Big Money Politics Beware!

For many decades the two biggest parties in British politics have had a financial edge over their opponents. There is a clear link between the achievement of power and the ability to receive vast sums of money from party political donations. The very concept of big money politics is arguably quite regressive to a modern liberal democracy, because the party that has the best policies should win the election not the one with the biggest bank balance. Also it's worth noting that big money politics is linked to the corrosive effects of lobbying with the party more concerned about their next big donations and not what is in the best long-term interests of the country. Furthermore, the political parties become so reliant on big money donations that they do not strive to create a party with a mass membership; hence party politics suffers as a result. The Conservative Party has been in the pocket of big business and corporate Britain for over the past 40 years. While the Labour Party on the other hand, has been in the pocket of the trade unions literally since its creation in 1900 and has been exclusively in the receipt of trade union donations since the 1920s. Big money politics has been a factor in Britain for decades (if not centuries) and it seemed like this big money consensus between Labour and the Conservatives would go unchallenged with big business and the trade unions eagerly funding their preferred party. However could this be about to change?

Today the Independent reports that Nick Clegg is intent on tackling the big money politics that has dominated our political discourse for so long. The Liberal Democrats are Britain's third-largest party and currently the junior partner in the ruling coalition. They have never been reliant on the support of big business or the trade unions; they have just been dependent on private donations from supporters and party members; much like all the other smaller parties. Mr Clegg as Deputy Prime Minister is putting forward some radical plans that would see the wide scale reform of party political donations. Amongst the Deputy Prime Minister's ideas are to cap individual donations to political parties at £50,000. He is also considering whether small donations to political parties should qualify for tax relief, similar to the current situation for charities.

Naturally, the vested interests in both Labour and the Conservatives are concerned about Mr Clegg's plans. This would seriously curtail the financial clout that the trade unions and big business have over British politics. Although this may have a positive effect on party politics as parties will need to go out of their way to recruit new members to ensure that they receive adequate income, hence parties being more focused on the concerns of their members than the concerns of their donors. In this Independent article, it also outlines recent donations made to the main political parties. Between April and June this year, the Labour Party received £3.2 million in donation, £2.7 million of which came from trade unions. In the same period the Conservatives received £4.2 million in donation, a million pounds of which came from wealthy companies and £2.4 million in donation came from wealthy individuals. The Liberal Democrats received just short of £1 million in donation of which over half a million came from wealthy companies. Here is the link to the Independent article: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-worried-by-cleggs-plan-to-cap-party-donations-2343467.html.

I for one hope that Nick Clegg succeeds in tackling big money politics in our country. It has been a long-held aim of the Liberal Democrats to tackle big money politics and I sincerely hope that they succeed in doing so. Should Mr Clegg and his Liberal Democrat party be successful it will be a good day for British democracy with the tarnish of big money politics removed and hopefully our democracy and our political parties will be strengthened as a result; without the albatross of big money financial interests hanging around their necks.