News releases

The Electoral Commission – the independent party funding watchdog – has published details of campaign spending by political parties and third parties that campaigned in the National Assembly for Wales elections in May this year.

A total of 16 parties contested seats at the Assembly elections. Those reporting spending £250,000 or less were required under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 (PPERA) to submit expenditure returns to the Commission by 5 August 2011.

Only one party in Wales, the Conservative Party, spent over £250,000 in the elections and is due to submit its return by 5 November 2011. The Commission will publish this information on Thursday 1 December 2011.

The Commission can now report that 14 parties submitted their returns by the deadline, spending a total of £586,817 on campaigning during the regulated period that ran from 6 January 2011 to polling day on 5 May 2011.

Five third parties reported spending £27,632 during the campaign.

One party, The Christian Party “Proclaiming Christ’s Lordship”, and one third party, The Campaign to End All Animal Experiments, submitted their returns late.

Late submission of an expenditure return without reasonable excuse is a breach of party funding rules.  The Commission is now reviewing the circumstances of these cases in line with its enforcement policy.

In their returns to the Commission parties reported all spending against one of nine categories. The table below shows spending by category for all 13 parties that have reported spending in Northern Ireland.

Third party spending at the National Assembly for Wales election 2011

Further details, including a breakdown of each party’s spending by category, and copies of individual invoices and receipts, are available on the Electoral Commission website at www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-finance/party-finance-analysis/campaign-expenditure/2011-devolved-elections

In addition, Assembly constituency candidates are required to submit candidate expenses returns to Returning Officers. Individual regional candidates are required to submit candidate expenses returns to Regional Returning Officers. The Commission will collate and publish data on the candidates’ expenses in October.

Kay Jenkins, Head of the Electoral Commission’s office in Wales, said: “It is important for transparency in the democratic process that the public can see how much money parties spent campaigning and what this was spent on. Releasing this information today is part of ensuring transparency in our democratic process.

“We are disappointed that one party and one third party did not submit a return by the deadline, failing to achieve the the good level of transparency achieved by other campaigners.  We are assessing these cases, which may lead to sanctions against these two campaigners.”

The Commission is currently scrutinising the information submitted by parties and third parties. The Commission monitors the campaigning activity of parties, candidates and third parties at election time and will be carefully cross checking information gathered through our monitoring against the returns submitted.

The Commission also published today campaign expenditure returns for parties that spent £250,000 or less contesting the Northern Ireland Assembly election and the Scottish Parliament elections.

Ends

Electoral Commission press office: 02920 346810
Out of office hours: 07789 920 414

Notes to Editors

1. The Electoral Commission is an independent body set up by the UK Parliament. Our aim is integrity and public confidence in the UK’s democratic process. We regulate party and election finance, set standards for well-run elections and are responsible for the conduct and regulations of referendums held under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act (2000).
2. The rules for party expenditure including full details of spending limits can be found on our website at  www.electoralcommission.org.uk/elections/election-spending/party-campaign-expenditure 
3. Full details of all the spending returns can be found on our website at www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-finance/party-finance-analysis/campaign-expenditure/2011-devolved-elections 
4. Where returns have not been received by the appropriate deadlines we assess each potential breach in line with our enforcement policy, which can be found at www.electoralcommission.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0003/106743/Enforcement-Policy-30March11.pdf
5. A third party is an organisation that campaigns at election time in favour of or against a party, candidate or policy. For further details see www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-finance/legislation/third-partiespermitted-participants/third-parties
6. To view full details of spending down to a return item level, compare headline data with previous elections or extract expenditure information from our database for your own use, please use our PEF Online registers at https://pefonline.electoralcommission.org.uk/search/searchintro.aspx