News releases

The financial accounts of 13 UK political parties and 9 accounting units with gross income or total expenditure exceeding £250,000 for the year ending 31 December 2009 have been published today by the Electoral Commission, the independent party funding regulator.

Political parties

The following parties have submitted their 2009 accounts to the Commission:

    
Accounting units

The following accounting units have submitted their accounts to the Commission:

• Conservative Party: Cities of London & Westminster
• Conservative Party: Kensington, Chelsea and Fulham
• Conservative Party: Richmond Park
• The Labour Party: Scottish Labour
• The Labour Party: National Trade Union Liaison Accounting Unit
• Liberal Democrats: ALDC  
• Liberal Democrats: England
• Liberal Democrats: Parliamentary Office of the Liberal Democrats
• Liberal Democrats: Scotland

The full statements of account are available at: http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-finance/party-finance-analysis

Regulatory Action

The following two parties failed to submit their accounts to the Commission.

• The British National Party 
• Christian Party “Proclaiming Christ’s Lordship”

The British National Party’s Regional Accounting Unit also failed to submit their accounts to the Commission.

The SDLP Assembly Group accounting unit submitted accounts before the deadline, but failed to include an auditor’s report for their accounts as required by law; accordingly their accounts are considered to be late and are still outstanding.

For late submission of their statements of accounts the parties will be fined a minimum of £500 and the accounting units will be fined a minimum £100. This figure will increase if the accounts are more than three months late.

Peter Wardle, Chief Executive of the Electoral Commission, said:

“The rules that we regulate demand that political parties, who play a crucial part in our democracy, are transparent about how much money they raise and how they spend it. Their annual statements of accounts help give that picture.

“Most parties and accounting units submitted their accounts on time; one made what we hope will prove to be a one-off mistake and will face a fine for late submission. But two parties have repeatedly failed to put information about their income and expenditure into the public domain on time.

“That is not acceptable, and as well as fining these two parties for late submission, we will be monitoring them closely to try to ensure they meet the same standards of reporting as the others. The sanctions we currently have available to deal with this sort of non-compliance are limited, but we look forward to Parliament giving final approval to a wider range of sanctions, before the end of this year.’

The Commission published the financial accounts of 289 political parties and 499 accounting units whose gross income and total expenditure were £250,000 or less on 27 May 2010. They can be found on The Electoral Commission’s website here.

The Commission also publishes a comparison of the parties’ gross annual income and total expenditure. The figures from 2003 to 2009 are available on our website here.

The Commission is currently reviewing the accounts submitted. Where this review suggests that there may be discrepancies, we will raise this with the parties in the first instance.

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For further information please contact:
Electoral Commission press office on 020 7271 0704
email: press@electoralcommission.org.uk 
outside office hours 07789 920414

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 and set standards for well-run elections.
2. Under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 (PPERA) political parties may register accounting units with the Electoral Commission. An accounting unit is a constituent or affiliated organisation of a political party and is responsible for its own financial affairs and transactions.
3. PPERA requires that parties and accounting units with a gross income or expenditure in excess of £250,000 are given six months from year end to prepare their accounts and have them independently audited. 
4. The 2009 statements of accounts for parties and accounting units with a gross income or expenditure in excess of £250,000 were due with the Electoral Commission by Wednesday 7 July 2010, unless an extension was granted. Each of these statements of accounts must be audited by a qualified auditor and an audit certificate submitted with the statement of accounts.
5. PPERA provides the Commission with the powers to impose prescribed fines on political parties (£500 - £5,000) and accounting units (£100 to £1,000) who submit financial returns late. The fines are imposed on a sliding scale based on the length of delay in the submission.
6. Parties have 14 days to appeal a fine imposed on them. If a party is not going to appeal a fine, they have 14 days to pay.
7. Parliament needs to approve a Statutory Instrument before the new powers and a wider range of sanctions contained in the Political Parties and Elections Act 2009 can take effect.
8. A glossary of financial terms used in the statements of account is available at www.electoralcommission.org.uk/glossary.
9. Whilst the Commission is reviewing the submitted accounts to establish whether any follow-up action is necessary, the fact that a Statement of Account has been placed on the public record should not necessarily be taken to indicate that the Commission has verified or validated it in any way. 
10. Some parties submit figures rounded to the nearest pound; others rounded to the nearest thousand pounds.
11. The SDLP's Assembly Group accounting unit submitted accounts before the deadline but the certificate enclosed was an Accountant's Certificate rather than an Auditor’s Certificate making the return incomplete.