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Political Parties: Funding

My Lords, I entirely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, that it was sensible to wait until the Armed Forces debate had concluded and that we all owe thanks toSir Hayden Phillips for his work. I agree with him that funding of our political process is important; public confidence depends on it. It was typically discreditable of him to say that the Conservative Party put forward proposals and we did not agree them. What is the Conservative Party’s position in relation to, for example, caps on expenditure? The chairman of the Tory party, someone called Mr Francis Maude, said: "““Let’s be quite clear: the reason party funding needs reform is nothing to do with how much is spent””." It would therefore appear that the Tory party does not agree with the idea of caps on expenditure. As the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, knows, all three main parties agree in principle to some form of donation cap. The Select Committee on Constitutional Affairs recommended a voluntary arrangement. We agree, and think that this would work by providing enough flexibility to respect the different structures and traditions of the various parties. That is our position on the trade union link, and it is reflected in much of what Sir Hayden says. The noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, asked about the timing. Our position on timing also answers the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Shutt of Greetland. My right honourable friend the Prime Minister has said that he welcomes Sir Hayden Phillips remaining involved and he believes that further discussions, "““should begin soon and conclude before the summer recess, in order to build a platform for legislation in the next Parliamentary session””." That is the timetable indicated. I very much agree with the noble Lord, Lord Shutt of Greetland, that one of the great concerns is expenditure, buying constituencies in the course of general elections. He obviously has in mind the book Dirty Politics Dirty Times by the noble Lord, Lord Ashcroft, which analysed the election in May 2005. The noble Lord, Lord Ashcroft, said that, "““it soon became clear that we had been wasting neither our time nor our resources. Of the 33 candidates who won seats from Labour or the LDs, no fewer than 25 had received support from the fund that I had set up with Leonard Steinberg and the Midlands Industrial Group””." This says a lot about campaign expenditure.