Q
12Mr.
Tyrie: A moment ago, you referred to controls over
expenditure and the Hayden Phillips process. With your permission,
Mr. Cook, I will address only the party funding issues now
and come back to triggering after my party spokesperson has
contributed, as I think we were originally going to do and if I am able
to catch your
eye.
Q
13Mr.
Tyrie: On the party funding issues, is it the case that
expenditure caps form part of Hayden Phillips’ terms of
reference? Mr.
Straw: They certainly form part of his
recommendations,
and—
Mr.
Tyrie: I would just like an answer to the
question. Mr.
Straw: I believe they do, but I can read out the
terms of reference for
you.
Mr.
Tyrie: Perhaps you would like to read them out to
us.
Mr.
Straw: The terms of reference
state: “To
conduct a review of the funding of political
parties. In
particular,
to: examine
the case for state funding of political parties, including whether it
should be enhanced in return for a cap on the size of
donations; consider
the transparency of political parties’ funding;
and report...
by the end of
December”. The
terms go on to state that Sir Hayden Phillips will work with
stakeholders and that he has been asked
to “produce
recommendations, which are as much as possible agreed between the
political
parties”. Now,
Mr.
Tyrie—
Mr.
Tyrie: I do not need any more. All I am really
after— Mr.
Straw: My answer is yes; your answer, I know, is no.
We will have to disagree about it.
Q
14Mr.
Tyrie: I would just like you to have another go at finding
the reference to expenditure in Hayden Phillips’ terms of
reference. I have them in front of me. I am not going to read them out
as you have done, but I would like you to identify the place in the
terms of reference where expenditure is referred to.
Mr.
Straw: In the first line. If you are reviewing the
funding of political parties, I fail to see how you can possibly make
judgments about the funding of political parties and not make judgments
about expenditure—those are two sides of a balance sheet, or an
account. You are from the party of business, Mr. Tyrie, so I
would have thought that you would know
that.
Q
15Mr.
Tyrie: The terms of reference actually
say “to
examine the case for state funding of political
parties.” Mr.
Straw: First, it
says: “To
conduct a review of the funding of political
parties. In
particular—” The
“in particular”, however, does not exclude anything else,
otherwise it would have said “exclusively to consider”. I
do not recall that particular issue, a rather theological issue.
Unusually for you, if I may say so, Mr. Tyrie, it is one
that I have never thought is a strong argument. I know where this is
leading. You say that we should not be bothered about expenditure
limits, but that is not the view of your party. Mr. Nick
Herbert was quite explicit in saying
that— James
Duddridge (Rochford and Southend, East) (Con): On a point
of order, Mr. Cook. I seek your guidance on whether we
should encourage witnesses to give evidence on things that have already
been written, which we could have read before and which are not
actually the witness’ own words. We want the people giving
evidence to give evidence, not to give other people’s evidence.
I seek your advice on what instruction we should give to those called
before the Committee.
The
Chairman: Thank you for your question. It is fairly plain
to me that a question was posed to the Secretary of State and that he
is giving an answer. If that means referring to other opinions and
statements by other recognised agencies, the questioner must be
prepared to accept the explanation being put on offer. The Secretary of
State may finish.
Q
16Mr.
Tyrie: To clarify matters, Secretary of State, will you go
back to where you felt that I was being theological? You seemed to
break off into a series of
sub-clauses. Mr.
Straw: You were trying to dance on the head of a pin
about the terms of reference. You and I have debated the matter before,
Mr. Tyrie. Sir Hayden Phillips will give evidence at 12
o’clock today, so it is better to ask him. He chose to interpret
his terms of reference in the way that he did, and he produced the
report.
Q
17Mr.
Tyrie: Were you participating in the talks at the time
that the matter was discussed with Hayden
Phillips? Mr.
Straw: What happened
was—
Q
18Mr.
Tyrie: Will you just answer the question: yes or no? It
was a very clear
question. Mr.
Straw: It depends on what you mean by
“talks”. What happened, as you will recall, was that
there was a process leading up to the interim report and then to the
final report on 15 March last year where Sir Hayden interviewed the
different parties. Following that report and its acceptance in general
terms by all three parties, there was a detailed process of all-party
talks.
Q
19Mr.
Tyrie: Were you at the meeting at which the leader of my
party and the then Prime Minister discussed the terms of
reference? Mr.
Straw: No, I was abroad at the time. I was Foreign
Secretary.
Q
20Mr.
Tyrie: I was at that meeting. I attended every meeting. Do
you think it relevant that the then Prime Minister made it clear that
the purpose of the talks was to examine state funding, caps on
donations and transparency? If you read the terms of reference, you
will find that they exactly match the wishes of the Prime Minister and
the Leader of the Opposition in that respect. Do you accept that there
has been a change of attitude by the Labour party towards the need for
fundamental reform, as a consequence of the change of
leader? Mr.
Straw: It is worth bearing it in mind that Sir Hayden
produced his report when Mr. Blair was still Prime
Minister.
Q
21Mr.
Tyrie: He produced his interim
report. Mr.
Straw: No, he produced both reports, with great
respect. Mr. Blair
was—
Q
22Mr.
Tyrie: It was the interim report with the first mention of
expenditure. Mr.
Straw: No, Mr. Tyrie, there were two
reports. There was an interim report in October 2006. There was a final
report on 15 March 2007, and then there was the process of
negotiations. Tony Blair ceased to be Prime Minister on 28 June
2007.
Q
23Mr.
Tyrie: When did the talks break
down? Mr.
Straw: That was not a final report. The breakdown of
the talks took place—as you will recall, because I think you
were there—on 30 October 2007. For the life
of me, I do not understand what point you are making. In chapter 4 of
the final report, Sir Hayden discussed limits on spending. Your party
accepted that report and welcomed it. The shadow Leader of the House
said: “We
welcome the publication of Sir Hayden Phillips’ report. We
accept his main recommendations...we are happy to discuss spending
caps on all year round non-election campaigning and proposals for
tighter controls”—[Official Report, 15 March 2007;
Vol. 458, c.
469.] on
party spending. In a parallel statement, Francis Maude
said: “We
welcome this report. We accept its main recommendations...we also
accept Sir Hayden’s call for caps on spending...Sir
Hayden’s objectives are ours. We hope that all parties now work
together to achieve
them”. I
have never understood what point—if I may say so, Mr.
Tyrie—that you, in particular, are making. It is completely at
odds with the approach that your own party spokespeople were taking at
the time that Hayden published his 15 March report and
subsequently.
On 11
December, after the breakdown of the talks, Nick Herbert, now the
shadow Justice Secretary,
said: “We
are much more interested in reducing the cost of politics and that is
what David Cameron has made
clear”.
Q
24Mr.
Tyrie: When we had a meeting with Tony Blair, at which you
were not present, it was clear that the difficulty in the whole area
would be affiliation fees. It would be the extent to which we could
include trade unions and a cap on donations. That was the primary task
given to Hayden Phillips subsequently. Do you agree that the talks in
fact broke down because it was clear that genuine choice of whether to
donate would not be given to affiliated members? It was likely that we
would continue with a situation in which a large proportion of
affiliated members who do not even vote for the Labour party would none
the less be forced, in practice, to continue contributing to
it. Mr.
Straw: No. For the record, I was not present, but
from talking to those who were I do not accept your interpretation of
what took place at that meeting, which was in the early part of 2006,
nor do I accept your interpretation of the breakdown of the talks. I
have already referred, Mr. Cook, to the welcome given
by—
Q
25Mr.
Tyrie: You are not accepting my interpretation of a
meeting at which you were not
present. Mr.
Straw: No, not least because I have seen what
followed from that meeting—that is, how Sir Hayden Phillips, a
distinguished public servant, operated. How he interpreted his terms of
reference was, with respect, rather different from how you have
interpreted them. I think that we are entitled to rely on his opinion
there. Secondly, as I have already spelt out, your party welcomed Sir
Hayden’s recommendations—not with an aberrant
back-of-the-envelope remark to a political journalist, but with a
statement in the House, reinforced by Francis Maude outside the House.
One of those
referred—
Q
26Mr.
Tyrie: I was asking you about affiliation fees, Secretary
of State. I am trying to get at whether you feel that the question of
choice on affiliation fees was crucial to the breakdown of the
talks. Mr.
Straw: And I am answering, if I may. I listened
politely, if I may say so, to your question, so I would be grateful if
I could answer it in my own way.
You will
recall one of the points of Sir Hayden’s
recommendations—page 10 of his March report—in respect of
trade union affiliation
fees: “In
my view, these payments may be regarded as individual donations for the
purpose of the new limit if, and only if, the decisions reached are
clearly transparent and it is possible to trace payments back to
identifiable
individuals.” Co-operatively,
up to the end of July, we worked on how that could be put into effect,
notwithstanding the fact that it would lead to some quite significant
relationship changes. As I have said, there was then a change of
approach by the Conservative
party. I
have always regarded David Heath as a reasonably independent witness to
what happened in terms of argument between the Conservative and Labour
parties. On more than one occasion, but here on 3 January this year,
David Heath
said: “Frankly,
it is entirely bogus
what” the
Conservative party
are “saying
about trade union funding. Some of the abuses that undoubtedly are
there were dealt with and the Labour party had to move a long way on
it. It
was interesting that
their”— the
Conservative
party’s— “attitude
changed on this subject markedly over the summer at about the same time
that a certain Lord Ashcroft moved into Central
Office.” That
is a matter for you. I do not know the reason, but it was absolutely
palpable that the approach of the Conservative party shifted about
180° between March 2007, when this report came out, and 30
October, when the talks broke
down.
Q
27Martin
Linton (Battersea) (Lab): The Secretary of State may be
relieved to know that I am not going to ask about what is not in the
Bill, nor about the history of the talks with Sir Hayden Phillips,
which I am sure that we can come back to. I am interested in the issue
of party funding, which I have always understood to include both income
and expenditure of political parties. I regard the Political Parties
and Elections Bill as landmark legislation in the field. I support some
wider reform of donations and spending limits, but the Secretary of
State was right to go ahead with a limited Bill, which deals with the
most urgent loopholes in existing legislation, specifically those that
allow unincorporated associations to make, effectively, undisclosed
donations and candidates to spend without limit at least up until
Dissolution. My
questions are specific, mainly designed to draw out detailed points
from the Department. Would clause 8 really close the door on
all undeclared donations from unincorporated associations, or oblige
all donations over £200 to be disclosed? I have another couple
of small points to add at this stage. I should like to know whether
clause 8 will also catch donations through British companies that are
foreign owned. It seems to me that if it does not catch them, that
could be put right in this Bill.
I should also
like to know—if the Chairman agrees—a bit more about
clause 10 on triggering. There are a lot of questions about when it
would come into force and what will happen to people who have already
declared themselves candidates on the date this Bill receives Royal
Assent. Will they have to stop handing out leaflets, or pull down
websites that describe them as candidates? Can we have some of the
practical details of how this Bill will work? I do not know whether I
am anticipating another section of the discussion in asking
that.
Mr.
Straw: May I respond to the clause 8 point
Mr. Cook? How would you like me to
proceed?
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