Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill
Debate between Stephen Twigg and John Pugh(10 years, 9 months ago)
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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.
John Pugh
One thing that puzzles me is that, during previous debates on electoral legislation in the House, Labour Backbenchers pleaded time and again with the then Labour Government to do something about expenditure in marginal constituencies—Ashcroft money. Some of them are no longer Members of the House. Why did the Labour Government not do anything?
Stephen Twigg
The hon. Gentleman moves the debate to party political spending, which is not addressed in the Bill. I would happily work with him and his colleagues to address party political funding—I would be delighted to do so. Perhaps we can pursue that beyond today’s debate.
In Committee, the Minister, who has led for the Government today, promised
“to ensure that, on Report, the fundamental concern of charities over the confusion that they say the Government have introduced into the definition of election materials and election purposes will be addressed.”—[Official Report, 10 September 2013; Vol. 567, c. 862.]
In reality, the Government amendments simply fail to fulfil his promise.
I refer the House to the legal opinion of Ros Baston, who has been working with a number of third sector organisations. Her legal opinion, which is one of a number of which the Minister will be aware, demonstrates why we need far more scrutiny and consideration of part 2. It states:
“Issues-based campaigning will continue to be covered by regulation. It appears that the government considers that removing the previous reference to ‘enhancing the standing’ of parties or candidates has a significant effect on the scope of what is covered…In my view, it does not…The natural meaning of ‘promote’ is to enhance the standing of, or make people think better of, something or someone…The natural construction, therefore, is that issues-based campaigning will be covered where it can be reasonably regarded as intended to encourage voters to look more favourably at candidates or parties who do or don’t support particular policies, as well as support for a specific party or candidates. This is primarily an objective test, and, in simple terms, looks at the likely effect of the activity.”
The Minister spoke of intent, but Ros Baston asks us to look at the likely effect of the activity. If an activity is likely to make people think better of parties or candidates who support something, it might be covered by the Bill, even if there are reasons for it such as awareness-raising—the hon. Member for Cheltenham (Martin Horwood) has made that point.
Ros Baston also states:
“Campaigns could fall within regulation if they…promote policies which, for whatever reason, are associated with one or more political parties or candidates”
and not others
“such as housing, welfare, a referendum on EU membership, wind farms or HS2”
and
“use MPs or candidates as active advocates of their cause”.
She continues:
“I do not consider it sustainable to argue that the campaign is not hoping that people or parties sympathetic to its cause are elected. Therefore, when it undertakes public awareness activity in the run-up to elections, it may well at some level intend to improve the chances of election for those who support their cause as well as to encourage others to join the campaign. There is, after all, no requirement in the Bill or the proposed amendments for the activity to be directly or obviously partisan, or for candidates to be named.”
The opinion goes on:
“The effect of the Bill remains that more charities and low spending campaigners will be subject to the enhanced and much more onerous restrictions. This is because the range of activities covered will increase”—
that is why it is not simply the same as the current legislation—
“and the thresholds for registration will decrease to just £5,000 in England and £2,000 in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland”.
We will discuss those thresholds under the next group. Furthermore, it states that the additional
“limit on spending in individual constituencies could mean that a single joint campaign on a specific issue in one area could result in further spending—local or national—being unlawful.”
Ros Baston’s final point is that the
“amendments make two changes which are of concern to campaigning organisations.”
Those relate to “market research and advertising” and to
“the definition of a ‘section of the public’, and the removal of the exclusion for material sent to ‘relevant supporters’”.
She states:
“It remains unclear as to whether the costs for research which is used in publications are included, and the government has not excluded staff costs (which are excluded for political parties). It also remains very probable that many political blogs will be covered notwithstanding the amendments. This could lead to a bizarre situation where political parties would not have to account for spending on certain types of market research, but that non-party campaigners would have to do so.”
I do not want my entire speech to be made up of the opinion of Ros Baston, but I will give one final quotation because it is an interesting and forceful opinion:
“The drafting is so vague that campaigns will have to consider whether market research will be caught, regardless of whether the results are used to produce material available to the public or to target particular members of the public. Further, there is no requirement for the research to actually be used in practice at all.”
Academies Bill [Lords]
Debate between Stephen Twigg and John Pugh(14 years ago)
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Stephen Twigg
That is absolutely my understanding, and the figures that the Department for Children, Schools and Families gave under the previous Government were those signed off by the Treasury.
Stephen Twigg
I am being tempted to take a lot of interventions, but I understand that Members of all parties may want an early vote because they need to be somewhere else a little later this afternoon. I will give way to the hon. Gentleman, but this will be the final intervention that I take.
Stephen Twigg
The hon. Gentleman ought to see that the answer to his question has been given in the debate. The Government are already indicating that there will be extra money for free schools. They could have said, “We don’t think Building Schools for the Future can be afforded, so we’re going to do this in a different way over a longer period.” They could have gone ahead in the form that we had proposed, but spread over a longer time. That would have meant that the type of work that we had done in Liverpool, and that had been done in Durham and elsewhere, would not have been wasted, and we could have moved forward on that basis.
I was making a point about where we can go next. It would be useful if the Minister could inform the Committee of what the key factors will be when the capital review team considers the criteria for schools such as Holly Lodge, St John Bosco and De La Salle in my constituency. Will it be to the advantage of a school if it is willing to seek academy status? Will deprivation be a factor in whether a school is given priority, and will educational improvement be a significant factor, as it was under BSF? Will the Government consider links to the wider economic policy in a region? If Liverpool is to get the private sector growth that is crucial to our economic future, we need investment in our education. Will the capital review team consider that factor?
I urge the Committee to support this sensible amendment, which would enable local voices to be heard as important decisions are taken about the spending of large amounts of public money.