Parties set for criticism over donation accounts
The Electoral Commission is expected to criticise the Labour and Conservative parties next week over a “significant” number of donations that were reported late.
The watchdog will publish details of donations made last year but which were not disclosed, and is expected to call on parties to clean up their act.
A spokeswoman said the commission was “disappointed” that so many donations had been reported late, given that the legislation governing this area had been in place for five years.
Yesterday, Labour MP Brian Jenkins wrote to commission chairman Sam Younger to complain about the under-reporting of donations to local Conservative associations.
He noted particularly those given by Lord Ashcroft, deputy chairman of the Tory party, though his company, Bearwood Corporate Services, ahead of the general election.
“It is time for the Tories and Lord Ashcroft to be transparent about his funding of Tory campaigns at a local level and the nature of various companies and organisations used in this process,” the Tamworth MP said.
However, a spokeswoman for the Electoral Commission made clear that Labour would also come under fire when it published its next report on party donations next week.
“Following the receipt of the 2005 statement of accounts from the political parties and accounting units, we identified possible under-reporting of donations from accounting units of both the main parties,” she said.
“We highlighted this when the accounts were released. We have since been in touch with accounting units and as a result, we will be publishing details of a significant number of late donations to both parties which have since been reported to the commission when we publish the donations for April to June next week.”
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