According to Anne-Marie Trevelyan, the International Development Secretary, there is no case for the state funding of political parties in the UK. This is what she said:
“We have an incredible system in the UK where we don’t ask the state to fund our political parties and if we didn’t have the private donations that come through from donors large and small – in my constituency, people donate £25 a year and donors who can provide more, do more – if we didn’t do that, the taxpayer would be funding political activity. I think our UK system is uniquely well-placed to ensure that we get this broad stretch … the unions fund a great deal of the Labour Party’s activity, again that’s from many, many small voices, and then some large ones too.It’s a mix which brings a real depth of voices to our political parties across the piste.” Trevelyan was speaking after the revelation that being Treasurer of the Conservative Party and donating £3m is a sure-fire way to becoming a peer.
