Back to future for party funding?

Analysis
By Nick Assinder
Political correspondent, BBC News website

Politicians have for years been wringing their hands in dismay and despair at plummeting election turnouts and a widespread disengagement by ordinary citizens from the political process.

John Major took to the soap box

The phrase "what is to be done?" echoed through Westminster as successive general elections saw governments given power on a diminishing popular vote and, as a result, shaky mandates.

Meanwhile, parties had to turn increasingly to wealthy benefactors, often in secret, to keep them afloat.

Commons leader Jack Straw believes he is on the way to answering that question with a "back to the future" approach to campaigning that would force politicians, through lack of funds, to engage directly with the public and sell themselves and their policies.

A strict, presumably modest, cap on all spending would mean parties would have to "recruit, retain and involve more members and supporters".

It could have the effect of pushing politics back 30 years or so to an era of mass membership drives, the soap box, the town hall meeting and the doorstep - with all the consequential dangers of hecklers, egg throwers and occasional dog attacks. But that is what engagement was once all about.

Arms race

In other words, Mr Straw believes "the more local and personal our politics becomes, the more that trust and confidence in the system will be built up".

It has been pointed out, needless to say, that such a move might help Labour which is currently having trouble finding funding while the apparently reviving Tories are not having the same problems.

Any end of union funding of Labour, being demanded by the Tories, would also throw a spanner into the works.

Mr Straw's solution, however, is a million miles removed from what has, over the years, become the norm.

Straw is looking for radical change

Vast sums of money have been spent attempting to get the parties' messages across through ever-more flashy election broadcasts, advertising campaigns, computer targeting of individual voters and US-style rallies.

In the 2005 general election, such spending was capped at £20m per party - but that was a huge £5m increase over the previous 2001 election.

As Mr Straw is pointing out in his Fabian lecture, there was an "arms race" of spending which, over the past 25 years, saw a threefold increase in funds raised by the parties at the same time as their membership halved.

There has also been the on-going row over secret loans to political parties, and the linked cash-for-honours inquiry.

Much of this cash was spent on a style of election campaigning which often involved keeping ordinary voters well away from the party leaders and other high profile politicians.

Same sins

At the 2005 election it seemed to stretch to include the media on occasion - memorably at the start of the Labour campaign when Tony Blair launched a poster campaign at a location free of members of the public.

There were a few TV cameras there to capture the moment, but when those journalists who managed to get to the site attempted to ask questions, a wall of party supporters was strategically manoeuvred between them and their quarry.

Indeed the use of party supporters to play the part of normal members of the public at photocalls and election events is something that all the main parties have been guilty of.

Labour launch sparked criticism

And yet it was only back in 1992 that Tory leader John Major pulled off a largely unexpected win after he took, midway through the campaign, to addressing crowds from his soap box. He tried the same thing in 1997 but, as the huge defeat showed, there was only so much the soapbox could achieve.

Now, thanks to the recent rows over party funding and a reluctance to see more public funding of political parties, Mr Straw has been charged with coming up with an alternative.

And it seems from his Fabian lecture, that he wants that old Major-style soap box, the truly public meeting, once beloved by the likes of former Labour leader Michael Foot, and mass membership drives back on the agenda.

The big parties may be addicted to big donations, but a bit of cold turkey might be just what Britain's political process needs. Jack Straw seems to think so.

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