("Details of campaigns officer

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 10:00 pm on 21 November 2000.

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Photo of Baroness Gould of Potternewton Baroness Gould of Potternewton Labour 10:00, 21 November 2000

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord for that explanation because that is certainly not the interpretation that the Labour Party puts on the clause. I shall make sure that it is aware of that particular interpretation and then we can perhaps discuss the matter further.

The second area of discrimination is the restriction on small parties. I raised that matter in Committee, but since then I have given more thought to the question. While I believe that the provision discriminates against small parties, there is a particular problem in the sense that if we included small parties that might give support to extremist parties. Therefore, we have a dilemma and the only way out of it is not to follow this route at all. I would like to see parties such as the Green Party benefit from this measure, but I would not like to see the National Front benefit. We have quite serious problems there.

The other point concerns state funding. I accept that the Neill committee may not have identified tax relief for state funding, but the House of Commons Select Committee report of 1994 identified tax incentives as a form of public subsidy, that is to say, state funding. That view was fully supported by the Conservative Party in its evidence to the Select Committee. I would like to know what has changed its mind. If the party thought it was state funding then, why does the Conservative Party not believe that that is the case now? I am sure that we shall be told, as we have been in the past, that we have Short money, Cranborne money, free postage and so forth, at elections. But all those fundings are specific; we are now suggesting something that is general state funding with no specific strings attached. I accept that sometimes the strings are difficult to identify. General state funding has been consistently opposed by the party opposite.

The aim of the Neill committee has been to clean up politics and to provide absolute transparency and clarity. I believe that the additional subsidy to political parties from the state would not assist that process. If there is no case for direct grants through state aid, I do not believe that there is a case for tax relief.

Perhaps I may make a couple of small points. It has been suggested that if we follow this particular road it will help increase the membership of political parties. It is a mistaken motivation to gain membership through an essentially economic activity rather than through political motivation.

I would like advice on the next point because I may be misinterpreting it. The qualifying donation at the moment is £500. What safeguards are there in this clause, or in Neill, that at some future point it may not be increased to £5,000 or £50,000 so that big donations receive tax relief? I cannot see any assurance anywhere that that does not happen. There are too many flaws in the amendment. I do not believe that the clause as it stands is transparent enough in the way in which the procedure would work.