When reading the Telegraph on Saturday, I came across an article tucked away somewhere on the fourth page that left me foaming at the mouth. It was about the plans expected in Labour’s next election manifesto to force taxpayers to contribute up to 30 per cent of the cost of running all political parties. I have been waiting to calm down so I can blog about it coherently, and today I noticed that the good Dr Eamonn Butler of the Adam Smith Institute has raised his voice already in a letter to the Editor of the Telegraph:
He [Lord Triesman, Labour’s ex-general secretary] says that sound policies need good research, and that is expensive. But taxpayers already pay huge amounts for policy research from our universities. And yet more is freely available from independent bodies and think-tanks.
Taxpayer funding only consolidates the status quo. It will go to the biggest existing parties. How are newcomers (and radical new ideas) to break through when the old guard is awash with funds to use against them?
I can just hear the Labour policy apparatchiks scratching their heads and saying Hmm, we haven’t thought of that, honest…
Public funding of political parties is something we have in Australia, and it is a loathesome practice there too. It has the disadvantages of entrenching the political status quo, and in Australia the enforcement of it has led to laws so complicated as to who is and who isn’t eligible that it has given lawyers a lot of work and has damaged the political process (and at least one person has spent time in prison for claiming it when not eligible, before the courts reversed the decision on appeal).
Plus, there is the issue of who the fuck do the politicians think they are to use our money like that?
Will they follow the IPPR’s suggestions further and ban contributions from individuals in excess of £5,000 a year?
This is obviously more “democratic”. It would have much less effect on New Labour than its opponents, and would effectively prevent any strong new parties from being founded.
Taxpayers should not have to support political parties with whose views they profoundly disagree. I am against the socialists as a matter of deep principle, and it would be an infringement of my human rights were I forced, through taxes, to give them money to preach their foul message.
I am sure a way can be found to have this ruled a breach of human rights.
…I can just hear the Labour policy apparatchiks scratching their heads and saying Hmm, we haven’t thought of that, honest…
BALDERDASH!! and likewise BWAHAHAH !!
They were just hoping no-one would notice is all.
Just the ruling class quietly cementing their hegemony into place.
Politicians demanding taxpayers pay for political party expenses. Wow! Who could have predicted such a thing?
“…Taxpayer funding only consolidates the status quo. It will go to the biggest existing parties. How are newcomers (and radical new ideas) to break through when the old guard is awash with funds to use against them?…”
I figure that this is a feature not a bug.
So … New Labour are proposing to use taxpayer money to help fund, among others, the BNP? Yes?
Canada has just introduced similar legislation. As one would expect in a one-party state, the amount given to each party is proportional to the number of votes received in the LAST election. Thus the top dogs get more to keep them top dogs next time around.
Such legislation is the work of the left-liberals who believe that voters cannot be trusted to vote the right way, but removing the right to vote from everyone would be bad optics. So under the guise of “taking money out of politics”— stopping people using their own money to further their own values— they cement into place a bien pensant aristocracy. France does it more efficiently through the grand ecoles network of civil servants, judges and procurators, and large corporation executives, which make it possible for the party in power to steal the money directly (Mitterand and Kohl, Elf etc etc.).
Any country that introduces such laws is basically giving up the universal franchise and turning its future over to civil servants, NGOs and the chattering classes.
Pubic funding of elections has been in Australia for yonks. The ultimate example of snouts in the trough. Legislate for our money to be used to secure their votes. The money is paid on the basis of votes received at an election. So if you win, you get the most cash.
Its very hard to understand the justification for this, yet is goes pretty much unquestioned in the media (surprise). I’ve seen suggestions that public funding means the parties won’t have to sell their souls to nasty corporations, but that’s obviously crap as party spending on election campaigns is only limited by the available spending.
It must be fundamentally anti-democratice because it is biased to the status quo and gives independents and new parties a competitive disadvantage.
If nothing else, surely the loser should get the most money, to give them a better chance next time.