I have to say that I have never heard the Minister flannelling on. I thank him for his reply. However, I have some problems with it. I think that the answer to my noble friend who keeps an eye on the non-accredited campaigners is clear: there is no one to do it. I understand the intention was that people should be able to spend up to £500 below the radar. He has called in aid, I think, the Electoral Commission. I really have to take issue with the Electoral Commission’s full submission for today. It keeps on saying, and has said it on this amendment, that these are intended to be localised events. I worry about the Electoral Commission if it really thinks that that is what a recall will be. It has to get real. Particularly as regards the first of these, it will not be a localised event. They will be extremely high profile. Michael Crick will be there and all of us will be there working for or against. There will be an enormous amount of scrutiny. The Electoral Commission has to get real about the fact that they will not be very localised. I am worried particularly about those that are under £500. As I have said, the £50 figure was probing but I wonder whether £150 or £200 is not a better figure.
I think that the Minister used the word “content”, and I have to correct him. The content of the material will not be scrutinised, it will only have to have the imprimatur, “printed and published by”, on it. That is the only requirement. More than that, those spending
less than £500 are absolutely free of any requirements about donations. They can be taking money from Hong Kong or anywhere else without having to declare it. Even if there was someone to look over them, it would still be completely legal for them to do this. If I have understood this right, they can spend up to £500 with donations coming from anyone because they do not come under the PPERA rules at all. Therefore they break all our normal rules on this.
9.15 pm
On donations over £500, it is also important to make it clear that where I think the Minister said that the returns will go to the petition officer, he implied that the officer would do something with them. However, the returning officer in an election is responsible only for looking after and keeping custody of the returns and making sure that they are available for scrutiny by the other political parties, by the police, or by anyone else who makes a complaint. Having spoken to petition officers, my understanding is that they have no role in scrutinising and checking up on them. They make sure that the political parties put them in by the right date, but they do not scrutinise whether the donations have been made correctly. We will come on to an amendment which tries to deal with this by making sure that the returns do go to the Electoral Commission so that somebody checks on them. At the moment, no one does.
The point I made at Second Reading is that this is new for petition officers. Currently, donations are made only to political parties, which then submit them to the Electoral Commission, which checks over whether this one or that one is a registered donor, whether they really do live in the country and whether they are on the electoral roll. No doubt there is something else that the commission has to check, but I have forgotten it. However, the people who become the petition officers do not do that at the moment, so they will be unaware of it. That is why we are really worried, even more than the people spending over £500, about whether they will be checked. At least they will be caught by the rules for those spending less than £500.
I am sorry that this has been a long response to the Minister’s response to me, but there are some serious issues here around where the money comes from and the checks being made on it. I would be grateful if the Minister could ensure before Report that there is absolute clarity about small, non-accredited campaigns not having to abide by any election law other than that of putting “PandP” on their material. Also, would the Government consider whether the figure of £500 is right, thus enabling so much activity to be carried out unregulated?