on your concerns.

John Major gave a speech to the Westminster press gallery last year in favour of more state funding, calling the current situation a disgrace. In his day he had to suffer all that tuna tartare and meringue baskets in return for a cheque when he was probably desperate for shepherd’s pie in front of the cricket finishing his red boxes. He must wish he had done something when he could. David Cameron, Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg still can.

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