The Notebook: James Chapman on getting big money out of politics
Where the City’s top thinkers have their say. Today, James Chapman, director of Soho Communications takes the pen to talk the internet, the boat race and getting big money out of politics.
It’s time to accept that political parties need to be funded by the state
Just before the Easter weekend, Rishi Sunak sneaked out an announcement of a knighthood for Mohamed Mansour, a senior Treasurer for the Conservative Party who just happened to have given it £5m last year.
Typically, lists of people who have received honours are published at New Year and on the King’s official birthday in June. Why the curious timing?
Perhaps the Prime Minister anticipated criticism for yet another gong being given to a major party donor. It follows weeks of controversy over the Tories’ refusal to hand back £10m given to them by Leeds businessman Frank Hester. He is alleged to have said Diane Abbott, the UK’s longest-serving black MP, made him “want to hate all black women” and that she “should be shot”, remarks that are now being investigated by police.
With the government having raised the spending limit for the general election expected this year from £19 million to £35m, Labour is also increasingly turning to individual businesspeople for funding.
The House of Lords is so stuffed with wealthy individuals who have given money to all three main political parties that it would be better called the House of Cronies.
Anti-corruption campaigners claim there is even an alleged ‘price’ for a peerage – £3m.
Surely it’s time to accept – as almost all other western democracies do – that political parties need to be funded by the state.
Back in 2011, the Phillips report, commissioned by the previous Labour government, recommended state funding based on numbers of votes.
Reform foundered when the Tories refused to countenance a very low limit on individual donations and Labour wouldn’t discuss giving up its trade union funding.
Until someone grasps the nettle and gets all big money out of our politics, with state funding taking the place of telephone number-sized cash donations, all the main political parties will be condemned to never-ending controversies about donors.
With each one, already fragile public trust in our democracy is damaged a little further.
The internet – a passing fad…
Some 25 years ago, as a gauche young science reporter, I wrote an article for the Daily Mail about a think tank report highlighting the fact that two million former internet users had given up on the technology, frustrated by high costs and slow dial-up speeds. The piece itself was fairly nuanced, but a Mail sub-editor, perhaps reflecting corporate unease about what the impact of the internet might be on print titles, christened it with what has since become an infamous headline: ‘Internet “may be just a passing fad as millions give up on it”.
After someone dug out the cutting, this has gone viral to such an extent that barely a day goes by on social media without someone sending it to me with understandable amusement to ask for an update on my prediction. I used to point out that the research was not my own, having been sponsored by the Economic and Social Research Council, was based on then verifiable facts and widely reported by other outlets, including the Guardian. Now I roll with it and embrace the infamy.
The Boat Race was a lesson in pollution humiliation
Following a warning about the high levels of E. coli in the Thames, losing boat race crew Oxford revealed several of their number had spent the morning throwing up after apparently coming into contact with the raw sewage being pumped into the river. Rowers had been told not to enter the water and to cover blisters and open wounds for fear of infection. This reflects a situation where every river in England is polluted beyond legal limits. With the eyes of the world on the race, the state of our waterways has become an international humiliation. Ministers, the regulator and the privatised water companies should hang their heads in shame.
Rachel Reeves can benefit from Sunak’s tourist tax blunder
I hear a move to scrap the so-called ‘tourist tax’ and restore tax-free shopping in last month’s Budget, bringing us back into line with every country in the EU, was personally blocked by Rishi Sunak. The PM was apparently reluctant to admit making a personal mistake by axing the tax break for tourist shoppers when he was Chancellor and insisted (despite ordinary High Street businesses such as Primark and M&S pleading for a U-turn) that only a few luxury retailers in London’s West End, which he didn’t care about, were affected. If Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves wants to win business plaudits, promote economic growth and embarrass Mr Sunak, she should pick up the mantle of reform in this area.
Recommended: The World: A Family History of Humankind by Simon Sebag Montefiore
I am halfway through The World: A Family History of Humankind by Simon Sebag Montefiore, a dizzyingly ambitious attempt to tell the entire story of our species from prehistory to the present day in one book. By necessity, some huge historical events are dealt with in the space of a page or two, but the author manages to span centuries, continents and civilisations successfully. I have learned a huge amount already.