Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill

Debate between Earl of Sandwich and Baroness Tyler of Enfield

Wednesday 15th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Sandwich (CB)]

My Lords, I detect self-restraint in the House at the moment, and I know that we need to move on rapidly, but I just wanted to say a word in support of Amendment 39A. I have to repeat what the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, said earlier about the value of charities generally within the political system and the role of networks, which have become so important and have been encouraged by government. If the noble Baroness, Lady Chalker, were here—she could not be here today—she would explain how the Government were siding with charities all the way through the 1980s and 1990s to achieve consensus with coalitions. The idea of attacking even the larger coalitions seems to be against the Government’s own policy.

The noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, said on an earlier amendment that a lot of damage had been caused by Part 2, but it must also be said that the Bill has strengthened the charities in opposition to it. That must be a force for good. But one damaging effect of the Bill, which was not intended by the Government, is that if it is unamended, many charities will become more wary in their campaigning. They will in many cases withdraw from the front line. I have been 40 years in charities and church organisations attending party conferences. What would they all be like without those charities displaying their wares, and so forth?

I know that the Government have come quite a long way to meet the smaller charities, but I do not think that they have moved far enough. The noble and learned Lord should recognise the injustice of netting so many legitimate activities just to catch one or two miscreants who would probably be recognised anyway in the context of a local constituency. Charities are usually pretty visible in what they do. The Electoral Commission itself says that we are talking only about a small number. Although the numbers add up and may increase, we are all in danger of exaggerating the number involved. It is the sledgehammer effect.

Surely, when there is disaffection with elections generally and with mainstream politics and politicians, we want more awareness among the public of the range of current non-party political issues. The amendment leads us in the right direction.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I rise briefly to support Amendment 39A and, in doing so, very much welcome Amendment 39 introduced by my noble and learned friend. In Committee, I drew on my personal experience of being involved in coalitions of charities both previously and currently. It is very important —Amendment 39A achieves this—that even small and medium-sized charities are not restricted to being involved in only one coalition. I end by giving the example of when I was chief executive of a charity in the field of family relationships. At any one time, with a very small amount of money, we would be involved in a campaign to do with children and young people, a campaign to do with domestic violence, and a campaign to do with older people and the role of grandparents. All of those were important activities. We could never have done that ourselves; we simply did not have the money. That is why Amendment 39 is so important.