Non-party campaigners: Senedd elections

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Activities that will not be regulated

The following activities are not regulated:

  • costs associated with publishing anything (except adverts) appearing in a newspaper, periodical or on a licensed broadcast channel1
  • costs associated with translating anything from English into Welsh or from Welsh into English2
  • costs that are reasonably attributable to an individual's disability3  
  • volunteer time4
  • reasonable personal expenses incurred by an individual in travelling or in providing for the individual's accommodation or other personal needs5
  • reasonable expenses incurred that are reasonably attributable to the protection of persons or property6
  • anything that counts as campaign spending by a registered political party or a candidate’s election expenses7

Translating material into or from Welsh

Any additional costs you incur if material you are publishing is translated from Welsh to English and vice versa do not count towards your spending limit. You must make an honest assessment of the basic costs if only one language was being used and should use this to determine the additional costs.

For example, you produce a bilingual leaflet which contains Welsh and English versions of the same text and is therefore a few pages longer than if the leaflet was only produced in one language.

The translator’s fee and the cost of designing, printing and posting the additional pages do not count towards your spending limit. Any other language translation costs will count towards your spending limits.

Expenses incurred in relation to an individual’s disability

Any additional support costs for disabled people who are working on any regulated activities, or for disabled people to access or take part in any regulated activities that you are organising, also do not count towards your spending limit.

For example, producing a supply of Braille campaign leaflets to distribute to blind members of the public or hiring adapted equipment so that disabled members of the public can take part in a public event.

Volunteer time

You do not need to include the time volunteers spend on regulated campaign activity as regulated expenses. However, spending money on any resources that you provide for your volunteers to carry out regulated campaign activities will be covered. For example, if a minibus is hired to transport volunteers to carry out canvassing, the cost of the hire will count towards your spending limit.

Sometimes you may not be sure if someone is a volunteer or if their time should be treated as notional spending. For example, they may offer similar services professionally to the ones they are performing for you.

They are likely to be a volunteer if, for example, the time they spend on your campaign is not paid for by their employer (unless it is their usual annual leave). If they use specialist equipment or materials, you should consider whether their use is notional spending.

Personal expenses

Reasonable expenses incurred by an individual on travelling, accommodation or other personal needs in relation to regulated campaign activities will not be regulated.

For example, if an individual travels to another city for the weekend to join your local campaign and pays these costs themselves, these costs will not count towards your spending limit.

However, if you reimburse an individual for their personal expenses, these expenses will be regulated campaign spending and must be reported.

Security expenses

Reasonable expenses attributable to the protection of persons or property will not be regulated.

Last updated: 19 August 2025