Jago M – LVI
In recent news, there has been increasing speculation about the richest man in the world, Elon Musk, gearing up to possibly donate to Nigel Farage’s reform UK as a part of his apparent far-right crusade into the world of politics. Elon Musk could donate as much as 8.5 million to reform, setting a new record for the largest-ever single donation to a British political party. Elon Musk would be allowed to do this because Musk could use Twitter’s UK branch to donate legal money as long as the sum is less than the total earnings of the company in the country which last year was 8.5 million. This is even though Musk has never lived in the UK and is not involved whatsoever in British society and therefore has no vested interest in British politics and governance apart from his apparent vanity project of spreading his anti-woke message and stirring up violence in the UK during the summer riots by tweeting such messages as “Civil war is inevitable” … “Britain is going full Stalin”… “The people of Britain have had enough of a tyrannical police state”. This combined with the potential bankrolling of Nigel Farage’s far-right reform party has obviously caused great alarm and led to a renewed debate about how political parties are funded with lots of calls on Labour to close this loophole.
However, this could backfire as it would rightly look like Labour moving the goalposts when it suits them and would almost certainly play into Farage’s anti-establishment narrative of being suppressed by ‘the elite’. Instead, Labour should look at a complete overhaul of how political parties are funded to completely eliminate the interests of big corporations and big donors from our politics.
This is a sensible policy as it has become adopted by more and more countries over time as a viable way to combat corruption and make voting rights truly equal and fair. This includes the most developed and liberal democracies like Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands. The UK also already has limited public funding for political parties, which could be easily expanded, in the form of short money which is distributed to parties based on their number of seats in parliament. Public funding would take the form of distributing funds to parties based on the amount of votes they received in the last general election and also their performance in state polls to avoid disadvantaging new and small parties which would lead to the entrenchment of the current political establishment and parties. This would then enable a ban on all political donations above £10,000.
Public funding would thus replace the murky world of political donations in which big corporations and the super-rich get to dominate the policies of our political parties and instead the attention of parties will be refocused on the needs of the average voter. The danger and peril to democracy that large political donations face is clear in the countless scandals which have come to light over the years including but not limited to the “Cash for Honours” scandal, the “Cash for Access scandal” and the scandal over the apparent VIP lane for tory donors to PPE contracts.
Finally not only would this be a morally positive and virtuous change for the government to implement it could also be politically apt and shroud. This is because Labour could use it as an attempt to refocus on their electoral message of a change in governance from the corrupt and slimy Tories to a service-focused labour government after the controversy and scandal over freebies over the summer. It would also signal that Keir Starmer’s premiership is not simply defined by his perceived habit of backtracking on electoral promises, a narrative that has increasingly dominated media coverage.
Ultimately, the influence of private donations in British politics poses a serious threat to the integrity of our democracy. By adopting a more comprehensive public funding model, we can ensure that political parties are focused on serving the interests of the public, not the wealthy elite. This reform could not only reduce corruption and increase transparency but also promote fairer political competition, where every vote counts equally, regardless of the financial imposition of that voter. This could also serve as a chance to combat Nigel Farage’s populism by countering his message of politicians being controlled by a shadowy elite and also limit reforms own funding which seems to be increasingly dominated by wealthy individuals from figures like Richard Tice to now Elon Musk. For Labour, this could represent an opportunity to rebuild trust with voters, repositioning itself as a party committed to fairness and equality in political representation. It’s time for a system that works for the many, not just the few. However, with Starmer seeming to increasingly benefit from the support of big money as seen in the election I remain doubtful that his Labour Party will be the champion of such a reform.