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

Baroness Royall of Blaisdon Excerpts

Wednesday 18th December 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon (Lab)]

I am sorry to stop the noble Lord in full flow, but we have all had many conversations with charities over the past weeks and not one charity has mentioned that to me personally or to my noble friend. Can the noble Lord name the charity that has these grave fears?

[Lord Tyler]

My Lords, they are innumerable: NCVO, Bond and a whole number of organisations have said to us that targeting into one constituency or a small number of constituencies is recognised as a possible problem. It is not something that they necessarily want to do but they recognise that there could be a threat.

As my noble friend Lady Williams pointed out so powerfully on Monday evening, this type of deliberate distortion of our electoral process is far advanced elsewhere, in the USA in particular, but is already on its way this side of the Atlantic as well. By definition, however, we need to ensure that the net is not of so fine a mesh that we create a totally inappropriate bureaucracy for much smaller, much more locally based groups. Here I think I share the objectives of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hardie, and others.

I referred on Monday to this essential balance between transparency and accountability on the one hand and excessive regulation on the other. The collective contention of very many organisations is that while the 2000 legislation was a concern and is defective, many of them simply did not have to worry in the past because their spending came beneath the existing thresholds.

In evidence to the Commons Select Committee, the chair of the Electoral Commission described the threshold as the measure that determined how far you go down in the pyramid of organisations engaged in campaigning. I think she described the situation very well. It is not a simple, two-dimensional triangle; it is a three-dimensional pyramid, so the further you go down in terms of the threshold, the more small organisations—huge numbers of organisations—potentially feel threatened and have to look to the way in which they are operating. At the top are a small number of large organisations that might seek deliberately and decisively,

“to promote or procure electoral success”,

of a party or candidate—the now accepted definition in the Bill—and at the bottom are a whole range of smaller bodies that are concerned that their activities might be perceived to be doing so.

We can continue to seek to reassure them as to whether they really would be caught by definition or we can provide explicit reassurance in the Bill by lifting the threshold to its existing level. I think we should do just that. Our amendment on this subject deals neatly with the conundrum that the Government have faced in so doing. My noble friend Lord Wallace of Saltaire said in his letter to colleagues on 5 December that in increasing the thresholds the Government would,

“need to take account of the consequences for the constituency limits set out in the legislation and the Government will reflect further on the detail of how to bring this about”.

This comes to the nub of the issue I referred to earlier. I hope that the amendment helps my noble friend.

The Minister was right, of course, that it would be plainly illogical to have a simple threshold of £10,000—or a much bigger one of £20,000 or £25,000—and then have a constituency spending limit during the post-dissolution period of £5,800. An organisation could be spending the whole limit of £5,800 and beyond without even being registered and therefore without declaring the expenditure. This would undermine the whole spirit of transparency and accountability that runs through the Bill. In the second part of our amendment, we stipulate that a higher threshold can apply unless all the spending is targeted in one constituency. I have heard the argument that this somehow adds complexity, but I do not accept that.

Of course, in a later group we will come to other detailed amendments, which clarify and make more workable the application of constituency limits. A whole section will do just that. I am sure that the Committee will recognise how crucial these are to the success of the Bill, and to its acceptance by MPs in the other place. After all, they themselves face very stringent expenditure limits at elections. When Amendment 166A in this group is taken in conjunction with our later Amendment 170A, which clarifies the scope of the constituency limit, it will be very clear when spending has occurred only in one constituency.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Ramsbotham (CB)]

My Lords, I support Amendments 167A and 167B. I have two questions for the Government that have not been raised. First, we have had no specific evidence from the Government that the previous spending limits were overly permissive, resulting in undue influence on the outcome of general elections. Therefore, I would be grateful if the Minister would outline what specific evidence gave rise to this clause.

Secondly, because it again comes from the Government, I note that the Electoral Commission thinks that the regulatory burden that the Bill would impose on registered campaigners has been grossly underestimated in the Bill’s impact assessment. With many Bills coming before this House, I have had occasion to question the depth of the impact assessment. It really must go into the impact on others who will be affected by the Bill, and that has not happened in this case.

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon]

My Lords, noble Lords from across the House have made it abundantly clear that the Government’s decision to significantly reduce the threshold at which organisations register with the Electoral Commission was not based on any evidence and would significantly hamper the ability of civil society organisations to participate in democracy in the run-up to an election. I add to that the comments from committees of this House and of the other place about the lack of an evidential base for this policy.

The Joint Committee on Human Rights said:

“We are not yet satisfied that the Government has sufficiently explained the need for the reduced registration thresholds (particularly in light of the increased range of regulated activities)”.

The Political and Constitutional Reform Select Committee said:

“In the absence of any evidence that there is a need to lower the threshold for third parties to register with the Electoral Commission, we recommend that the Government revert to the existing levels”.

The reductions are patently unreasonable and unfair, but they give rise to a particular concern because of the cumulative effect of provisions in the Bill. The evidence of that is overwhelming in the report of the commission. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hardie, was right to ask what assessment had been made of the cost of the new obligations and bureaucracy. I look forward to the Minister’s answer.

The decision taken by the Government when they drafted the Bill to lower the thresholds at the same time as increasing the range of regulated activities—including, astonishingly, staffing costs, which we debated on Monday—suggests that the Bill is more about stifling dissent in the run-up to an election than about taking big money out of politics; at least, that is certainly the effect of the proposals that they have come up with. The Network for International Development Organisations in Scotland has said that,

“a prevalent fear is that it will put a halt to all activity. If the threshold is as it stands, that would be one member of policy staff. Everybody else would have to stop work. It would effectively cut down some organisations”.

The Electoral Reform Society agrees, and says that:

“I think that this will kill small organisations. They just won’t participate. There is just too much bureaucracy. They’ve never had to register before”.

Finally, the RSPB corroborated both these statements, saying that,

“it is illogical to halve the thresholds and caps at the same time as widening the activities that count towards them; this could seriously curtail legitimate charitable work”.

I wonder why the thresholds were changed and I would be grateful for an explanation from the Minister.

The noble Lord, Lord Tyler, was, in many ways, fear-mongering about the flooding of organisations by big money. I have looked at Bond, because the noble Lord quoted it. It said that big money in a constituency was “theoretical” and that no one had provided a specific example. As the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, said, we are casting our net to catch the large fish but it is the small fish—which play a hugely important part in making our civil society vibrant—that are being caught, and the governance of the country will suffer.

My noble friend Lady Mallalieu was very clear about the issue. The Commission on Civil Society and Democratic Engagement says, in its report:

“The most important measures to avoid undue influence, such as US style super PACs, are already in PPERA and the Representation of the People Act. In addition, none of the measures introduced effect undue influence in relation to political parties or candidates”.

I look forward to the Minister’s response.

In closing, I will say that I, like others, am particularly concerned about the situation in Northern Ireland, where the reduction to £2,000 is not just unfair and unworkable but absurd. On Monday, we all agreed that civil society has a vital role in sustaining the peace process in Northern Ireland, where the situation is still fragile, and the reduction in the threshold can act only as an impediment to the fantastic work of its vibrant and valuable civil society. I look forward to hearing from the Minister that the Government have, indeed, listened and will move on this issue.

[The Advocate-General for Scotland (Lord Wallace of Tankerness) (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hardie, for introducing these amendments. It has been obvious since Second Reading in this House, and indeed before, that the registration threshold has given rise to considerable controversy and debate. As noble Lords are aware, third parties that incur controlled expenditure are not subject to any electoral controls on their activities provided they campaign only up to a particular expenditure threshold in a relevant election.

The 2000 Act sets this threshold at £10,000 for third parties campaigning in England and at £5,000 for third parties campaigning in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland. As has been said by numerous contributors, the Bill amends these amounts to £5,000 and £2,000 respectively. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hardie, perfectly fairly asked the purpose of this. The aim is to increase openness. There is a good argument that those who spend money in a way that can reasonably be regarded as intended to promote or procure success at any relevant election—to promote not a policy but the advantage of a party or candidate—should do so transparently. Amendment 166, tabled by the noble and learned Lord, seeks to return the thresholds to their original PPERA levels. The amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Tyler seeks the same result, but proposes a third threshold of £5,850 where spending has been incurred solely in a single constituency.

My noble friend Lord Hodgson goes a step further and suggests thresholds of £14,000 in England and £7,000 in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The amendments tabled by the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries of Pentregarth, go further still and propose thresholds of £20,000 and £10,000 respectively. Finally, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hardie, suggests a registration threshold of £25,000 applied to each of the constituent parts of the United Kingdom.

Noble Lords will know that when a third party registers with the Electoral Commission, it becomes a recognised third party. Upon registration, the third party becomes subject to spending and donation controls for the duration of the regulated period of the relevant election. The Bill intends to ensure greater transparency of campaign finance, which is why it revised the current registration thresholds to £5,000 and £2,000. It was intended to have the effect that more third parties would be required to account for expenditure and provide details of the donations they receive, bearing in mind that the fact of registration means that the expenditure can reasonably be regarded as intended to promote or procure success in a relevant election for a particular party or candidate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Tyler]

My Lords, I will respond very briefly to the debate. I think my noble friend the Minister will accept that there is real concern about making sure that we have—if we are going to have—applicable, effective and manageable constituency limits. Therefore, I am sure that we will return to this on Report. If we do not and were to remove the whole of Clause 28, I am sure that it would be put back, in one form or another, by our colleagues in the other place, who have a considerable interest in the extent to which their constituencies are subjected to considerable investment—

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon]

My Lords, perhaps I may point out that it has already been through the other place and it was not thus amended.

[Lord Tyler]

The very fact that it has come to us is making the point for me. I think that the other place would consider it essential to retain some constituency limits. However, I accept that there are concerns about workability. I hope my amendments will improve the extent to which they will be manageable and enforceable, but in the mean time I am happy to withdraw the amendment.