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

Lord Finkelstein Excerpts

Wednesday 18th December 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, I will speak briefly in support of my three noble colleagues. The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, has done a very good service to the House by tabling this amendment, and I hope that there will be a sympathetic and encouraging response from the Minister who replies. I take issue with just one point made by my noble friend Lord Tyler. I would not like to see the booklet sent out in place of the individual election addresses which candidates are able to send out, one to each elector, at public expense. That would be a further depersonalisation of our politics in this country. Every candidate should be encouraged to send out an individual election address which reflects that particular candidate and his or her interests—that should continue. However, I agree with all that my noble friend Lord Marland said about encouraging participation. It is right for us to give that modest encouragement and assistance, because, after all, it is capped—at a realistic and modest level—and it would not transform politics in the short term. One of the problems we have in this country is the declining membership of political parties. Nevertheless, that would be a move in the right direction and it has my total support.

[Lord Finkelstein (Con)]

My Lords, I apologise for not having spoken at Second Reading, when I was not present, and I declare my interests in charities that are in the register of interests.

It is natural for us, as people who are involved in politics, to think that it would be a good idea to subsidise politics in a way that other activities are not subsidised, and for us to be keenly aware of the difficulties we all have as members of political parties in raising money for our political causes. However, our problems in doing that are the same as those that other people have. We should therefore think very deeply about appropriating for ourselves a privilege that is not given to other people. Although this is a modest proposal, and does not go as far as other proposals for state financing of political parties, it would be naive of us to think that if we asked the electorate to treat political parties as if they were charities, they would not in return begin to expect political parties to behave as if they were charities and ask us to do all sorts of things that justify our claim that subsidising our activities is something of public worth. Therefore, although I respect the intention behind this amendment, and I understand why we all feel that our work is incredibly important and therefore should be exempt from the normal taxation that other people’s important work is subject to, we should be careful before appropriating to ourselves that privilege.

[Lord Campbell-Savours]

Does the noble Lord know by how much the state already funds political parties now? Does he know what the figure is?

[Lord Finkelstein]

I know it is already many millions of pounds, and I am very nervous and worried about that. That money leads to the state beginning to suggest to political parties how they should spend that money, in a very restricted way. In the end, to avoid the problems that the noble Lord talked about in his speech, we would have to impose all sorts of restrictions on political parties’ funding. Otherwise, political parties would be able to raise that money on top of the other money that has been given to them.

[Lord Marland]

Before the noble Lord sits down, perhaps I could reiterate what I said earlier. The state gives political parties £7 million a year. Does he not agree that, because he did not know that himself, this has not been transparently demonstrated to the world at large—and that the proposition in the amendment is much more transparent than what currently exists?

[Lord Finkelstein]

Yes, I think I would agree that it is more transparent, but the noble Lord is assuming that for that reason I agree with the original proposal that we should be spending all that money in the first place. I am very nervous about the amount of money that the public are already giving to political parties. It is not very transparent to people, and I think that if they knew what was being given they would not agree with it. Although I can see why this idea might be an improvement, it is being proposed not as an alternative but as an additional sum.

[Lord Cormack]

Does my noble friend not accept that we are talking about voluntary donations? Nobody is going to be compelled to give anything. All it means is that if my noble friend decides, in his generosity, to give a modest sum to a political party—I cannot guess which party it would be—that would be his voluntary decision, and a very modest subsidy from the Treasury would come with it. This will broaden the base of political parties in a way that both he and I would surely desire.

[Lord Finkelstein]

I am going to gain an exemption from my other duties as a taxpayer, in order to do this. It therefore constitutes a privilege that I am being given for giving that money to a political party. Naturally, we are all in favour of doing that because we are all involved in politics.

[Lord Deben]

I am sorry to interrupt, but if we are starting to talk about taxation in that form, I must say that I do not want a state in which it is a privilege not to pay taxes. That is a very peculiar Conservative view, if I may say so.

[Lord Finkelstein]

We are required to give money to the state to pay for all the services that we enjoy, and the amendment suggests that instead of doing that, we should be given an exemption from that duty merely by dint of the fact that we wish to give money to a political party—a privilege that is not granted to us in respect of any other decision that we may take. Any other decision that I may take about what to do with my money is not granted that privilege; I am not to be granted an exemption from my duty to fund the National Health Service—except, by coincidence, in the opinion of a group of political activists, if I give money to the cause of political activism.

[Lord Deben]

My noble friend has just admitted that he has a large number of charitable activities. I am very happy that that should be the case. The real problem with not extending this provision to political parties is that it says that a political party is somehow less worthy than charities. My concern is that that is an insult to the noble nature of a political party.

[Lord Finkelstein]

Being a member of a political party is not a charitable activity.

[Lord Deben]

Of course it is.

[Lord Finkelstein]

If it were a charitable activity, the party would be a charity. It is not a charitable activity; it is a political activity. There is a distinction between a charitable activity and a political activity. I am sure that the noble Lord is motivated in his politics by a charitable instinct, but that is very different from a political party being a charity. There are rules that govern what is a charity—rules that we have determined should exist. If we wished political parties to be charities, my point is precisely that the electorate would begin to expect us to impose on political parties the same sort of restrictions that we place on charities.

[Lord Campbell-Savours]

In the light of these interventions, might the noble Lord not wish to revise his article on these matters in the Times this morning?

[Lord Finkelstein]

It is hardly to my surprise that I discover that in a group of people who are involved in politics, everybody thinks that political activity is very special and ought to be granted privileges not granted to other activities. It should not come as a surprise to any of us that we are all very keen on it and understand its importance. My question is whether we think that because we have an interest in politics and believe it to be a noble and important activity, we have a right to expect the electorate to grant us that privilege—an exemption from our other duties as taxpayers. I would argue that we do not.

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts]

My Lords, I wish to add a few words. This discussion shows that in the area of political funding, for every solution there is a problem. I take a more sympathetic view of the issue than my noble friend Lord Finkelstein because I think that it is dangerous for parties to depend for their existence on a few major donors, wherever those donors may come from. We therefore have to find a way to replace those donors either with the state or by encouraging more people to make their donations worth more: for example, by means of gift aid, thereby taking them into the charity arena.

At the moment, there is a disconnect between the general public and Parliament. There are a number of reasons for that but the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, put his finger on it: a large proportion of that disconnect is due to difficulties in the area of funding. Some reports are blown up by the newspapers but the public is left with the impression that everybody has their nose in the trough. Even when people are found not guilty of offences in this regard or libel suits are successful, that impression is nevertheless left behind.

I offer a personal view on this. I am on the Lord Speaker’s outreach panel, the members of which give talks in schools, mostly to sixth forms, but sometimes to members of luncheon clubs and so on. It is interesting to see the reaction of 17 and 18 year-olds to talks about Parliament. After you have told them a bit about what we do, you ask them what they think about Parliament and the subject of money always comes up. It is not a question of one party or the other but of a general “smell”. At the moment, we are not passing the “smell” test as far as 17 and 18 year-olds are concerned. I am not suggesting that this amendment is perfect, but it provides a way for us to begin to address the “smell” test and start to deal with some of the issues that so far we have failed to grasp. If we do not grasp them, I fear that the reputation of Parliament will continue to decline because the newspapers and the media will continue to make hay with our reputation.

Although my noble friend is absolutely right about his narrow point, he has to decide where the balance of advantage and disadvantage lies. We should tell our fellow citizens that this process should mean a lot to them as it is the means by which irreconcilable policy issues are reconciled, and that if we do not reconcile them inside this place, we literally fight it out in the streets; and that is not very attractive either. Although I do not think that the amendment is the answer to this problem, I am sympathetic to it because it is the beginning of the answer and deserves to be explored further.

[Lord Deben]

My Lords, I have always been an agnostic about this issue and it is rare that I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, but I thought that his speech was remarkably informed. However, the important point is that those who do not want this measure have to find an alternative; and that is the trouble. Every time you talk about party political funding, people do not like whatever you suggest, so you end up with a system which is clearly not acceptable.

This measure is the best solution I can think of for the very reason that the noble Lord who has just spoken put forward: that is, whenever you give a talk in schools, money is the universal and everlasting concern that is always raised. I am not sure that it is easy to answer it because I know perfectly well that, in all the cases I have ever known, donors to the Conservative Party did not get what the newspapers thought they got. I think of a specific occasion when I was a Minister when, because somebody dared to tell me that a particular person was a donor, I am afraid that the opposite happened to what would otherwise have happened. I am sure that the noble Baroness on the Front Bench opposite would agree that such things happen on the opposite side of the House as well. That is what decent people do but it is not what indecent newspapers pretend those people do.

If our whole body politic is being poisoned by the present system, it is incumbent on those who object to the measure being put forward to suggest a different, better solution. I hear none, so, although I do not particularly like this measure, I do not know of a better one. We need to think about this issue much more seriously. The political parties should not wander on saying, “Well, we cannot think of anything better so we will go on with this”, because it is damaging the whole system.

[Lord Finkelstein]

Is the noble Lord proposing that there should be a cap that accompanies this amendment? Because if he is not, why would it affect the problem that he is talking about? It only affects the problem that the noble Lord is talking about if you ban people from making the bigger donations.

[Lord Deben]

I am sorry; my noble friend misses my point. I am an agnostic on this. I am merely saying that as an agnostic listening to the debate, having listened to this debate for many years now, I think that those who defend the present system should not be allowed merely to say, like my noble friend did just then, that this is a problem, and that that is a problem. They have to explain how we can go on with the present system without the poison constantly dripping down into the system in which we live. It is rather like climate change. I never understand why I am supposed to explain that it is dangerous to put vast quantities of gases into the atmosphere. They should have to explain why it is safe to do so. That seems to me to be the right way round. I am in exactly the same position here. Those who defend the present system have got to explain why it is that we should go on with something that is clearly poisoning the body politic.