Clause 9
Political Parties and Elections Bill
2:15 pm
Michael Wills (Minister of State, Ministry of Justice; North Swindon, Labour)
I appreciate the intention behind the amendments. They seek to clarify important points of detail and I am happy to respond. Amendment No. 182 would downgrade the requirement on regulated persons to prove that they have taken “all reasonable steps” and to claim that as a defence. Instead, it would require them to take only “reasonable steps”. In our view, that would undermine the important requirement to take “all reasonable steps” found in section 56 of PPERA. It would mean that having taken some—but not all—reasonable steps could be used as a defence. That would create a mismatch between the obligation in the 2000 Act and the protection that should properly result should it be fulfilled.
Section 56 (1) of the 2000 Act imposes the requirement to take “all reasonable steps” to verify that a donation can be accepted. If that obligation is fulfilled, and if the party still feels that it is entitled to accept the donation, there would be no offence if it turns out later to have been wrong. To allow some protection if the obligation is only partially fulfilled does not make sense. Indeed, it may result in less rigorous efforts to comply with the requirements to ascertain the identity and permissibility of donors.
The requirement in section 56 means that parties are under an obligation to ensure that they take all reasonable steps to verify the identity and permissibility of donors. Amendment No. 182 would devalue that by establishing an easier defence. “Reasonable” is the key word. “All reasonable steps” does not mean that all steps that could possibly be taken, should be. We are concerned about the amendment, not least because it would send the wrong signal about the importance of compliance.
Amendment No. 183 would mean that a decision on the permissibility or otherwise of a donation could be made by the party as a distinct entity, as well as by the party’s treasurer. It is unclear how it could be proved that the party as a collection of members believed something, but that is what the amendment would allow. We believe that the provision is workable only if it refers to an individual’s belief and the treasurer is the obvious individual in that respect.
The amendment would not expose the treasurer to any wider liability. It simply makes it clear that it is his or her belief that is important in a case where all reasonable steps have been taken, and that there is a subsequent question about whether it was believed that the donation should lawfully be accepted. For those reasons, I do not believe that the amendment would work.
I do not fully grasp the purpose behind amendment No. 184. A reasonable belief may be harder to prove than a simple, subjective one and that makes the defence more difficult to satisfy. In that situation, requiring a reasonable belief to be shown would be unduly burdensome, and it is therefore unnecessary. It is hard to imagine an unreasonable belief being reached if all reasonable steps have been taken to ascertain the permissibility or identity of a donor. Therefore, we are not sure that the amendment adds much. In the absence of clarity as to the rationale for the amendment—which potentially makes the defence easier while the other amendments in the group have the opposite effect—we would resist it.