Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill
(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)
Read Full debate17:00 - The House divided: - Ayes: 261 / Noes: 298 - Question accordingly negatived.
18:00 - The House divided: - Ayes: 261 / Noes: 312 - Question accordingly negatived.
18:56 - The House having divided: - Ayes: 304 / Noes: 260 - Question accordingly agreed to.
Simon Hughes
That is why my assumption is that, although the Government might not respond directly by accepting the new clause, colleagues on the Front Bench will be able to answer the point made by the Electoral Commission, as there is obviously regular engagement between the Government and the commission. I hope those on the Front Bench will be positive about that point.
It is clear, as my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso) said earlier, that new clause 3 is not supported by the Electoral Commission. For want of other guidance, the Electoral Commission is always the best place to go to for a steer on the appropriate response, so I will not support the new clause.
My concern is that the Government should give time for Committees to report and for their deliberations to be considered and that, when the Electoral Commission expressly supports the Government’s proposals or proposed changes, the Government should be responsive.
Let me make a general point about the timetable. Obviously, the Bill took a huge amount of time in gestation and was then born very quickly—it shot out of the cot, or cradle, or wherever it had been kept—
The Leader of the House of Commons (Mr Andrew Lansley)
That is often the way.
Simon Hughes
Yes, it is. The Bill was held in dock for a long time, but then somebody suddenly pressed the button and out it came. I do not think that anyone can complain that there has not been enough time in Committee or on Report; the complaint is that, as people know, we have not had the pre-legislative scrutiny that all Bills ideally should have. I know that the Leader of the House would accept that in principle.
We are in the second day on Report and we must have Third Reading, so we cannot now do all the revision and careful scrutiny that we would like to. That is probably true across the House. I am in favour of many of the Bill’s principles, so I do not have issues with some of the changes, but I hope that the Government will ensure that there is the time for that careful consideration and to listen to the voices before the Bill goes from this place to the House of Lords.
A commission has been set up, prompted by the voluntary sector, to be chaired by the Lord Bishop of Oxford, who is a Member of the House of Lords. It is considering these issues and will have a valuable contribution to make, provided it can report soon. I hope, too, that the Government will take seriously what it says.
Simon Hughes
I made it clear that because this is the second and last day on Report and because we must have Third Reading, at this round of our deliberations we cannot do that in this building. Other work is taking place, however, not least in the Joint Committee on which I serve with colleagues from both Houses. We want to report in time for our work to be taken into account up the corridor in the House of Lords. Any amendments made in the Lords must still come back to this place, so I ask the Government to give time for the Committees that are working and have not reported to report and for those reports to be considered by the Government in good time to be seen by colleagues in the Lords and for the independent commission to report and to be seen, provided it gets on with the job quickly.
The Deputy Leader of the House of Commons (Tom Brake)
Before I tackle new clauses 2 and 3 and the amendments, I welcome the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Wayne David) to his place. I am not sure whether this is his last appearance in his current position—
Tom Brake
Okay. I also welcome the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), who is making his first appearance in this capacity, as well as the hon. Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith), who is staying put, I believe. This is also perhaps the first opportunity for me to welcome the Minister of State, Cabinet Office, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark). He might be familiar with a quote from Christopher Hitchens:
“What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.”
He might have found during the debate that a lot is being asserted by Opposition Members without evidence. Clearly, the Government dismiss that with evidence rather than without it.
The hon. Member for Caerphilly made an enticing offer that we should pause the Bill, but I am afraid that I shall have to decline. I can only imagine the hue and cry from Labour were we to do nothing with the Bill only for someone to spend just under £1 million in one constituency or another during the run-up to the next general election to try to unseat a candidate they did not want to support. Would the hon. Gentleman then accuse us of failing to take action?
We have also heard some examples of Opposition Members’ belief that the Bill would have stopped updated health and safety provisions in relation to mining disasters. We heard from the Chair of the Select Committee on Political and Constitutional Reform that the Labour party would not have existed had the Bill been in place. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State will become familiar with such arguments, which are completely outwith anything the Government propose in the Bill.
New clause 2 would require the Government and the Electoral Commission to undertake a post-legislative assessment of the impact of part 2 on third parties campaigning in elections to the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the Northern Ireland Assembly and on third parties campaigning in Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland constituencies for the UK parliamentary elections. That assessment would also have to consider the impact of part 2 on referendums in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Part 2 would not come into force until a report of the assessment was laid before Parliament.
Only some of the part 2 provisions apply to third parties campaigning in elections to the devolved Administrations. At the time of the Bill’s introduction, the Government published an impact assessment to accompany it. The analysis has been thorough. To require the Government to undertake another analysis at a later date serves no purpose. In addition, the Electoral Commission already has a statutory function of reporting on the conduct of elections under current legislation. As part of that function, the Government would expect the commission to examine the impact of changes to rules on third-party campaigning at future elections. It would not be for the Government to duplicate the role of the independent regulator.
The main thrust of the remarks of the hon. Member for Caerphilly was about the potential risk of impact on the Scottish referendum. I want to make it clear that the Bill does not have an impact on referendums. Although the regulated period for the 2015 UK parliamentary election will overlap with the regulated period for the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, spending in the Scottish referendum is a matter for the Scottish Parliament. Such expenditure could not, in our view, reasonably be regarded as intended to promote electoral success and would therefore not be controlled under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 or regulated by the Bill. We believe that expenditure incurred during the regulated period for the referendum would be treated as referendum expenditure and not controlled expenditure for the election, unless there was a clear or direct link to a campaign in the election. We do not think that the commencement of part 2 should be delayed as the hon. Gentleman said.
Mr Allen
Up until yesterday, the Electoral Commission, which is charged by Government and the House in these matters, was still stating:
“We await confirmation of the Government’s view of the impact of the Bill on the referendum on independence for Scotland.”
So even yesterday, the Electoral Commission was unclear. The Minister is stating unequivocally that there will be no impact whatsoever on the contending parties—those that support voting yes, voting no or whatever—and there will be no impact whatsoever on the independence campaign by any of the players or third parties. This was not made clear to the Electoral Commission even yesterday, when the question arose.
Tom Brake
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention, which gives me an opportunity to restate the fact that the Bill has no impact on the Scottish referendum. The Electoral Commission wanted that clarified, and I have today very publicly done so. My right hon. Friend the Leader of the House had clarified that point in discussions with the Electoral Commission yesterday.
Wayne David
Surely, the comment from the Deputy Leader of the House depends on clearly differentiating expenditure for election campaigning and referendum campaigning. We might find that sums of money are used for identical purposes at the same time. Common sense dictates that that is bound to lead to complications.
Tom Brake
I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman was in the House in 1999 when PPERA was being debated and when it became an Act in 2000. That Act seeks to address that sort of issue. Our position is clear. I do not think that I need to restate it a third time, but I will: the Scottish referendum is not affected in any way by what we are debating here.
I shall move on to new clause 3, which would require the Electoral Commission to identify the Bill’s impact on both its own resources and on third parties. It would require the commission to lay a full cost projection before Parliament within one month of the Bill receiving Royal Assent. As I have just explained, the Government have already published an impact assessment to accompany the Bill. That assessment considers the impact on both the Electoral Commission and third parties. The assessment estimates that the lowered registration thresholds will bring 30 more third parties into the regime administered by the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000—that is, third parties that campaign for the electoral success of a party or candidate.
The assessment also estimates that only 10% of third-party organisations will see their expenditure affected by the reduced spending limits proposed in the Bill. At the 2010 UK general election, only two organisations even passed the lower limits proposed in the Bill. There will be a relatively small administrative cost to each registered third party as a result of the new reporting provisions that the Bill introduces. The impact assessment considers that the enforcement cost to the Electoral Commission will rise by a maximum of £390,000 annually. Let me say again that this analysis is comprehensive, and I see no need to repeat it after the Bill has received Royal Assent.
The Electoral Commission states in its parliamentary briefing:
“We do not support this amendment since there are more appropriate vehicles for consideration of these issues.”
The Electoral Commission is already required, under PPERA, to submit an estimate of its income and expenditure to the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission each financial year. That estimate must indicate what the commission considers its requirements for resources for the next five-year period might be. There is therefore already provision in legislation for the commission to provide the information that the amendment seeks.
Tom Brake
I am afraid I am going to disappoint the hon. Gentleman by restating what I have said. We have already carried out an impact assessment and the Electoral Commission will no doubt want to conduct one on the impact of third parties.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) referred to amendment 65. I can assure him that the Government will listen to the Committee’s views, although we are working to a timetable that requires the Bill to be in place to address the next general election, and the regulated period for that starts 12 months before. We will of course listen to the Committee’s views and to the views expressed by others, including the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, the Electoral Commission or anyone else who has views on the subject. We are not closed to other views.
Angela Smith
Is the Deputy Leader of the House therefore saying that he and the Government will listen to the views of the Committee and the independent commission before the Bill goes to the House of Lords?
Tom Brake
No. The hon. Lady paraphrases me incorrectly. That is not what I said. I said that we would listen to the views, but at the same time we are working to a timetable. The sooner those views are available the better, and the sooner there will be an opportunity for them to be considered.
Amendment 65 would amend clause 41 in order to prevent part 2 from coming into force until a Committee of either House has undertaken an inquiry and published a report on the impact of the Bill. As drafted, however, the amendment does not in fact require an inquiry to take place—it merely assumes that one might. The amendment’s effectiveness is therefore limited, as in the absence of any inquiry part 2 will come into force regardless. I once more reiterate my earlier comments: the Government have already published an impact assessment to accompany the Bill. That assessment considers the impact on both the Electoral Commission and third parties, and is thorough.
Amendments 66, 4, 5 and 6, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) spoke, would amend clause 41 so that the entire provisions of part 2 came into force on Royal Assent, subject of course to the transitional provision in clause 42. It is more appropriate—this is the response to the query he raised—for certain provisions, namely clauses 30, 31, 34 and 35, to be commenced at a date appointed by the Secretary of State, rather than on Royal Assent. That is normal practice. The purpose is to allow preparations to take place and the people involved to be brought up to speed on those aspects of the law, rather than forcing adoption on the day of Royal Assent.
Mr Chope
The right hon. Gentleman says that it is important that people should be able to get up to speed, but many of the Bill’s provisions will take effect on the day of Royal Assent. How is it that people will be able to get up to speed on those provisions in time but not on this provision?
Tom Brake
Clearly the Government have made an assessment of the areas where it is possible to prepare in time for Royal Assent and those where it is not, which I think is reflected in the clauses to which I have just referred.
Clauses 30, 31, 34 and 35 do not have a direct effect on the regulated period of the other provisions in part 2, which are affected by the transitional provision. It is more appropriate for clauses 30, 31, 34 and 35 to be subject to commencement by order in the usual way. Amendment 67 takes the opposite approach and appears to intend that, subject to amendment 66, which we have just discussed, all of part 2 but clauses 30, 31, 34 and 35 would not come into force on Royal Assent. However, its effect would in fact be the contrary. In the absence of any considered commencement and transitional provision, all of part 2 would come into force on Royal Assent. I suspect that that is not the intention, but it would be the effect.
In relation to amendments 10, 11 and 12, tabled and spoken to by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch, it appears that he is seeking to delay the Act’s measures, rather than to have them swiftly implemented. He has already tabled amendments 4, 5 and 6 to clause 41 so that all of part 2 would come into force at the same time and then become subject to the transitional provisions of clause 42. I know that he was seeking to bring clarity, but the effect of amendments 10, 11 and 12, together with amendments 4, 5 and 6, is that the measures in part 2 would not come into effect before the 2015 general election. Amendments 10, 11 and 12 would remove the transitional provision of clause 42 altogether, with the result that the part 2 provisions would come into effect only at the commencement of the next regulated period after Royal Assent, which is unlikely to be the regulated period for the 2015 general election. The Government are committed to enhancing the transparency of spending by third parties, and that includes enacting the measures within part 2 in time for the regulated period of the 2015 general election. I therefore do not consider it appropriate to delay their implementation until after the 2015 general election.
Mr Chope
Going back to the point about people needing to be given time to get up to speed, if clause 30 was brought in immediately on Royal Assent, it would state:
“The Secretary of State may by order vary any percentage for the time being specified”.
What is the point of not bringing that into effect on Royal Assent, because the only impact of doing so would be to give the Secretary of State the power to bring it in? Does the Secretary of State need to be brought up to speed?
Tom Brake
That is a challenging question, so I might need to get back to my hon. Friend shortly on it. I think that the whole issue of percentages is one that might require a response from others and measures to address it. I have heard his query and will ensure that he gets a specific response.
Mr Allen
I will make a small contribution in order to make a request on behalf of those of us who have considerable respect for the opinions expressed about Northern Ireland and concern about the impact of the Bill there. I think that the Deputy Leader of the House inadvertently passed over that without responding to the pertinent points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan). This takes the whole question of people intervening when there are questions of free speech to a rather more delicate and, indeed, darker level. I hope that the Deputy Leader of the House has some response to the points made by my hon. Friend.
Tom Brake
I hope that the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) will agree that I tend to take many interventions and make a point of trying to respond to them. To respond to his point on the impact in Northern Ireland, clearly the new definition of controlled expenditure will have an impact on the devolved Administrations. The lowered registration thresholds will also have an impact in Northern Ireland. With regard to Northern Ireland Assembly elections, the amount that a third-party organisation can spend campaigning against a named candidate is being increased from £500 to £700 through this legislation.
Mark Durkan
Will the Deputy Leader of the House clarify something? If there is a non-party campaign on a legislative proposal in the Northern Ireland Assembly, the Scottish Parliament or the Welsh National Assembly in the same calendar year as a Westminster election, will that count as being within the regulated period, and will that campaign about devolved legislative proposals count as part of controlled expenditure?
Tom Brake
The hon. Gentleman asks a very specific and detailed question. The difficulty in answering it is the extent to which any local community campaign organised at any level would have an impact on Westminster elections. Rather than giving him an off-the-cuff response, I will ensure that he gets a detailed reply. On that point, I will conclude my remarks.
Wayne David
It is not the Opposition’s intention to press new clauses 2 and 3, on the basis of the commitment the Deputy Leader of the House has given to have further discussions, particularly in the House of Lords, which we hope will lead to substantive change. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 26
Meaning of “controlled expenditure”
Tom Brake
I beg to move amendment 32, page 12, leave out lines 31 to 33 and insert ‘“where—
(a) the expenses fall within Part 1 of Schedule 8A, and
‘(b) the expenditure can reasonably be regarded as intended to promote or procure electoral success at any relevant election for—
(i) one or more particular registered parties,
(ii) one or more registered parties who advocate (or do not advocate) particular policies or who otherwise fall within a particular category of such parties, or
(iii) candidates who hold (or do not hold) particular opinions or who advocate (or do not advocate) particular policies or who otherwise fall within a particular category of candidates.”’.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Government amendment 33
Amendment 101, page 12, leave out line 37 to line 9 on page 13 and insert—
‘“For election purposes” means activity which can reasonably be regarded as intended for the primary purpose of—
(a) promoting or procuring electoral success at any relevant election for—
(i) one or more particular registered parties;
(ii) one or more registered parties who advocate (or do not advocate) particular policies or who otherwise fall within a particular category of such parties; or
(iii) candidates who hold (or do not hold) particular opinions or who advocate (or do not advocate) particular policies or who otherwise fall within a particular category of candidates.’.
Government amendments 34 to 45.
Tom Brake
Clause 26 sets out the test that third parties need to meet in order to incur controlled expenditure. There has been extensive comment from a number of bodies, such as charities and voluntary organisations, that the Bill will capture their ordinary campaigning activities. That was not the case. However, the Government gave an undertaking in Committee to revert to a test based on the wording of the existing legislation, which provides that controlled expenditure is only that
“which can reasonably be regarded as intended”
to promote or procure the electoral success of parties or candidates. The Government’s amendments meet that commitment.
I would like to thank the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, the Electoral Commission and others for the constructive discussion we have had in relation to the amendments. I accept that there is not total agreement on our amendments, but I know that the NCVO, for instance, is at least partially happy about the proposals we have come forward with.
Stephen Twigg (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab/Co-op)
The Deputy Leader of the House will have seen the letter today from Sir Stuart Etherington of NCVO, which states:
“Simply returning to the previous form of words does not solve the problem… In our view, the assurances given by ministers on the floor of the house that charities campaigning on policy issues will not be affected have not been met”.
Tom Brake
I am aware of that, but I am equally aware that Karl Wilding, the NCVO’s director of public policy, said yesterday that it is partially happy about what the Government have done and that we have made some progress. [Interruption.] Yes, I accept that it is partially happy, but it is worth remembering that one of the NCVO’s other concerns, as highlighted in its letter, is the PPERA legislation, which goes back to 2000, under the previous Government. It may be pertinent to remind the Labour party what the then Home Secretary, the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw), said:
“In terms of the day-to-day non-campaigning part of their activity, third parties will not be caught by the provision but, if they seek to influence an election, which is the expenditure in question, our proposed arrangements are reasonable.”—[Official Report, 10 January 2000; Vol. 342, c. 41.]
That is very much our view. We are in the same place.
I know that the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) is new to his position, but I am sure that he will have been told in his briefing that, in response to a request from one of my right hon. Friends, the Government undertook to ensure that we reverted to the definition applied in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. That is precisely what we have done.
Mr Tom Harris (Glasgow South) (Lab)
If the statutory arrangements put in place by the previous Government in the 2000 Act were satisfactory, why does the Minister wish to change them now? Can he list even one example of behaviour by third parties that has led him to believe that new legislation is needed?
Tom Brake
The hon. Gentleman may not have understood. The fact is that we had no intention of changing the test of what constituted promoting or procuring the electoral success of a party or candidate. By reverting to the PPERA legislation, we have put charities and other organisations back to where they were in the run-up to the 2005 and 2010 general elections in relation to what constituted procuring the electoral success of a party or candidate. I accept that in other ways we have changed things in response to the Electoral Commission’s request about the definition of controlled expenditure.
John Pugh (Southport) (LD)
In his letter, Sir Stuart Etherington says:
“A health charity could publish a leaflet highlighting the dangers of smoking. If smoking legislation became a party political issue in an election this activity could be deemed to have the effect of supporting a party’s campaign”.
Has he simply misunderstood the legislation?
Tom Brake
If an anti-smoking organisation ran a campaign subsequently adopted by a party, that would not count as controlled expenditure unless that organisation subsequently said, “Oh, by the way, party X is supporting our campaign, so vote for party X.” The mere fact of running a campaign supported by a party would not incur controlled expenditure. That is clear.
Mike Thornton (Eastleigh) (LD)
There is another point. Back in 2010, the Royal British Legion ran a campaign called “Time to do your bit”. There seems to be an illusion that that would not be possible under the new legislation. Can the Minister assure me that such a campaign would be possible?
Tom Brake
I thank my hon. Friend for that point. That campaign was clearly run on the basis of PPERA, which is what we are reverting to. If the Royal British Legion said, “We are endorsing a candidate who has supported our position and encourage people to vote for them,” it would be caught. [Interruption.] Of course it would be caught, because it would be procuring the electoral success of a party or candidate. If it intended doing such a thing in the 2015 general election, it could choose to register as a non-party organisation and spend £390,000 across the country running that campaign. However, I question whether the Royal British Legion would want to be in such a position.
Stephen Twigg
Will the Minister respond to the specific point raised earlier by my hon. Friend the Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) about the Royal British Legion campaign? In that case, what might apply in England, Wales and Scotland would for obvious reasons not apply in Northern Ireland.
Tom Brake
What applies in Northern Ireland could equally apply in Scotland, England or Wales. It would all depend on whether the Royal British Legion in Northern Ireland was in some way or other promoting or procuring the electoral success of a party or candidate. If it was doing that, it could be caught. If, for instance, it was promoting or procuring the electoral support of a number of candidates because a number had endorsed its message, that would also be deducted from its spend as a third-party organisation if it was promoting the electoral success of a party or candidate. As I said, I doubt whether the Royal British Legion would want to be in the position of promoting a party or candidate. That is not what it does.
Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)
Is not the point that all the organisations that we describe in these case studies do not seek the support of one political party, but set out to win a consensus across the political divide for their cause? Therefore they should have nothing to fear.
Tom Brake
That is absolutely the point. I would make a stronger point. In all the conversations that I have had with charities, they have gone to great extremes to underline the fact that as charities they do not campaign for the electoral success of a party or candidate because the Charity Commission would stop their charitable status if they were seen to be campaigning politically. They do not do that, so the argument that the threshold or total national cap is being dropped or will in some way inhibit charities is not true.
Charities do not campaign for the electoral success of a party or candidate so the threshold would not apply and they would not need to keep details of controlled expenditure. [Interruption.] I find it hard to believe that the question is still being asked. Charities are not affected by the Bill because they do not campaign for electoral success.
The Government amendments meet the commitment we made in Committee, and I thank the organisations that we have worked with on the issue. We believe our amendments provide clarification and reassurance to charities, voluntary organisations, community groups and other campaigners that their normal engagement with public policy will not be subject to regulation as long as it cannot reasonably be regarded as intended to promote or procure the electoral success of a party or candidate.
By reverting to the existing terminology, amendment 32 achieves the aim of making the test for controlled expenditure one that has been in existence since 2000. I have seen continued comment from some organisations that the rules will prevent charities and other campaigners from making their views known. Those objections are based not on what is being done in the Bill but on the rules already set out in PPERA. Those rules have been in place for a number of elections, including the 2005 and 2010 general elections. I am sure that everyone on both sides would agree that, during those elections, charities and other campaigners were not prevented from engaging and influencing public policy.
Tom Brake
I will come to that. Others in the House will know from experience that campaigners make their views abundantly clear at election time, as they should.
In answer to the sedentary intervention from the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby, I should say that we are changing the controlled expenditure provisions because the Electoral Commission asked us to bring in line the controlled expenditure that applies to third- party organisations to that which applies to political parties. Do the Opposition believe that the current ability for an individual or group of organisations to spend a large amount in one parliamentary constituency is acceptable, or do they think that it should be controlled, as we do?
Mr Harris
The Minister made a good point in stating that the Royal British Legion would not want to be associated with any particular party or candidate. That charity is a good example of one that tries to generate consensus across the electorate.
May I ask the Minister about a different kind of campaign? The RSPCA has a well known objection to the badger cull. It is possible that, in the run-up to the 2015 election, it will run information campaigns opposing the cull. They would not be national campaigns, because they would focus on areas where the cull was happening. Such campaigns would not be for or against any particular party, but we all know what conclusion voters would draw. Would such a campaign be included in this legislation?
Tom Brake
The hon. Gentleman is inviting me to judge whether that campaign would fall foul of the rules without sufficient detail about what it might constitute. It is not my position to do that; it is for the Electoral Commission. If the RSPCA ran a campaign in a number of constituencies saying, “We are against the badger cull”, and subsequently a candidate announced that they were also against it, provided that the RSPCA did not say, “Candidate A is backing our campaign—vote for candidate A”, it would be able to proceed with campaigning. [Interruption.] Someone is saying that I am not able to give a detailed answer. In fact, I am sure that in the run-up to the 2005 and 2010 elections the Electoral Commission had discussions with a number of different organisations to clarify where the boundaries lie on these issues, and it is right for it to do so.
Angela Smith
The Electoral Commission has made clear its view that it should enforce the rules already laid down by Parliament, not determine the rules. The Deputy Leader of the House said that it is up to the commission to decide what is permissible and what is not; surely that is not right.
Tom Brake
The Electoral Commission has produced guidance that the different organisations have to work within, and it will investigate any issues that are believed to have arisen. It clearly has an important role. The Government are not in a position to set out in legislation each and every possible type of campaign that the commission might have to account for. That is why it produces guidance and why—we will support it in this—it will sit down with campaigning organisations to ensure that that guidance is available for them so that they can work effectively.
Tracey Crouch (Chatham and Aylesford) (Con)
I recognise that some progress has been made on the precise wording of the clause, but there remains a huge amount of uncertainty among the charities and, indeed, the Electoral Commission as to how this will work. Does the Minister recognise that that makes it very difficult for people not only to understand it but to support it?
Tom Brake
I do. It would be foolish of me to say that some charities are not concerned about this issue. Clearly they are, and the NCVO and others have expressed their concerns. Our role is to restate as many times as is required that, as my hon. Friend will know, charities overwhelmingly do not campaign for the electoral success of a party or candidate and therefore are not caught by our proposals. We can restate that in as much contact with charities as possible. Of course, as I think she would agree, other organisations that are clearly campaigning for the electoral success of a party or candidate should be caught by this legislation, as they are caught by the current legislation. Nothing that we are proposing changes that, apart from the things that I mentioned earlier as regards, for instance, the level of controlled expenditure that we allow.
Dr Francis
The theme of the Deputy Leader of the House’s remarks is that there is considerable misunderstanding out there among voluntary organisations. Would it not be reasonable and decent to provide more time for his proposals to be better understood?
Tom Brake
What is reasonable and appropriate is for us, as a Government, to set out very clearly our intention, which is not to stop charities campaigning on policy issues, and to restate that intention as often as is required so that charities can see what it is. That is what we will carry on doing, and I am confident that we will get the message across.
Government amendment 33 removes the additional test that expenditure might otherwise enhance the standing of a party or candidate. I hope that charities and campaigning organisations will see this as a positive step in providing them with greater clarity. Although we do not consider it to be a significant change, we recognise that this additional limb of the existing PPERA test was perhaps less clear and might have suggested a more remote connection from promoting electoral success, and we want to be clear that that is not our aim. This should provide further clarity and reassurance to campaigners as to the test they have to meet in order to incur controlled expenditure.
Simon Hughes
My right hon. Friend has set out all the things that should be of reassurance, which is very helpful to those in the House and, I hope, outside it. Will he repeat the assurance that he and the Leader of the House are willing, if necessary, to have a further conversation with Stuart Etherington or the commission to make sure, face to face, that what has been said is understood? A great deal of heat and noise has been generated, and at the beginning there might have been some justification for that. The Government are trying to deal with it, but it might be better dealt with by also having some further conversation to make sure that there is dialogue as opposed to just two separate statements in different places.
Tom Brake
I can reassure my right hon. Friend that the doors of the Leader of the House’s office and mine are permanently open to that sort of approach. In fact, the dialogue with the NCVO has been very active and constant, and I am keen to pursue that. The NCVO is, as I stated earlier, at least partially happy and has in the past said that the amendments significantly meet its concerns. There is common ground and we want to ensure that it is developed further.
Martin Horwood (Cheltenham) (LD)
Although the Deputy Leader of the House has said that this issue is clearly to do with candidates or parties, there is a slight problem with the wording of lines 1 to 4 on page 13, which note that “for election purposes” means
“for the purpose of or in connection with…candidates who hold (or do not hold) particular opinions or who advocate (or do not advocate) particular policies”.
Although this is a valuable Bill which has been widely misrepresented by 38 Degrees and others, I think that wording presents a potential risk to charities such as the one for which I used to work and campaign, in that it might restrict what they perceive to be their political activity.
Tom Brake
I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. My issue with his concern is that that terminology is used in PPERA, which has been around for 13 years. One would therefore have expected such concerns to have emerged in the past 13 years, and seeing as they have not, I am reasonably confident that they will not emerge by 2015 either.
James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)
I welcome the fact that the Government are in listening mode on these issues. Given that Government Members often accuse Labour Members of listening too much to trade unions, I was particularly interested to hear that the Deputy Leader of the House and the Department have been listening to the TUC with regard to the annual conference, so perhaps they are not exempt from lobbying by the unions. The issue of the annual conference is obviously one for the main political parties and some of the minor political parties plus the TUC. Is there a list of defined organisations for these annual conferences?
Tom Brake
I am not aware of a list of defined organisations. If hon. Members look at the list of third-party organisations that registered in 2010 and 2005 they might be able to draw some conclusions about which annual conferences I have in mind.
As I have said, the Government believe that the amendments provide the clarity and reassurance that charities, voluntary organisations and the Electoral Commission have sought. We are aware that campaigners will want to understand how to comply with the provisions of the regulatory regime as amended by the Bill. Just as it has for previous elections, the independent regulator, the Electoral Commission, will develop and produce guidance to inform campaigners what expenditure it is likely to consider to be regulated or not regulated. The Government stand ready to support this work.
Amendment 101, tabled by the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen), seeks, along broadly similar lines to Government amendment 32, to revise the definition of “for election purposes” to be activity which can reasonably be regarded as promoting or procuring the success of a party or candidate. However, the amendment would also introduce a new primary purpose test, which the Government cannot support. Such a test would be likely to create greater regulatory uncertainty and an obvious avenue for avoidance activity that could fatally undermine these rules, which are supported in principle by the hon. Gentleman’s party.
The concerns of campaigners and the Electoral Commission on the introduction of the draft Bill was that the revised language was untested and caused uncertainty. Our purpose in reverting to the original PPERA test is to address those concerns by reintroducing a test with which the commission and campaigners are familiar, and on which the commission has existing guidance and experience. Introducing a new and untested primary purpose test would completely undermine those benefits. Rather than having the clear test of whether the expenditure can be reasonably regarded as intended to promote electoral success there would be two tests: can it be so regarded and is it also the primary purpose? The opportunity for uncertainty and legal challenge would only be increased by the following questions. What is the primary purpose of your campaign? Is it to promote the issue or to promote those who support your issue? That is an additional test which does nothing to provide the clarity that campaigners say they want.
Perhaps more damaging is the opportunity for avoidance. The primary purpose of an environmental organisation’s advertising campaign might be claimed to be to recruit new members and encourage donations, but it might also urge support for its preferred party. It may be said that the primary purpose is to protect animal welfare, but that may be done only by encouraging support for particular candidates. Those are activities that are and ought to be regulated. The primary purpose test would drive a coach and horses through the legislation. Groups carrying out these activities have previously undertaken campaigning as recognised third parties, which is perfectly appropriate: they can campaign without restrictions. Under the hon. Gentleman’s amendment, however, all could be potentially excluded from registration. The Government have responded to concerns from the Electoral Commission and other groups that the test for controlled expenditure needs to be clear. The amendment would introduce unwanted uncertainty for campaigners.
The amendment would also create a loophole in the law that third parties could use as an avenue for avoidance and that would undermine the regulatory regime. That is not just my or the Government’s view. The Electoral Commission has expressed concerns that the amendment would introduce a new subjective element test which could lead to significant regulatory difficulty. It has also stated that it does not support an exemption for charities from these rules. I urge the hon. Gentleman not to press his amendment.
Stephen Twigg
May I first put on record my thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Wayne David) and the hon. Member for Norwich North (Miss Smith), who, along with my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith), have led on the Bill until now? I also welcome to his post the Minister of State, Cabinet Office, the right hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark), whom I will be shadowing in my new role.
I have heard very little today to change the view I held before the debate started that part 2 of the Bill is little more than a gag on charities and campaigners which, as hon. Members of all parties have said, both today and during the Bill’s earlier stages, will have a chilling effect on our national political debate. Earlier my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly reminded the House that the Bill underwent no pre-legislative scrutiny, and doesn’t it show? Given that it was published just before the summer recess, it is to the particular credit of the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee, chaired by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen), that it was able to give the Bill a degree of scrutiny and table a number of constructive amendments in September and today. What we are left with from the Government is a half-baked set of proposals that pose a real danger of causing more harm than good. It is clear from the widespread concerns raised by charities and campaigning organisations that the lack of consultation and full scrutiny will limit their activities in practice—not in furthering political objectives, but simply in meeting their own charitable objectives.
I listened very carefully to the Deputy Leader of the House’s speeches on this and the previous group of amendments. Nothing that he said has changed the sense I had in preparing for today’s debate that part 2 is a solution in search of a problem.
As the Minister has rightly reminded us, the previous Labour Government introduced a cap on third-party spending, because we do not want to go down the American route of unaccountable organisations spending vast sums of money. We introduced the cap and have no objection to a tough cap on third-party spending. However, the big money in British politics is not third-party spending but spending by the political parties. At the last election, political parties spent 10 times more than third parties. If the Government were serious—[Interruption.] The Leader of the House heckles me from a sedentary position—I cannot quite hear what he is saying—but if he and the Conservative party in particular are serious, why do they not confront their reliance on a tiny number of wealthy donors from the City of London? There is nothing on that in the Bill, which is supposedly about getting the big money out of politics.
In the 2010 general election, political parties nationally spent £31 million; third-party campaigners spent £3 million. The biggest third-party expenditure was 4% of the £17 million spent by the Conservative party, which spent the same as all the other parties and all the third parties added together. Let us be clear: if the Government were serious about taking big money out of politics, they would consider ideas such as a reduction in the overall expenditure cap for political parties during election years and the introduction of a £5,000 cap on donations to political parties.
Stephen Twigg
I will give way when I have made this point. This Government—[Interruption.] Do I get a permanent commentary on my speeches from the Leader of the House? I will get used to it. The Government have wasted an opportunity to tackle the real problem of big money in politics, and thereby ripped up a cross-party approach to party political funding.
Tom Brake
The hon. Gentleman will know that no agreement has been reached on party funding, but the Liberal Democrats would clearly welcome one. The Committee on Standards in Public Life has said that the overall controlled expenditure cap is generous, but does the Labour party believe that it should be reduced or that it is set at the right level?
Stephen Twigg
I will come to that, but I am not aware of a problem. When an hon. Friend intervened, we did not get an answer from the Minister on whether there is an example in practice of the limit being too high. However, the Opposition do not have a closed mind on a proper cross-party, evidence-based debate on the matter. We do not believe the Government have done that.
Stephen Twigg
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right that one risk is that the Bill will result in litigation and a shift in the use of moneys that charities would otherwise use to fulfil their charitable objectives. However, I think that the situation might be worse. As I have said, nothing that I have heard today has changed my view, which has been expressed by other Labour Front Benchers, that many organisations will be gagged because they will simply stop their campaigning work owing to their fears about the legislation. [Interruption.] The Leader of the House and the Deputy Leader of the House can shake their heads, but that is what organisations fear. That is deeply unhealthy for our democracy.
In conclusion, will the Government amendments mean that issue-based campaigning will be excluded from the regulations? From Ros Baston and other lawyers it is an unequivocal “no”. Secondly, and crucial to today’s discussion, will the amendments make any significant changes to the categories of activities to be covered by regulation? Ros Baston finds that the changes will not improve the clarity of proposed regulation, and indeed are likely to result in new uncertainties. In other words, instead of making progress, the Government amendments risk making a bad situation even worse.
We have already heard about the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, which the Deputy Leader of the House said was partially happy. I invite colleagues to read the letter, dated today, from Sir Stuart Etherington, chief executive of the NCVO. He states:
“The Leader of the House suggests that at both the 2005 and 2010 election this wording has not prevented charities and voluntary organisations from campaigning and influencing policy…The Leader misses an important point. At previous elections the definition of controlled expenditure only applied to ‘election material’ (a much narrower category of activity) and expenditure thresholds were set at reasonable and workable levels. The Bill in its current form has significantly expanded the list of activities, and considerably lowered the threshold. The overall effect will therefore be that more charities and voluntary organisations will be subject to the enhanced and much more onerous rules.”
Tom Brake
I am afraid that the phrase I have repeated many times will get repeated again. Does the hon. Gentleman acknowledge that charities and voluntary organisations do not campaign for the electoral success of a party or candidates, and therefore will not be caught by controlled expenditure?
Stephen Twigg
If that is the case, why are we having this conversation and debate? If there is no issue, why have the Government brought this Bill before the House, unless there is something about which they are concerned?
As others have said, there is a real risk of a chilling effect on our national debate given the timing and rush of this Bill. The Minister has acknowledged that the Government are in a rush to get the legislation in place for the 2015 general election, and inevitably people will think that they are trying to insulate their own record, MPs and candidates from legitimate democratic criticism. A number of high-profile campaigns could have been stymied by the legislation, such as that run by the National Union of Students in 2010 on tuition fees, the equal marriage campaign by Stonewall, or, as many Members have said, the Royal British Legion military covenant campaign.
At a time when trust in politics is at an all-time low, why are the Government bringing forward a measure that could restrict the one part of our politics that is doing a good job of engaging people? As well as having a chilling effect on debate, the Bill could also allow this Government, and future Governments, to escape scrutiny on their record and policies. To pluck an example of interest to the Liberal Democrats, might it stop the National Union of Students from holding them to account for how they voted on tuition fees, stop organisations such as the excellent Family and Childcare Trust from highlighting how the Government have driven up the cost of child care for working families, or stop the Royal College of Nursing from warning the public about the impact of Government health policies?
The Royal British Legion was mentioned earlier in the debate, and its circular makes an incredibly powerful case about the weakness of the Government amendment. The Royal British Legion remains
“unconvinced that legitimate awareness-raising activities won’t be captured by the revised definition”.
The Electoral Commission’s own briefing confirms those concerns:
“activity does not have to be ‘party political’ for its costs to be regulated.”
Is it really the Government’s intention for the excellent work of organisations such as the Royal British Legion to be curtailed because of this hastily thrown together Bill? Surely it is not. Had they undertaken proper pre-legislative scrutiny—a case made powerfully by the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee—they would have discovered the problems that this clause and this part of the Bill will create.
Mr Harris
My hon. Friend is right to raise that concern. It occurs to me that, no matter how complicated a problem is, it will be a lot more complicated when we introduce talk of any of the devolved Administrations.
I want to offer one more important example that has been raised previously with the Minister. The National Union of Students might arrive in his constituency in the year running up to May 2015 with a leaflet saying, “Here is a photograph of your MP, Tom Brake, signing a pledge not to vote in any circumstances for increased tuition fees. This is what he said, and this is how he voted.” Will he confirm—yes or no—whether that campaign or that union would fall foul of the spending limits and the sanctions in the Bill? That is a reasonable question, and it is reasonable to ask the Minister to say, one way or another, whether that is the case.
At the last general election, I attended a number of hustings. At the very end of one that was organised by a church—a charitable organisation—it was announced that the candidates present would be asked to sign a public pledge and that a photograph of the candidates signing the pledge would be subsequently distributed to voters. The pledge was to campaign to allow asylum seekers to get work legally. I said, “No, I don’t believe in that policy,” and had to walk off the stage and allow the other candidates to have their photograph taken, which would have had an effect on the voting intentions of certain groups of people in my constituency. A charitable organisation was distributing information that had an effect on my election. Will the Minister say whether that, in his opinion, according to the legislation, will fall foul of the limits and sanctions in the Bill?
Those are important questions. If the Minister can answer them one way or the other, he would help a great deal in reassuring members of civic society and the heads of charities on whether their activities in the run-up to the next general election will, after all, be perfectly legal and not subject to sanctions.
Tom Brake
With the leave of the House, Mr Speaker, I should like to respond to a couple of points.
The hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) said that we need to address party funding. I agree with him. The Government offered the Labour party an opportunity in the Bill to address trade union funding, which the leader of the Labour party wants to address. I regret that that offer was not taken up.
The hon. Gentleman referred extensively to legal advice —he said that that was not the entirety of his speech, although it did feel that way. One point he did make was that, because of the Bill, organisations must consult to see whether what they propose to do is acceptable. However, they must do exactly that under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000—there will be circumstances in which organisations will want to check whether what they do is within the rules. There is no change in that respect.
I was hoping to hear from the hon. Gentleman something about what the Opposition believe. We have heard that they support the measure in principle, but, contrary to what he has said, we did not hear whether they believe that the cap is appropriate or that there is a need for a constituency limit, or whether they support the extension of controlled expenditure to other items, which the Electoral Commission has asked us to do.
The hon. Gentleman went on to explain that he would support amendment 101. The Chairman of the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee said that although he wanted that amendment to be passed, he did not really want it to be in the Bill in practice. That was an unusual position to adopt.
Mr Allen
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. The right hon. Gentleman is misleading the House inadvertently about the words that I used and my intent. I would be happy to see amendment 101 in the Bill. However, I feel that there is sufficient time for the Government—even this Government—to improve the wording. I do not claim that it is perfect. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman, who has conducted the debate quite civilly to date, will not misrepresent me again.
Mr Speaker
The hon. Gentleman has made his point, to which there is no requirement for a reply. The Deputy Leader of the House may continue with his advocacy.
Tom Brake
I have noted the hon. Gentleman’s point. The Opposition spokesman said that he would support amendment 101. Personally, I think that it should be put into room 101.
The hon. Member for Stevenage (Stephen McPartland) supported what the Government are doing, which I welcome. He said that he would not support the loss of freedom of speech and nor would I or anybody else on the Front Bench. This is a good opportunity to remind people that this Government have got rid of ID cards, stopped the retention of the DNA of innocent people, got rid of internal exile and reduced the pre-charge detention period from 28 to 14 days. We will take no lectures on civil liberties from the Opposition.
The Chairman of the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee explained the he is the trustee of a charity. I congratulate him on that. He said that he would advise his charity not to campaign on policy issues. I hope that that is not the case. We are talking about the PPERA legislation from 2005 and 2010. I assume that he did not advise his charity not to campaign on policy issues in 2005 and 2010, so I hope that he will not give it that advice now.
Tom Brake
I am afraid that I am due to complete my remarks. I am happy to discuss the hon. Gentleman’s point of view with him later.
My hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso) rightly highlighted the risk of having a subjective test. He pointed out what part 2 is about, which has been rather lost in this debate. It is about preventing organisations such as the National Rifle Association from playing a major part in elections in this country.
There were a number of other contributions. The Chair of the Joint Committee on Human Rights said that the Bill may well have a chilling effect on freedom of speech and assembly, and he called for a democratic pause. We will certainly consider his Committee’s report and we can work with the timetable that he set out for its publication. However, as I said in response to a similar intervention, we intend to move forward with the proposals.
The hon. Member for Darlington (Jenny Chapman) expressed support for amendment 101, which the Government oppose adamantly.
Finally, the hon. Member for Glasgow South (Mr Harris) asked me again to comment on a number of theoretical campaigns, without providing the detail that I or anybody else would need to judge whether they would constitute promoting or procuring the electoral success of a party or candidate. I am therefore clearly not in a position to comment.
I have listened carefully to what the Opposition have said, but I will press the Government amendments.
Amendment 32 agreed to.
Amendment made: 33, page 12, line 34, leave out subsection (3) and insert—
‘( ) Omit subsection (3).’.—(Tom Brake.)
Amendment proposed: 101, page 12, leave out line 37 to line 9 on page 13 and insert—
‘“For election purposes” means activity which can reasonably be regarded as intended for the primary purpose of—
(a) promoting or procuring electoral success at any relevant election for—
(i) one or more particular registered parties;
(ii) one or more registered parties who advocate (or do not advocate) particular policies or who otherwise fall within a particular category of such parties; or
(iii) candidates who hold (or do not hold) particular opinions or who advocate (or do not advocate) particular policies or who otherwise fall within a particular category of candidates.’. —(Mr Allen.)
Question put, That the amendment be made.
Mr Allen
The hon. Lady makes a clear and succinct point. The sad fact is that this provision is a mystery; clause 27 has no antecedents and no pedigree, and we are not sure why it is in the Bill. Nobody has asked for a reduction in the interaction. Many colleagues throughout the House want a greater interaction—dare I cite the Prime Minister talking about the big society? I welcomed those words, because I would like to see that. This provision does not welcome the big society; it shrinks the big society to a slightly smaller big society that feels unloved, chilled, unable to get its point of view over and unable to articulate the things that drive it to be in existence.
My reason for moving amendment 102 and asking colleagues in all parts of the House to support it is, again, to send a signal to the Government that they should think again on the issue—this is not the end of the process. They should go away, take good advice, perhaps even listen to this House and perhaps even set up an arrangement whereby further evidence can be taken. My Committee, which is all-party, and its unanimous report might be able to help in that, and we are keen to find a way forward that arrives at a consensus. The only way in which we will get that pause, and get the Government to have another think and a little more of a listen to all the people who are writing to us today on this issue—people whose credentials are unimpeachable—is by voting down clause 27 tonight. The only way to do that is to support amendment 102 and I urge all colleagues to do so.
Tom Brake
Third parties may campaign in a relevant election up to a particular threshold without being subject to any electoral controls or restrictions on their activities. The Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 sets the threshold for third parties campaigning in England at £10,000, and at £5,000 for third parties campaigning in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Third parties may exceed these thresholds only if they register with the Electoral Commission as “recognised third parties”. They are then permitted to incur “controlled expenditure”, as it is defined by clause 26 of this Bill
Upon registration, third parties also become subject to spending and donations controls for the duration of the regulated period of the relevant election. The Bill’s intention is to ensure greater transparency of campaign finance, and so provides that a third party must register with the Electoral Commission as a “recognised third party” if it wishes to spend more than the revised threshold in the Bill—£5,000 in England or £2,000 in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland. That will have the effect that more third parties will account for their expenditure and provide details of the donations they receive. It is not clear to me what the Opposition’s concerns about this provision are. It is about providing more transparency so that people can see who is campaigning locally in support of a party or candidates.
Lady Hermon
What is the reasoning for halving the expenditure threshold from £10,000 to £5,000 in England but more than halving the threshold in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland? Our threshold has been reduced from £5,000 to £2,000. Unless my maths escapes me, our figure is less than half what it was. What is the justification for doing that?
Tom Brake
I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention. The reason is simply that the Government wanted to arrive at some straightforward figures—£5,000 and £2,000 in the respective nations—and we felt that given the size of those nations, spending £2,000 had a significant impact on the election campaign. Therefore, from a transparency point of view, we felt this was important to allow people to see who was actively campaigning in support of a party or candidates.
Mark Durkan
The Deputy Leader of the House says that the Government wanted a figure that was straightforward. Were the existing figures not straightforward enough? Who has been running rings around them? What has been the ambit of the abuse that the Government are trying to deal with? What problem has been solved? Problems have been created, but the Deputy Leader of the House has not told us what problem is being solved.
Mr Speaker
Order. Before the Deputy Leader of the House responds, I ought to emphasise what should be apparent to everybody—namely, that we are operating under very tight time constraints. There are amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) about which he might wish, perfectly reasonably, to speak and others also wish to contribute. A degree of self-discipline is now imperative.
Tom Brake
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for that guidance. The answer to the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) is that the provision is about transparency and making people aware of a wider range of organisations that are campaigning in constituencies up and down the country in support of a party or candidate.
Once a third party has registered with the Electoral Commission it may then only incur controlled expenditure to a maximum spending limit, which is currently set at approximately 5% of the potential party spend. That amounts to just under £1 million—£988,000—across the UK. Evidence from recent elections shows that the third-party spending limit for UK parliamentary elections, which applies separately for each of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, is so high that third parties are effectively unrestricted in their level of spending. That renders the limit ineffective as a spending control.
As Members will be aware, clause 27 lowers the spending limits for the purposes of UK parliamentary elections to 2% of the maximum campaign expenditure limit that applies to political parties campaigning in UK parliamentary elections. That is equivalent to £319,800 in England, £35,400 in Scotland, £24,000 in Wales and £10,800 in Northern Ireland. The Bill lowers the thresholds to increase transparency by identifying third parties that campaign in the political process, and I should have thought that Opposition Members would support that. Amendment 59 would amend clause 27 so that it no longer does that.
It is right to distinguish which organisations incur expenditure campaigning at elections and to ensure their funds are fully accounted for, but we recognise that there is a balance to be struck between transparency and placing regulatory requirements on third parties. We also need to take account of the spending limit in constituencies, to which I shall come shortly.
Amendment 60 proposes that until the Electoral Commission has undertaken an assessment of the impact of clause 27 on both political parties and third parties, and until that report is laid before Parliament, the provisions of clause 27 may not come into effect. A few hours ago, we had a lengthy debate on the impact assessments that the Government has carried out and that we would expect the Electoral Commission, as part of its normal duties, to conduct after the legislation is implemented and elections have taken place.
At the last general election, the largest 10% of third parties spent more than the remaining 90% put together. We are seeking a level playing field for the different third parties that might oppose each other in the course of an election campaign. It is worth noting that only two organisations spent more than the new lowered limits proposed in the Bill—Unison and Vote for a Change. That demonstrates that the spending limit is so high as to be ineffectual in creating the level playing field that spending limits seek to provide.
Clause 28 sets the constituency limits and the Government have been put on the spot and asked why we want to reduce the national spending cap. Third parties must comply with particular spending limits according to whether they are campaigning in England, Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland. Under the provisions of the Bill, they may spend up to an aggregate £390,000 campaigning in a UK parliamentary election, a figure that we think allows third parties to campaign vigorously nationally but that also provides a greater degree of control over spending to ensure that big money does not seek to play a part in influencing the outcome of elections, particularly in a limited number of constituencies, distorting the electoral process. A third party could, however, choose to direct the entire national spending limit at only a small part of the UK. Again it is not clear whether the Opposition are comfortable with the current situation, where that is possible, or whether they would like to see change. Our view is that we do not want disproportionately large amounts of money to be focused on a limited number of seats. In other circumstances, that is the argument that the Opposition would put to us today if we were not taking the action that we are taking.
Clause 28 therefore introduces an entirely new provision whereby third parties will be permitted to spend only up to a certain proportion of their controlled expenditure in individual constituencies. Subsection (6) limits this per constituency spending to 0.05% of the maximum campaign expenditure limits applied to political parties, which amounts to £9,750. This limit applies for the duration of the regulated period for a UK parliamentary general election.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
I wonder why, if there was a particular situation relating to a particular constituency, it would be wrong for a disproportionate amount of energy to be focused on that constituency. Surely in this country we have a general election, but within that we have 650 individual elections, and if there were special, unique features associated with a particular constituency and an argument going on there, it would not be unreasonable to have a different expenditure level in that seat.
Tom Brake
I would have hoped that the hon. Gentleman would agree that election campaigns were about political parties fighting together to secure the election of one of the candidates, and that if, for instance, an industrialist who was very pro-fracking decided that he or she wanted to unseat a parliamentary candidate who was anti-fracking and was prepared to spend just under £1 million under the current legislation in unseating that candidate, the hon. Gentleman would not support that. We certainly do not want to allow that to happen.
Further, also under subsection (6)—
Mr Speaker
Order. I say very gently to the Deputy Leader of the House, to whose contribution I am listening with my usual interest and respect, that I know that he will want the hon. Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith) to be able to speak from the Opposition Front Bench, as well as the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart). I therefore confidently anticipate that the right hon. Gentleman is approaching the conclusion of his oration.
Tom Brake
Indeed, I will do so.
Under subsection (6), only a proportion of the expenditure—£5,850—may be incurred during the period between the dissolution of Parliament and the date of poll. Third parties campaigning for or against a particular candidate or candidates already need to think carefully about their spending to ensure that they stay on the right side of the separate, existing rules on candidate expenditure in the Representation of the People Act 1983. Third parties clearly campaigning for or against a particular candidate or candidates may spend only up £500 doing so. Besides raising this amount to £800 through clause 34, the Bill does not otherwise affect those provisions.
There are many other amendments that I would have liked to have an opportunity to discuss today, but the Government can support none of the amendments in this group. I hope therefore that Members will seek to withdraw them.
Mr Speaker
I thank the Deputy Leader of the House for being so co-operative.
Mr Lansley
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I thank Members from both sides of the House for their contribution to the debate. We have been busily engaged in considering the Bill on Second Reading, in Committee and on Report on either side of the summer and conference recesses and during the September sitting. The contributions of Members have exposed the issues and enabled the debate to take place.
As on Second Reading, I thank the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee for its scrutiny. I met the Committee on the morning of the Second Reading debate and my colleagues met it before that. The Chair of the Committee, the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen), made manifest his irritation with the amount of time that was available for that scrutiny on several occasions. However, I thank him and his colleagues for their participation.
With regard to our debates yesterday and today, I wrote to the Chair of the Joint Committee on Human Rights on Monday to explain in detail why I believe the Bill to be compatible with the European convention on human rights. I look forward to the Committee’s report. My colleagues and I will take full account of its conclusions, which I hope it will reach soon.
I thank my good friend and colleague, the Deputy Leader of the House. I also thank the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), who has responsibility for employee relations. Owing to the length of today’s debates, she has not been able to explain part 3 as fully as she would have wished. I am extremely grateful to the former Minister with responsibility for political and constitutional reform, my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Miss Smith). I am also grateful to the officials who have supported the ministerial team and to parliamentary counsel for all their work on the Bill.
I do not want this moment to pass without expressing my thanks to the kaleidoscope of talent—I use those words advisedly—that has participated in the debate from the Opposition Front Bench. I know that in order to try to construct an Opposition they found it interesting to see how our team was constructed. The shadow Leader of the House and the hon. Members for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith), for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), for Hemsworth (Jon Trickett), for Harrow West (Mr Thomas), for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) and for Caerphilly (Wayne David) all contributed to our consideration of the Bill. They were an Opposition in search of an argument and they did their best.
The Government made a commitment that we would be the most open Government ever and that we would promote transparency in public life. We have sought to improve public confidence in our political system. We have been the first Government to publish details of the meetings that Ministers and permanent secretaries have had with external organisations. We have published details of our relationships with media editors and the like. We have published details of hospitality, departmental business plans and procurement processes. There is a wide range of raw data that people can assess for themselves. We have always sought to take transparency further.
The purpose of the Bill is to achieve transparency by fulfilling our coalition commitment to introduce a statutory register of lobbyists so that the public know who lobbyists represent when they meet decision makers, and by making it clearer where and how money is being spent by third parties at elections to influence the outcomes of those elections. We are also seeking transparency by giving the public, and members of trade unions, the confidence that they know who their members are. Together, those measures will increase transparency in the political system.
Jonathan Edwards
On Second Reading I listed a number of lobbying scandals that have decimated and dominated politics in this place for far too long: donations for dinners, cash for honours, cash for questions, a ministerial cab for hire. Which of those scandals will the Bill stop in future?
Mr Lansley
The character of each of those scandals is of a particular kind. We are setting out to ensure that relationships between lobbyists and key decision makers in Government are more transparent in future, so that those who impact on our political system do so in the glare of public life. For most of the things the hon. Gentleman describes, people were trying to seek influence covertly, and in some cases were completely contrary to the law and the codes of conduct of this House and elsewhere, or of government. We must expose those relationships everywhere, where we can, and when people breach the code, we will deal with it.
The Bill has been widely debated in the House and beyond, and I thank Members for sharing their views, because healthy debate is a cornerstone of our democracy. The measures in the Bill have also been misrepresented, and during the passage of the Bill we have fully exposed where those misrepresentations lie. The hon. Member for Nottingham North explained on many occasions in the course of his 190 minutes of offerings that there had not been sufficient scrutiny of the Bill. I gently say to him, however, that one does not take the moral high ground over lack of scrutiny by taking up more time than is needed to explain the issues. [Interruption.] Actually, I think there are relatively few issues, and we have exposed them clearly and answered them fully. I encourage Members in the other place to read the debates. They will see that, as the Bill completed its passage through this House, those issues have been answered, and by virtue of the amendments tabled the Bill has been improved. As is always the case, all is capable of improvement.
Simon Hughes
There can be no serious objection to parts 1 and 3 of the Bill, but there are clearly continuing concerns about part 2. The Leader of the House has committed to considering the report by the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee when it is published, but will he confirm the undertaking that he and his colleagues will work to ensure that the misrepresentations are dealt with, and that the concerns—and some uncertainties—can be discussed with Ministers, the voluntary sector and others, including the Electoral Commission, in the days ahead?
Mr Lansley
I hope I will be clear, just as I thought my right hon. Friend the Deputy Leader of the House was clear during discussions on part 2 of the Bill. We had a number of meetings with a range of organisations, and we listened carefully to points raised in this House and by those organisations. I met the National Council for Voluntary Organisations before Committee stage, and I was clear that we would make changes to the definition of expenditure for electoral purposes, to remove what it regarded as the risks and uncertainty associated with those definitions. It was not our intention to change in substance the test for what constitutes expenditure for electoral purposes, albeit that we intend—rightly, I think—to introduce greater transparency by including the range of controlled activities in a way consistent with recommendations by the Electoral Commission in its regulatory review.
It is important for us to have a registration threshold, so that those who want to spend a significant amount of money to influence electoral outcomes do so openly. They will not be prevented from doing that, but they will have to do it in a transparent way. It is important to get big money out of trying to influence electoral outcomes. It is therefore important to bring down the threshold, and for it to be disaggregated so that it cannot be spent disproportionately in individual constituencies or small geographic areas.
We did not want to change the test, in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, that only expenditure that could reasonably be regarded as intended to procure or promote the electoral success of a party or candidate should be controlled expenditure. That will still be true. In fact, it will be even more narrowly true, because we have taken out the strand relating to enhancing the standing of political parties at relevant elections, as it was capable of being used to create uncertainty.
Members have quoted from the letter by Sir Stuart Etherington, the chief executive of NVCO. I urge them to read it carefully. It says that there is uncertainty associated with the definition in the 2000 Act, and that that continues to be the case. It is the job of the Electoral Commission—taking the test we have here, which is as clear as we could make it—to inform organisations through the guidance it produces. We stand ready to work with the Electoral Commission. It is an independent organisation and it is for it to decide how it goes about that task, but we could not have made it any clearer.
Lady Hermon
The Leader of the House is being most generous in taking interventions. May I ask him to address one particular issue that pertains to Northern Ireland? He emphasised the need for transparency and the need to know who influences elections, and I think we all agree that that is important. However, the Government have agreed that the anonymity of donations to political parties in Northern Ireland will continue. That can no longer be justified on security grounds, because Northern Ireland has successfully hosted, without incident, the G8 summit in Fermanagh and the world police and fire games. How does he square those two things?
Mr Lansley
Each has its own particular characteristics and the Speaker will forgive me if I do not respond to that point, as I think it is outwith the terms of the Bill. We do not intend to change that. We are introducing transparency relating to expenditure by third parties seeking to influence the outcome of elections. The Bill has no impact on the donations that individuals or organisations make to political parties, or on how political parties spend money at elections.
We were not able, on Report, to discuss the final group of amendments on part 3 of the Bill. We continue to value the important role trade unions play in public life. We recognise that their influence extends beyond their own members, which is why it is important for members, employers and the public to have confidence that unions know who their members are. The Bill is in no sense an attack on trade unions. That is not correct. The measures are not designed to make it harder for unions to operate. I will be clear: the Bill will not prevent unions from taking industrial action; it will not require unions to collect more data; and nor will it place membership data in the hands of employers. Instead, it provides the public with reassurance that trade unions are fulfilling the duties to which they are already bound. Part 3 of the Bill strengthens requirements in existing legislation to ensure that unions can demonstrate that they keep an up-to-date and accurate membership register.
Part 1 will create transparency with regard to who is lobbying whom in relation to key decision makers. The Labour party, and last year’s report by the Select Committee on the earlier consultation, seeks a different Bill—one that creates a large-scale bureaucracy listing everybody who engages in any kind of lobbying activity. We have looked at that approach, and, frankly, it is not remotely justified. Transparency is the way forward: transparency in lobbying and in third-party campaigning. When people set out to influence the electoral outcomes, they must do so in a transparent way.
Charities, voluntary organisations and third parties who want to campaign on policies and issues will continue to be free to do so, as long as they do not step over the line and set out to influence electoral outcomes directly. There will be transparency in how trade unions represent their members, because they will know who their members are. These are the ways we will provide reassurance in the political system and enhance confidence through transparency and accountability. I commend the Bill to the House.
Tom Brake
I wish to make a few brief comments. First, I say to the hon. Members for Wallasey (Ms Eagle) and for Blaydon (Mr Anderson) that the problem with someone dusting down their Second Reading speech is that they miss changes made to the Bill in the interim. I would, however, like to thank all hon. Members for their contributions to this debate. I appreciate that organisations from all walks of life have expressed views—sometimes strong views—about the Bill, and I am grateful that so many have taken the time to share them.
The Bill is about transparency and giving the public confidence in our political system. I am sure that no Member would disagree that we must ensure that all those who impact on our democracy do so transparently, accountably and fairly—these measures will do that. This debate has covered a wide range of viewpoints. There is not time to address every point that has been raised, but I will quickly recap what this Bill will do, as that should address points raised. It will introduce a statutory register of consultant lobbyists to complement our existing transparency regime; it will fill a specific gap where it is not certain on whose behalf consultant lobbyists are lobbying; it will ensure that third parties campaigning at elections do so in a fully transparent manner; and it will give the public reassurance that trade unions which influence public life beyond their own members know who those members are. The Bill will bring greater transparency to our political system, as we promised to do, and I therefore commend it to the House.
Question put, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
The House proceeded to a Division.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
I ask the Serjeant at Arms to investigate the delay in the Aye Lobby.