The essential difference between a bribe and a
no-strings gift is not as straightforward as one might think; it appears to
revolve around the presence (or absence) of a clearly stated quid pro quo. Give
a politician a sum of money to change his views on an issue of importance to
you, and it’s a bribe; give it instead to a politician whose policies just
happen to include agreeing with you on the same issue, in order to help him win
an election, and it’s just a simple gift. Haven’t all those of us who have ever
donated to a political party wanted to see people who support our own personal
priorities win? There might be something of a moral difference between wanting
to see a party win because of a belief that it would be a good thing for people
at large on the one hand, and a belief that we will gain personally on the
other, but it’s hard to define – and sometimes the two things will, inevitably,
overlap.
That distinction between the presence and absence of
a quid pro quo might look a little different from the perspective of a mega-donor,
though. Reform Ltd have stated
that “Our donors want nothing and will never be given a peerage, knighthood
or a government contract”. Maybe not. They don’t need government contracts,
and peerages and knighthoods are over-rated anyway. Getting a government which
is ‘friendly’ towards crypto-currency speculators would certainly benefit them
though. Charitably, it might be possible that such a thought has never crossed
the minds of either of the two mega-donors, but if we look at action and
outcome from their perspective, the lack of a direct, stated quid pro quo doesn’t
alter the fact that they’ve paid a lot of money in the hope of achieving a
particular result from which they might just happen to benefit. Purely
coincidentally, of course.
The difference between the tens, or perhaps hundreds,
of pounds which many of us will have donated in any given year in the past, and
the millions being placed on the table here is primarily one of scale. Scale
matters, though. A party receiving thousands of small donations towards a
campaign can never end up being, or merely just feeling, beholden to any one of
those donors: it isn’t the same for a party whose entire election costs are
being more than covered by just two donors – who just happen to have similar
financial interests in the outcome. A cap on the size of any individual
donation is long overdue, and the government’s prevarication on the issue is
more than a little puzzling. It would be possible, of course, simply to scrap
political donations altogether and fund parties from the public purse. It’s not
likely to be popular and would probably create a whole industry finding work-arounds,
but it’s an option.
A cap is more likely and practicable but where
that cap should be set is another question, because there isn’t a clear and
obvious point at which any given donation ceases to be just one of many and
becomes election-changing. Maybe it should be set by reference to a variable
which is outside the immediate direct control of any government or party –
something like the average wage for a full-time employee. Maybe we could get lucky, and the scale of the
two latest donations will have the opposite effect to that intended, and
encourage Reform Ltd’s potential voters to wonder whether a party funded like
that can really represent them. I won’t hold my breath, though.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment