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Friday's Independent – "Labour says taxpayers may have to pay more for political parties" #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/Y76Gg8yWhB
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*Courageous politician in Sir Humphrey sense
It seems a terrible shame that the liberal application of tar and feathers to these rent seeking, statist parasites is illegal.
We're probably each individually answering one of 3 separate but linked questions
- Can Ed win support?
- Do I support it?
- Will it happen?
Mind you, I think that the American-style anyone-can-spend-anything approach espoused by Richard N - even with a tax break! - being equally unpopular. I think we'll need to struggle on with much the current system.
It also entrenchs a certain mind view - another block to insurgent ideas developing. I may think UKIP is a dreadful party which will do untold damage to this country, but they have the right to express their beliefs and compete for the attention of the voters.
If they tick no, they pay the same tax, and the money goes to general funds instead. At least this used to be the system when I lived there.
£1 per tax payer per year should just about cover it in the UK. It also logs party affiliation for Primaries.
Mass membership political parties are history. Even the party of fruitcakes has a tiny membership compared with the number of voters and internet trolls.
I'm not trying to be incognito, per se, but don't want to advertise my name. If people want to take the necessary 30 seconds to figure out who I am from google they can do that. Or they can just look at my avatar (my personal message to David Cameron) and identify where it is - that is a nice clue as well.
"The troubling fact is that Labour really needs the money. With a general election due in two years and the party desperately struggling to pay its bills, the loss of a million pounds is a severe blow. If Unison and Unite follow suit, Labour will not be able to fight the election.
The clever thing to have done would have been to build up cash deposits before taking on the unions. Instead, by first neglecting a problem that time and again he was warned would hurt him, and by then responding in a frenzy, Mr Miliband has done the equivalent of Arthur Scargill calling a strike just when the other side was at its most powerful.
The best response would be to use this opportunity to widen the basis of funding, as left-of-centre parties do successfully in the United States, Germany and France. That will require an appeal that is broader than the one Mr Miliband currently offers. The parlous nature of Labour Party finances is more of a consequence of its poor electoral prospects than it is a primary cause..."
Carney can keep base rates as low as he likes - but that doesn't mean businesses, mortgage holders or governments will continue to get cheap credit.
If political parties cannot attract the support or the money to carry out the activities that they would like to carry out, that's their problem not the general public's. In an age of austerity, state support of political parties ranks somewhere between offering free heroin to all junkies and nationalising donkey sanctuaries.
But good luck persuading them of that.
The second tweet gives the game away - let's bankrupt the parties and then we'll have a good argument for state funding.
Interesting the sole arguments Tim has put forward for £5k is the damage it would do to the Tories
The reason Labour is not having a melt down about the threat to Union funding is that they are getting £5.5m a year plus their travelling costs from public funds. This, not all these famous small donations, is what is paying off their overdraft and a major reason why the Union donations form a more modest part of their income.
I mention these facts not to make a party political point (before the election the tories were getting over £4m) but because they do not sit particularly comfortably with the almost universal view on this thread that public funding of political parties is completely unacceptable. That horse left the stable a long time ago. The only question is how much and whether it should increase to allow a cap on private donations of the type mooted.
Here I am with the majority. The biggest flaw in our political class is that they are completely detached from the real world and live a life of University activist, SPAD, MP, Minister that gives them no experience of how we actually make a living and pay for them.
I really can't see that getting any better if they don't even need to solicit our money.
Labour are too lazy to raise enough money - no more cash to the workshy.
Similarly some charities such as Shelter, which gets quite large grants from public funds, do they support the Tories?
We would just be creating a lot of unregulated front organizations with a funding cap.
You can always find people to support the idea of someone else paying – But if you mean support from the general Tax paying public, then your answer is a resounding NO.
Their MPs are paid by the state, they get airtime on TV. OK they need a bit for membership, admin, adverts etc - but they could surely survive on next to nothing if they had to.
If all parties were forced to get by on 10% of what they had now would they cease to exist or merely have to cut out the marketing and froth? A huge cut in funds for all parties might be a very good thing. Make them effectively voluntary organisations rather than lobby magnets.
Where I differ from Tim is that this is undoubtedly a good thing and evidence that the economy is in fact recovering more quickly. Our current base rate is not a new norm but evidence of the horrendous damage done during the crash. It is a tax on the saver, the pensioner and anyone who has to buy an annuity designed to help banks and the over borrowed.
Interest rate increases will not burst any putative housing bubble but they are an essential tool in ensuring that the house price recovery does not spill over into undesirable side effects.
Interest rate rises are not just being driven by a recovering economy. They are also being driven by international factors as several developing countries have been drawing down on their capital to protect their domestic currencies. Whilst access to these funds has clearly helped western economies the reduction of these balances is also a good thing.
"...One homelessness charity warns that the “lobbying bill will effectively gag us as a charity to campaign.” The charity complains that the new law will limit spending to about £9,000 per constituency, of which 60% could be spent in the period between the dissolution of Parliament and the election.
This compares to £12,000 that can be spent by an individual candidate and the £30,000 that each party can spend nationally per constituency. As charities are not allowed to take part in party political campaigning or supporting political candidates there is no reason for them to be affected by the law at all...
Other third party groups will see the limits on their expenditure controlled. This will ensure that the highly regulated party spending in election campaigns cannot be swamped by a succession of similar pressure groups. Although the law does not allow concert parties with formal cooperation it is not difficult to have enough separation to avoid this situation. Parties are limited to £19.5 million for their national campaigns but at the last election Labour only spent £8 million so if the current limit on third parties remained, eight third parties could outspend one of the main participants.
As they will be less well known and may not make their aims entirely clear limiting this to £388,080 is an important safeguard..." http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10286333/Jacob-Rees-Mogg-Why-should-you-pay-for-charities-to-lobby-the-Government.html
Labour reduced a generation to penury in retirement so seeing the Labour party go bust would be rather good.
Frankly far too much money is spent on political campaigns and elections now. Get politicians back on to the streets and round the doors and cut the so called high-tech and expensive campaigning which frankly just irritates the hell out of most voters. It worked for John Major in 1992.
Utterly pissing it down in Yorkshire.
FPT: Mr. Dugarbandier, slight surprise to me, but I think that the team he bought was considered the unofficial Spanish team and he's been into cycling personally for a long time. He also has the dosh to do it, and it might provide him with a sporting interest once he leaves F1.
The first practice session at Monza starts in just over an hour.
Political parties have no right to exist if they cannot persuade anyone to join them or pay for them. If they can't they're dead and there is no reason why the rest of us should be forced to finance them.
They need to adapt or die. And if they only have a reduced income, well, too bad. They'll have to live within their income, just like the rest of us. Boo hoo!
The arrogance of such a suggestion is staggering. It's like those MPs caught with their fingers in the till over expenses then demanding an increased salary.
Away from the greenhouse atmosphere of PB, it is highly likely that 99% of the electorate does not know of the existence of Short Money or what it stands for - indeed if they knew that Labour was paying off its overdraft using taxpayers' money there could be an outcry and the existence of Short Money could be in danger.
In the 1600s-1700s the UK avoided a French-style revolution. Perhaps it is time to bring back Tyburn Tree and the chains at Wapping. A la lanterne les politiciens!
RichardNabavi said:
Personally I don't think it's a conundrum at all. The idea that money forcibly extracted on threat of imprisonment from honest taxpayers should be donated to a party, with whom they might violently disagree, is repulsive, especially since almost by definition any state funding will entrench the status quo. Conversely, if an honest citizen wants to give her own money to support a party because she thinks it will make the country a better place, why on earth shouldn't she?
AnneJP replied;
I have no problem at all with the TUs funding the political party they were instrumental in setting up to represent the interests of ordinary people. Equally, I have no problem at all with wealthy business-people funding a political party that represents their interests.
But if society as a whole is now saying that one or the other or both leads to the donors acquiring too much influence, then it follows that no political party should have more money available to it than any other.
Taxpayers are not consulted over any of the destinations of their money. Pacifists have no means of diverting their taxes from Defence to somewhere else. Anti-abortionists cannot divert their taxes from NHS abortion clinics.
Society has deemed certain things to be public goods, worth paying for from taxation. If political parties are a necessary part of democracy, then they may be a public good in the same way.
I do not know enough about the functioning of democratic systems to hazard a guess whether political parties are necessary.
It is sensible and reasonable for the govt to promote involvement in politics. For example, paying for an annual mailing to every voter from every party would be proportionate.
But giving polital parties cash to pay for the costs of spinmeisters, or advertising hoardings at election times? No thanks.
That's because the parties are players of the game, but they're seeking to change the rules to their own advantage. Furthermore, democracy is a battle of ideas. Who can persuade more people to vote for them, or donate to them? If you can simply alter the system and seize money paid for by people who have no liking for you but pay tax that's immoral.
There's no general clamour for a cap on donations because we don't have huge levels of spending, and we already have caps on expenditure. Let unions and the wealthy give their money, if they want to, and leave taxpayers' money alone.
It's also a politically stupid move. The Conservatives will just oppose it, leaving the public entirely opposed to Labour and on the side of the blues.
Of course, if Miliband hadn't just lost £1m of union funding...
If the political parties wish to boost their membership, their subscriptions should revert to being affordable to most, not the few.
One of the main reasons that we need to end the spare room subsidy is that people whose families have left school are continuing to under occupy state subsidised housing as a right.
There would be a lot more childrens bedrooms avaliable if the under occupiers moved out, and families who are currently in overcrowded conditions can have access to them.
It is also worth pointing out that Boarders in public schools often have multiple occupancy dorms in which they do far more reading and studying than the average council house.
So take your violin elsewhere tim, and spare us the cant.
http://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/ausland/europa/grossbritannien-die-imperialen-zeiten-sind-vorbei-12561599.html
It would inform us as to why we have ended up where we are, and warn us of any problems in future proposed legislation.
On short money: it was introduced because parties in government get benefits from their access to the civil service (which should not be used for party-political purposes). Does the existence of short money cause government parties to use the civil service in this manner more than they would anyway?
In which case, it could be rather counter-productive.
Can't repost easily - in an all day meeting. Feel free to quote me.
On a side note, Barry’s billions came from small individual donations and private business uses er, private money. – I don’t see what the relevance is or justification for Tax payer money being hived off to fund political parties.
Maybe the state can offer a compromise. A one off payment/loan to kick start all the parties. They each get £50m. Up to them how they get on. But this is it. After that its all small individual donations or nothing.
Some parties will use the money wisely to set mass movements. The others will die.
"Coming to the conclusion that UK politics is seriously underfunded. In an era that has Obama $1b campaign, sugar water and phone marketing budgets top $4b annually , £10m really doesn't cut it."
Really ? is it necessarily obvious that with party funding, more is better ?
Isn't the American system pretty much an arms race - drawing effort into outbidding your rival, rather than winning the argument?
http://ukrp.musicradio.com/lbc973/live?rpMsp=3
I suspect his attempts at a political career will match those of Iain Dale for success.
BNP,SNP, Labour,Conservatives, Lib/Dems, Respect, Raving Monster Loony Party, Stop the War, Any War Anywhere, Party.Sinn Fein, DUP etc.
And if not,why not?
Ed created his own financial problem , let him sort it out.
Catherine SIMMONS - GREEN 292
Robin JULIAN - UKIP 181
David COX - IND 160
Adrian FREELAND - IND 106
Phil PESTER - CON 88
Go Green ! Doesn't breakfast taste so much better with results like this !
I would argue that politics is more important than sugar water and should be taken more seriously.
Surely we can do better than those tired home brew leaflets that pretend to be local papers.
Wish I could watch - what is the weather forecast there for the weekend?
Currently have been playing email tennis since 6am with a Lithuanian client who is getting me so annoyed that I am tempted to tell them where to put their business.
the team was more Basque than spanish, sponsored by the basque region and a basque telecom company- seems it won't be that anymore, but still spanish. A lot better than all the staff losing their jobs/being taking over by a mentalist russian oligarch which seemed to be the other alternatives. I listened to a cycling podcast which waxed lyrical about(and suggested googling) Alonso's calves... on account of the 8000km he has apparently cycled this year.
Good on him, I say.
If only Gareth Bale could chuck some small change the way of Kettering Town in a similar spirit of convivilaity...
7 out of 10 results now in
vote share so far
6,198 votes cast
Con 29.96%
Lab 23.44%
UKIP 18.74%
LibDem 13.68%
Indy 12.22%
Greens 4.94%
In terms of child development, parental involvement in schooling and interest in homework is a far bigger detrrminant than whether home work is done in bedroom rather than kitchen table, or indeed done at all.
As you so frequently point out immigrant families do well academically, but are notably in more overcrowded accommodation. Parental interest rather than bedrooms is the key.
Mr. Dugarbandier, I might be wrong but I think that's slightly out of date. The team *was* Basque, but then opened up to become Spanish more generally in a bid to get more sponsorship.
If people want an actual democracy rather than the totally corrupt lobbyist-cracy we've got now where it's either unions on one side or corporatist crooks on the other then that will require some kind of active measure like state funding or low and well-policed funding caps.
You don't save money by letting corporate crooks buy the political process. You pay much more in the resulting cartel prices than you'd pay in state funding.
Personally not particularly keen on long term state funding, but there is no denying that all parties are in a rut and need something to get them out in the short run.