Elections Bill

Lord Collins of Highbury Excerpts

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Committee stage
Tuesday 15th March 2022 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Collins of Highbury]

24A: Clause 18, page 29, line 15, at end insert—
“(8) The Secretary of State must by regulations define “encouraged” for the purposes of this section within the period of 12 months beginning with the day on which this Act is passed.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment probes the use of the term “encouraged”.

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

My Lords, I am taking the unusual step of trying to get a debate going about a particular word. It may not last long but, knowing my ability, I suspect it will go on for a bit longer than people perhaps anticipate.

I raised this previously, on the first day in Committee: what is the problem that we are examining here, and what is the solution that this clause seeks to offer to that problem? It is not clear to me that we are providing a solution. No doubt the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, will seek to raise some of these broader issues in his clause stand part debate. One of the things suggested is that it is about changing a legal test in the notional spending provisions, which I know are an essential part of election spending controls.

When I first started working in Transport House in 1972, the Labour Party was fully occupied in Transport House. General election campaigns were run from that building and, even after the Labour Party left Transport House and moved to the Walworth Road, it still used the facilities we had in Transport House to conduct the national campaign. Of course, that was prior to some of the regulations about how we account for funding and spending.

This is really quite an important issue. In its briefing, the Electoral Commission points out that in the 2019 general election, notional spending accounted for 40% of the total campaign spend across all candidates, so it is a huge issue that we need to make sure we get right. The Electoral Commission says it is really important that candidates need to be clear when something is notional spending, because it counts towards their total campaign spend and they must not exceed it.

The Explanatory Notes for the Bill say:

“Clause 18 subsection (1) (notional expenditure: use of property etc. on behalf of candidates and others) amends section 90C of the RPA 1983 in order to clarify that ‘on behalf of’ means where the candidate has directed, authorised or encouraged that use by someone else. This will clarify that candidates only need to report benefits in kind which they have actually used, or directed or encouraged someone else to use and do not need to fear being responsible for benefits in kind of which they had no knowledge.”


I have heard the Minister stress that the Bill’s purpose is to better define things, make sure that they are better understood and make sure that, if there are any loopholes, they are closed. I tabled this probing amendment to ask exactly what “encouraged” means. How are we to define that? How will that be translated into codes and guidance that the Electoral Commission puts forward?

I have a concern, and I hope the Minister will spend some time explaining this. What is the problem? Are we properly accounting for all notional spend? To me, that is the problem that this clause should address. If the Electoral Commission is telling us that it is 40% of the spend, we need to make absolutely sure that it is properly accounted for.

My fear is that this Bill is not doing that and could lead to claims of, “I didn’t know—I had no knowledge, even though my campaign people were using an office or a car. I didn’t know that shop down the road was open for me to use.” There are issues of serious concern here. What is wrong with the existing provisions on notional spend? I would ask the Minister to describe the problems, give us the evidence of where problems have occurred and then tell us how this clause solves those problems.

I have tabled this specific probing amendment and I have no doubt that I will repeat some of these concerns when we get to the clause stand part debate. It is incumbent on the Minister to be absolutely clear on this issue. The Electoral Commission says in its briefing that this needs to be tightened up and people’s responsibilities made clear, but then I read in the Explanatory Notes that we want to ensure that candidates need not fear being responsible for benefits in kind of which they have no knowledge. I do not like the idea that ignorance is a defence, yet that is where this clause may be leading. I ask the Minister to tell us what “encourage” means, but also to give us a better explanation of the problem and the solution that this clause attempts to provide.

[Lord Stunell (LD)]

My Lords, I rise to ask some questions very much in parallel with those the noble Lord, Lord Collins, posed to the Minister. The word “encourage” is difficult to define in the legal sense. Is he prepared to share the advice that he has received from counsel about how a court might interpret “encourage” if an offence came before it? The noble Lord, Lord Collins, has illustrated that “encourage” is one thing and “ignorance of” another, but there is a tremendous zone in between, which will be an interesting legal minefield.

I would have thought that, in introducing this proposition in the Bill and to the Committee, the Minister would have in mind creating certainty, not a minefield through which agents, candidates and, for that matter, national parties have to step lightly to make sure that they do not offend and offend again. Speaking as a former candidate and a former agent, I never had any doubt about the distinction between things given to me by my party or anybody else for use in the election, and things that happened as a result of circumstances. Of course, we will come to third-party spending as a separate item later.

Although it has not been clearly expressed as such in the debate on this group of amendments, the specific reason for this clause being here at all is a legal case, which, from the perspective of the Conservative Party, went wrong. The party is seeking to change things so this does not go wrong next time; we will address the sense, or not, of that when we get to the next item for debate. However, even granted that it is a sensible inclusion in the Bill, would it not be rather more sensible to have an inclusion that does not lead to further ambiguity, doubt and difficulty, which will simply tie up agents, candidates and national party agents in trying to work out what “encourage” means or where the boundary of “encourage” lies?

I find it quite hard to understand the situation whereby a coach of activists can turn up and help you for a week and you could not be said to have encouraged it to happen. You may not have ordered them to come—but was any evidence presented that the local party officials at the time rejected it, but the national party insisted that these people came over their dead bodies? Where does “encourage” take us with that? Does “encourage” have a legal definition? We are familiar with other terms, which are used in perhaps somewhat similar circumstances, such as “facilitating”. Clearly, that is one way of looking at it. If they say, “Mrs Buggins will put somebody up for the night”, is that facilitating or encouraging?

There are many difficulties in the wording of this provision, quite apart from the outstanding difficulties with the clause as a whole, which we shall come to in a few minutes’ time. I hope the Minister will share with us the advice that he has had from legal counsel about how courts would interpret “encourage”. I am sure that the courts will come to a common-sense view, based on their understanding of UK language and legislation and any kind of previous case that they can draw into it, but a common-sense understanding of what “encourage” means may not be sufficient. At this point, I want to hear how the Minister imagines it will be interpreted by the courts when the inevitable cases come, via the Electoral Commission, the police or whatever mechanism is going to be permitted under this Bill for any offences to be prosecuted—we have dealt with that subject already. Assuming that cases will be taken forward, how does the Minister expect the courts to interpret “encourage”? What kind of evidence would show that encouragement took place or, alternatively, what kind of evidence could a candidate or an agent produce to show that they did not encourage? Would they have to produce some emails, perhaps, to show that they pleaded with headquarters not to send the money, help, leaflets or a coachload of young people?

The Minister can get the drift of the question that the noble Lord, Lord Collins, is asking, and which is important to understand, so that we get some measure of what this provision might achieve and what it might very well not achieve, despite the Minister’s intentions.

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[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful for this short debate. I will not enter into the discussions of election experiences, but I certainly agree with the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, that it is not always easy to find election agents. Anyone who has been involved in politics is mindful of the difficulties which sometimes arise in the course of elections.

What we are seeking to do in Clause 18—I will come on to “encouraged”, which has been suggested goes in the opposite direction—is to clarify the law on notional expenditure. A debate on Clause 18 stand part will follow this debate and it is probably the appropriate place for this. It makes it clear that candidates need to report only benefits in kind: property, goods, services and facilities provided for the use or benefit of a candidate at a discount or free which the candidate has used or which the candidate or their election agent has directed, authorised or encouraged someone else to use on their behalf.

This brings me to the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Collins. I say to the noble and right reverend Lord that I do not think that he is suggesting that the Secretary of State should draft regulations. I accept that this is a probing amendment; it is not a proposition that the Government have put on the Marshalled List. The noble Lord is seeking clarification of the term “encouraged”. The wording in the Bill was chosen to cover as many scenarios as possible and to capture circumstances where the candidate or their agent encouraged a particular use of property, goods, services or facilities, without going as far as directing it or specifically authorising its use. There is an area of uncertainty here, as he acknowledged. However, if only formal authorisation is required, the risk is that the candidate could encourage someone to use a benefit in kind without having to not report it as they did not give authorisation for it to be used. Requiring further regulations to define this term would risk reducing the breadth of the scope of these new rules on notional expenditure and opening up potential loopholes that we are seeking to address. The language in this clause has been crafted to strike a balance between the status quo, where no form of authorisation is required, which has generated understandable concerns from candidates and agents, and the overly blunt alternative of formal authorisation, which could risk being circumvented in practice, as the noble Lord suggested.

This clarification of the law on notional spending is vital to ensure that candidates should not fear being responsible for benefits in kind of which they had no knowledge. I think we would agree with that; the Explanatory Notes say that. Encouragement in the context in which we understand it and in this Bill must be a positive act. It is not intended to capture situations where a candidate did not have knowledge of someone using a benefit in kind on their behalf.

As I said at the outset, as an experienced campaigner I acknowledge that it is not always easy readily to apply the rules on election spending practically to the day-to-day reality of a campaign. We will discuss guidance in greater detail later today, but I assure the Committee that we intend that the Electoral Commission will produce guidance for campaigners to help them understand specifically these concepts and to apply and comply with the rules on notional spending in so doing. In the past, the commission has made good use of illustrative examples to aid campaigners. Further to this, we are broadening the scope of the statutory codes of practice on election spending that can be prepared by the commission to ensure that the codes include guidance on notional spending.

Some Members of the Committee asked for some specific comments on legal meanings or for further detail on “encouraged”. We expect that this guidance and the codes of practice will come forward from not the Secretary of State but the Electoral Commission. I understand where the noble Lord is coming from and will reflect on what has been said, and if I can I will put further clarification to him in writing and submit it to the House before Report, because I appreciate the direction he is coming from.

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for that response. Clearly, we are coming to a much more detailed debate about the clause in the stand part debate, but, in the light of the explanations given so far, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 24A withdrawn.

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[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

We need not discuss the various alternative forms of voter registration. “Not necessarily” is the easy answer.

The second principle I want to focus on, mentioned by my noble friend Lord Stunell, is that there should as far as possible be a level playing field. We have seen what happened as that disappeared with the lifting of funding restrictions in the United States. The quality of American campaigning and the level of trust in American democracy have gone down, and that is partly because of the sheer weight of money that now deforms American politics. We have it here. I read in the Sunday Times the weekend before last that in the last three months of 2019, Ben Elliot, the chairman of the Conservative Party, raised just over £37 million for the Conservative Party, more than it was able to spend legally in the course of the campaign, and that it represented two-thirds of the money raised by all registered parties in that period. That takes the whole idea of a level playing field for democracy into deep and difficult trouble, and it strengthens the case for making sure that the regulation of expenditure, which is what Part 4 is about, is kept tight, clear and simple.

The third principle that I hope the Minister will agree on is that funding and expenditure should be as transparent as possible, both by registered parties and, as we shall come on to, by third parties, and that this clause does not help in that regard.

Clause 18 weakens regulation. It complicates and confuses it. I think we have seen from Second Reading and from our first day in Committee that noble Lords throughout the House generally agree on the need to strengthen regulation and the Electoral Commission. For these reasons, I suggest to the Minister that the clause as drafted and as intended does not match the Bill.

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

My Lords, I come back to the comment I made on the earlier group of amendments: what is broken? What is this clause trying to put right, and does it solve it? I think we have heard from the debate on it that it does not really address the issue. Whatever happened in Thanet—and there may be other instances that were not subject to court cases—it has certainly gone through a proper legal process. As we have heard, both the Supreme Court and the Electoral Commission have addressed that issue.

I regret that we have moved away from the requirement that fundamental changes be subject to consent across all parties. That has been an important element of maintaining our democracy. Of course, the Trade Union Act was the first part of that attack by the Conservative Party on one party, which broke that consensus on funding.

As I have said before, the Conservative Party likes a debate about spending limits— “We can have a limit here, and the national limit and so on”—but the real debate is not about spending but about income. When David Cameron was Prime Minister and we have had discussions about it, we have seen that it is the income side of our politics that brings it into disrepute. Very rarely is it the spending side. The income side is about who has given the money, how much they are giving and what they expect for it. Taking big money out of politics is the issue. I say to the Conservative Party that its time will come, because when it is in opposition there will be a strong focus on the income side of this debate, and it will not like the result. It will not be able to rely on a large number of very wealthy people; it will have to rely on a larger number of low-income people, because I strongly believe that caps on donations are far more important than limits on spending. That is a debate for another day, but it is important to set today’s debate in context.

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[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, I will start by answering the noble Lord, Lord Collins. He asked twice, once of my noble friend and once of me: what is the problem here? Currently, as the 2018 Supreme Court case revealed, the law is at odds with what the candidates understand in their communities. That ruling has meant that agents are now unsure—we have talked a lot about how difficult it is to get agents —about how to account for notional expenditure. That is exactly what we are addressing in the Bill.

Before I move on from the noble Lord, I will just say how much I agree with him on the importance—to me, the most important thing in our electoral system—of that connection between an individual candidate, whether local or national, and the communities that they are trying to serve, and do serve if they win an election. To me, that is the most important thing in our democracy.

The level playing field was brought up by a number of noble Lords, including the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and the noble Lords, Lord Rennard and Lord Wallace. It is important, but the rules that we are putting forward on notional expenditure are designed to maintain free and fair elections. Political parties will not be able to spend more on candidates as a result of these amendments. All spending which is currently recorded will continue to be recorded. These amendments will therefore uphold the level playing field for elections, which, as I have said, form the cornerstone of our democracy. Expenditure that promotes an individual candidature will continue to count towards a candidate’s own spending limit. Expenditure which is joint between a party and a candidate will continue to be apportioned in an appropriate way and reported to the returning officer. The level playing field is continued.

A number of noble Lords brought up national spending limits. Spending limits are different from the protections for candidates which ensure that their agent must approve certain expenditure, but the Government are intending to review party and candidate spending limits for all other polls apart from local elections, which were increased in line with inflation in 2021. It is important that these are uprated in line with inflation, which will create a solid baseline for future reviews.

The noble Lord, Lord Stunell, again mentioned national versus local spending and asked whether this would cause spending to stop being reported and allow parties to spend more on candidates without reporting it. No, it will not. No notional expenditure will stop being reported as a result of this clarification. Benefits in kind which are offered and used by them or their agent, or anyone authorised, directed or encouraged to make use of them on the candidate’s behalf, will still need to be reported. Also, where a third party, including a political party, is spending money to promote a candidate directly to the electorate, this generally falls under spending in Section 75 of the Representation of the People Act 1983. Those reporting rules will still apply.

The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, asked about transparency. Transparency is indeed there and will continue to be there in all spending on local and national elections.

We have heard already, and it has been said a number of times, that Clause 18 clarifies the law on notional expenditure, making it clear that candidates need to report only benefits in kind—that is, property, goods, services and facilities that are provided for the use or the benefit of the candidate at a discount or for free—which they have actually used or which they or their election agent have directed, authorised or encouraged someone else to use on their behalf. I think it was the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, asked about somebody ringing up from central office and saying that they are bringing down a bus. I suggest that you will have either authorised or encouraged it; I do not believe you would say nothing on the end of that phone if that is going to happen. This is what was already widely understood to be true. Nothing much is changing; we thought that was true prior to the Supreme Court judgment in the matter of R v Mackinlay and others.

In its 2019 report on electoral law, the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee called for consultation to take place on how the law on notional spending could be clarified. In evidence to PACAC, the Labour Party said that it would be supportive of legislation

“that would serve to clarify Parliament’s intention as to the extent the election agent is responsible for expenditure by third party campaigns to support their candidates.”

So the Labour Party, in PACAC, was in support of this. That is precisely—

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

I am sorry to interrupt, but one has to see the context of that response. Our argument tonight is that this clause does not do that—it does not provide clarity. I wish it did, and then we could all support it. But it could lead to the complete opposite of what the noble Baroness is suggesting.

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I suggest that the Government believe that it does clarify; that is exactly what it does, so we will have to disagree on that. We feel that Clauses 18 and 20 of the Bill do precisely what the Labour Party asked for and supported in PACAC.

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Moved by

[Lord Collins of Highbury]

25B: Clause 19, page 29, line 22, at end insert—
“(aa) after sub-paragraph (2), insert—“(2A) The Commission must submit a draft code at least once during each 10 year period.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would amend provisions on the Electoral Commission’s guidance regarding election expenses to ensure that new guidance is published at least once every ten years.

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

My Lords, I hope the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, will speak in this debate, as Clause 19 sort of addresses some of the issues that he raised in the previous discussion.

I am not as old as the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, suggested, although I have to confess that I have been around for a very long time. I have had responsibility for the statutory adoption of electoral law, and as a trade union official I have been acutely aware of codes of practice and procedures and their statutory basis, particularly on employment law—but I will not go too much into that. With these amendments I am trying to probe the provisions in Clause 19 which says that we will amend electoral law. Again, that makes the point that the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, made—we have a proliferation of electoral law and there should have been a much bigger piece of legislation to bring everything together so that people whose job it is to apply the law do not have to have this constant reference back to a whole series of requirements.

According to the Explanatory Notes, the clause says that

“the Electoral Commission may prepare guidance on election expenses for candidates. The amendments are to make it clear that the guidance can cover the application of the rules in relation to expenses incurred. This is to ensure that the codes of practice are sufficiently broad and fully serve the purpose of explaining the rules on spending.”

One issue is that we go from codes to guidance. What is what? It is not altogether clear.

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[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

I will take that back and get an answer for the noble Lord. It is an important issue, as the way we will do elections in future will be very different because of new IT.

As I was saying, the new digital imprints regime will also improve the transparency of digital campaigning, requiring those promoting campaign content online, paid and unpaid, to clearly show who they are. With that said, I ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for her comments. Of course, I am trying to get on record some political points here, so I am going to repeat them. I understand the statutory requirements for consultation by the Electoral Commission, but there is often a failure to consult beyond the political parties, and we need to ensure that that is properly addressed. The noble Lord, Lord Stunell, made a very good point about transparency: if I wanted to look into a particular record, it is extremely difficult to do so, and there are ways to make it easier.

In later debates we will return to the issue of transparency, particularly when we get to Clauses 26 and beyond, but in the light of the Minister’s comments, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 25B withdrawn.

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Moved by

[Lord Collins of Highbury]

31A: Clause 21, page 31, line 34, at end insert—
“(8D) The Commission must refuse an application by a party under this section if assets are declared which are designated under the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment is intended to probe the relationship between sanctions and the registration of parties.

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

My Lords, this is a probing amendment, but it is highly topical. I am trying to see the relationship between the registration of parties and the sanctions legislation that we recently adopted. Following yesterday’s consideration of the fast-tracked Bill, Liz Truss plans to name even more people. It would certainly make it easier for Ministers to impose sanctions on those with Kremlin links. One of the things we addressed last night was the loopholes that have allowed oligarchs and kleptocrats to evade scrutiny. They have been quite successful in hiding their assets, certainly property—an issue we have discussed for quite a long time.

One of the things that I have been banging on about quite a bit is the Russia report and its recommendations on security risks to our democracy from interference from foreign powers and how we address that issue. We addressed this at Second Reading. It is not just some of the messaging and social network-type interference which we have seen, particularly in the US but also here, but about how our political parties are funded.

Boris Johnson told the House of Commons that

“it is very important for the House to understand that we do not raise money from Russian oligarchs.”—[Official Report, Commons, 23/2/22; col. 313.]

For many of us, it was very difficult to take that remark seriously when we look at some of the records that have been exposed. It is obviously impossible for someone with only Russian nationality, however rich, to donate legally to a United Kingdom political party, but what has undoubtedly happened is that a series of people with dual UK/Russian nationality, or with significant business links with Russia, have donated heavily to the Conservatives in recent years. Based on electoral information, Labour has estimated that donors who have made money from Russia or Russians have given £1.93 million to the Tory party or to constituency associations since Johnson became Prime Minister. In the other place, Ian Blackford of the SNP referred to the Conservatives having raised £2.3 million from Russian oligarchs.

I recognise that “oligarch” is a loose term associated with people who generally made their money from the financial free-for-all of the post-Soviet, Putin era, but those people often keep a very close link with the Russian President. One reason the legislation is so important is the connections. You can have a permissible donor who is linked very closely to someone who is not a permissible donor, and if the links to the assets and the finances are obscure it is difficult to follow the money, as Liz Truss said.

One of the biggest single donors to the Conservative Party is Lubov Chernukhin, who has donated £700,000. She has been a British national since 2011 and is married to Vladimir Chernukhin, a former deputy finance Minister under Putin. Documents published in the Pandora papers in October suggest that he was allowed to leave Russia in 2004 with assets worth about $500 million and to retain Russian business connections. Lawyers representing the couple say that none of the wealth was acquired in a corrupt manner and none of Vladimir Chernukhin’s wife’s donations was funded by improper means or affected by the influence of anyone else. That is extremely difficult to understand when you look at some of the documents in the Pandora papers published by the Guardian. Lubov Chernukhin is also notable for winning the prize of a game of tennis with Boris Johnson at the party’s 2020 fundraising ball. It is not clear whether she has managed to get that prize yet.

That shows us the extent of foreign money coming into our political process and our political parties. The reason I am raising that on this clause is that we have yet to see political parties being established for the purpose of undermining the political system we have. I anticipate all kinds of reactions from friends of Putin—to put it that way—that we have not seen before. If our sanctions legislation gets stronger and we have the economic crime Bill that we anticipate seeing in the next Session, we may see this hidden money going in different ways that will perhaps have less scrutiny but very strong connections. I am probing this to see what the Government have thought of in terms of transparency in the establishment of political parties and what they are going to do about the broad recommendations of the Russia report, which they have not really taken into account. We will certainly be returning to the question of donations to political parties later in consideration of the Bill, but I thought that this was an opportunity to look at whether there has been any risk assessment by the Government of how political parties that could fundamentally undermine our system may be established and funded. I beg to move.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I am conscious that there are other democracies in Europe which have parties on the right that have admitted to receiving money from Russia as loans or as grants. Happily, this country is not in that position, but a number of shadows hang over our politics and we have got quite close to it on a number of occasions. It currently affects the Government because they refused to publish the evidence the Intelligence and Security Committee collected on foreign interference in British politics four years ago and they have not yet published the evidence on the suitability of those who came in on the golden visa scheme between 2000 and 2015. That report was commissioned four years ago. If one goes back to the referendum campaign, so far as I am aware, we still do not know where the largest donation to the Brexit campaign came from, although I had one very odd conversation with a senior member of the City of London who told me that everyone knew that it came from a particular foreign country. There are issues here. We shall return to them when we get on to donations.

I mark in general that this is yet another reason why we should be lowering the limits on campaign spending at national and constituency level, not raising them, because money corrupts politics. I think that the Conservative Party has come close to corruption in the way it has very successfully expanded its fundraising, with the creation of a donors’ club. I have read on the front page of the Times that donors have said that they are unhappy about what the Prime Minister is doing on this, that and the other, and that clearly shows that donors influence politics to a considerable extent in the Conservative Party.

Yes, of course, we are all guilty. My party has also accepted one or two large and very welcome donations which were a little bit questionable. That is because we are so desperate for money for campaigning—and it is part of the reason why I agree that we should be lowering limits. So, I support the probing amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Collins. We will return to this on a later day in Committee. It is a fundamentally important issue for British politics, because part of what is corroding public trust in politics at present is the deep suspicion that money buys Ministers.

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[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I was working on my allotment on Sunday morning. I will come to the point that was raised by the noble Lord opposite, which I take extremely seriously. It is a probing amendment but an important subject. I have discussed it with the noble Baroness and the noble Lord. I look forward also to engaging in discussions when we come to her amendments, which are on an analogous subject.

What the noble Lord suggests is, obviously, on the face of it, a good idea: that the commission should reject the application of a political party if its declaration of assets and liabilities demonstrates assets designated under the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018. I absolutely recognise the importance of that regime, although a debate on its intricacies does not fall within the scope of this Bill. I do not make any complaints about that, however, and I am happy to address it because of the gravity and importance of the issue.

On the specific point the noble Lord raises—I will be brief—sanctions law is incredibly clear: all individuals and legal entities who are within, or undertake activities within, the United Kingdom’s territory must comply with UK financial sanctions that are in force. This includes not only political parties but candidates and other types of campaigners listed in the relevant areas of the legislation. Where a person or entity is designated as subject to financial sanctions, the nature of the resulting restrictions means that the person’s assets are frozen and consequently that person would be prohibited from using those assets for any purpose. This would include the funding of a political party.

While the Government entirely agree with the principle that sanctioned assets should not be used for the benefit of anyone—including prospective political parties, which we are discussing specifically on this amendment— we believe that the current sanctioning regime already provides for this and we remain to be convinced that an additional provision is required in this Bill. I am sympathetic to the noble Lord’s intentions here. I believe that his point is already acknowledged but, in the light of the importance of the matter that he has raised, I will make doubly sure that that is the case. With that assurance, I hope he feels able to withdraw his amendment. I am ready to discuss the matter with him further, as we have already engaged.

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for that response. We will return to this issue. I opened my remarks with the Russia report. The Government have said that they have responded to every recommendation, but one remaining issue is interference in our political system. We will have a future debate on donations but it is important to focus on this specific issue. We will see things in future that we have not seen before in terms of attempts to undermine our system, and we have to be prepared for that. I was very pleased that the legislation went through—I would like to have seen even stronger elements to it—but even in today’s Guardian, people are saying that many ways remain for oligarchs to get around transparency declarations, including not only offshore companies but “five close relatives”, who can shift assets so that none of them reaches the 25% ownership level required. We know that people can try to get round these things, and we need to be absolutely vigilant.

I appreciate the Minister’s comments, and that he will come back and speak to me further; in the light of that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 31A withdrawn.