Funding Political Parties

[jondwhite]

Peter Hitchens writes

http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2015/02/some-thoughts-on-political-party-funding.html

Quote:

Actually, we already have state funding of *Opposition* Parties, the so-called ‘Short Money’ first paid in the 1970s , named after the Labour politician Ted Short,  and far from ‘short’ in fact. Based on the number of seats held, it currently nets Labour more than £5.4 million a year in taxpayers’ cash, and was worth roughly £1.7 million a year to the Liberal Democrats while they were last in Opposition. More taxpayers’ cash (‘Cranborne Money’) goes to Opposition parties in the House of Lords. The big parties, in Opposition, get about half a million pounds a year through this scheme.  

   Another indirect subsidy is provided by the Broadcasting Rules, and the party political broadcast system, which give the main parties guaranteed access to the airwaves in rough proportion to their levels of support  

   All these subsidies encourage political inertia, nationalising the existing parties and favouring them because of their previous levels of support. Thus, if they are in decline (and most of them are) the subsidies tend to delay and obstruct that decline and prevent the emergence of new, more representative parties. In my view, Labour and the Tories are dead, speaking for nobody. UKIP and the Greens (though themselves imperfect in many ways as vehicles of the new left and the new right) are each much better representatives of the real divide in our society.

Is political party funding part of the problem?

[ALB]

I see one idea is to give political parties £3 for every vote they get:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2058339/Cost-funding-political-parties-3-vote.htmlThat would mean we'd get the £500 deposit back if we got 167 votes (instead of 5% of the votes cast, as now).. Sounds alright (as we can normally do that):  better the State giving us money rather than the other way round (even if the £500 entitles us to free postal distribution, a good bargain anyway).

[Author]

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