Press release

Time to reveal political donors says influencial Westminster Committee

25 March 2013

Friends of the Earth today welcomed the call by the Westminster Northern Ireland Affairs Committee for full openness for donations to political parties [1].

The MPs recommended full transparency for political party funding be introduced next year [2]. The Committee further recommended that anonymised information, such as the size of the donation, which party received it, if it was from a business or individual, and if the donor gave to other parties, be published for past donations [3].

Commenting, Northern Ireland Director James Orr said:

"The Northern Ireland Affairs Committee is to be congratulated for upholding the principle that transparency is vital for a healthy democracy. The Committee has seen through the illogical arguments put forward by those who wanted politics to be conducted in secret, and has come out in favour of openness, equality, and justice.

Mr Orr continued:

"The final decision rests with the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. She must now do the right thing and implement the Committee's recommendations. The Northern Ireland public has consistently supported openness in political funding, and the time has come to comply with their wishes. Northern Ireland's citizens have been denied the same rights as people in the rest of the UK for too long. That injustice must now be corrected."

Friends of the Earth recommends that the anonymised information for historic donations should include the type of business. Northern Ireland citizens should be able to assess if politicians have made decisions that unduly benefit a vested interest.

Notes

[1] Draft Northern Ireland (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill: Second Report of Session 2012 - 13

[2] Paragraph 29: Full transparency of donations and loans should be regarded as the norm and in principle, therefore, we would like to see political donations and loans in Northern Ireland subjected to the same regime that operates in Great Britain as soon as possible. Given the apparent insignificant level of donations over the £7,500 threshold, and the overall improvement in the security situation, we are not convinced that there is sufficient evidence to justify continuing the current position and we therefore recommend that from October 2014 all donations over £7,500 in Northern Ireland should be made public as in Great Britain.

[3] Paragraph 37: We recommend that the NIO use the new order-making power created by the draft Bill to allow the Electoral Commission to publish anonymised details of all individual donations and loans that have been reported since 2007. The Electoral Commission should also be able to indicate where multiple donations have been made by a single anonymous donor.

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Published by Friends of the Earth Limited