Part of the debate – in the House of Commons am 12:00 am ar 15 Rhagfyr 1949.
I want now to turn to the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg). I am amazed at the showing which the Conservative Party have put up in this Debate. Those of us who have studied this question of the publication of political accounts have been led to believe that there was a serious move in the Conservative Party which favoured the publication of accounts. My hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Bing) referred to an important committee which had recommended this to the Conservative Conference at Llandudno. We understood that an even higher-powered body under the chairmanship of the right hon. and learned Member for West Derby (Sir D. Maxwell Fyfe) was considering the recommendations after that conference. The impression that the country was given at the time of the Llandudno Conference, as reported by Trevor Evans in the "Daily Express" and by other people, was that the Conservative Party would shortly be publishing their accounts. Now we understand from the hon. Member for Oxford that what these Conservative committees are in favour of is what he called "a dirty business." That is the only conclusion we can come to as a result of his speech.
His attack on the Labour Party has already been dealt with by my right hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield (Mr. Arthur Greenwood). I want only to say that the whole tenor of his remarks on the trade union, Co-operative and Labour Party organisation showed that not only had he not read his own Amendment, but he had not read the Motion to which it was an Amendment. If he had, it would have been clear, even to the hon. Member for Oxford, that all we are asking for in this Motion—and what the Amendment is asking for as well—is that all organisations having political action as one of their aims should publish their accounts independently in a way that makes them available to the public.
That is done by the Labour Party for all the funds which pass through its channels. It is done by the trade union movement, for all its political funds, whether in the form of donations or affiliation fees to the Labour Party, or whether used for independent political action. However they are spent they are published in accordance with the requirements of the Registrar of Friendly Societies and are available to the public. The same is also true of the Co-operative movement. In the Labour Party accounts there appears the affiliation fee of the Royal Arsenal Co-operative Society; in the National Council of Labour accounts it is clear what sum comes from the Co-operative Union and the Co-operative Party accounts show the public what the Cooperative Party spends itself.
That is all that this Motion is asking—not that these organisations, whether they are the three I have mentioned, or the Fabian Society, or the Economic League, the Federation of British Industries, the National Union of Manufacturers or the Aims of Industry, etc., should amalgamate their accounts together in one amorphous mass, but that they should make their own separate accounts available so that any intelligent citizen who wishes to understand what economic forces are backing different political movements in this country shall be able to ascertain the elementary facts.
We have reason to believe that when it comes to questions of finance, not only is the Labour Party the weaker vessel, but it is a very considerably weaker vessel. I will give some reasons for that. Lord Woolton set out to raise £1 million. On 3rd October, 1946, he appealed at the Brighton conference for that sum. Next day in "The Times" it was announced that promises of well over a quarter of a million had been received from the constituencies. Was that done on the doorstep? Was that good democratic money got in shillings, sixpences or even amounts of five pounds? Of course, it was not. A month later the "Evening News" announced that the sum had run into six figures and that there were several individual contributions of £10,000.
If there are citizens of this country misguided enough to want to spend £10,000 on Conservative Party propaganda, they are entitled to do so, but it is an elementary democratic right that the citizens of this country should know who these people are. On 17th March, five months later, the £1 million target was reached. There was not very much good democratic money in that.
The position is obvious if we look at the expenditure of all political parties in the country at the present time. Look at the poster campaigns of the Tory Party. It has been estimated that in the two last local government elections, on their hoarding campaign alone, the Tory Party spent half as much as the total expenditure of the Labour Party headquarters in the 1945 election. The hoarding campaign which the Tory Party are running at the present time vastly exceeds anything that has been spent before in a comparable period in this country. Never has so much money been collected and expended by so few in so short a time.
I want to give a little evidence, in the few minutes at my disposal, about where this money is coming from, and how it is being collected. I can give a little evidence from the Midlands, which is the part of the country I represent. How do the Tory Party get their money in the Midlands? I have here photostat copies of two pages of the accounts of the Birmingham Unionist Association. Is this good democratic money? No. Everything is in terms of 25-guinea contributions by companies and firms in the City of Birmingham. I do not propose to give the names. How, in the Midlands, are the Tory Party getting their money? Here is a circular from Sir Francis Joseph, Baronet, from Federation House, Stoke-on-Trent, sent out to the industrialists in the Midlands. He talks of the Woolton Fund and goes on to say that they were united to raise money to fight the present crippling controls on industry by the Government. Then he says:
As a guide to you we are asking firms to contribute on the basis of ½ d. in the £ on the annual salary and wages account of the firm.
He encloses a circular sent by a body called the Midland Industrialists' Advisory Council, which, curiously enough, has the same address as the West Midlands Headquarters of the Conservative Party.
I have discussed the national issue and the regional issue; let me now come down to the local issue. What is happening in my own constituency of South-West Wolverhampton? The methods being used in that district are the same as in every district. How are they trying to get their funds? They do not rely on the doorstep appeal to the individual. They appeal to the shopkeepers, first of all, for subscriptions of £5 to £10 a time. They then circulate the business executives in the town and suggest subscriptions of between £10 and £100. They say this:
Many employers are basing their subscriptions on the number of people they employ. This method has the advantage of spreading evenly the support received from firms of varying sizes.
The annual subscription is worked out as follows:
1d. per week for every person employed by the subscriber.
I believe that hon. Gentlemen opposite have some objection against contracting out, but the employees under this system have no opportunity either of contracting in or of contracting out, because their employers, over their heads, without consulting them, or the shareholders whose interests they are supposed to represent. are pouring funds into the coffers of one political party. So that is where Tory funds are coming from.
Then there is the National Union of Manufacturers, if I may give another illustration of a crypto-Tory organisation. Mr. W. Blackwell, the chairman of the Midland area of this union, has invited manufacturers in the Wolverhampton area to band together
in a united front against the tyrannies of a Socialist totalitarianism.
He goes on to say that
the union is not a political body, but that as industrialists they can approach the problems of the day politically unbiased.
Those are the methods by which these organisations are collecting their funds. We have evidence to show that sums as large as £100,000 at a time have come from big vested interests in this country to the Aims of Industry. They are entitled to pay the money, just as the Co-operative movement is entitled to pay money to the Labour Party. On the same basis, they should publish their accounts. We are not disputing the right
of big vested interests to contribute to a political party. We are saying that it is an elementary right of democracy that the citizens should know the forces behind the political parties before they go into this Election.
I appeal to the Government tonight to accept this Motion—[Interruption.]—and if the Tories do not publish their accounts, to take the earliest opportunity to introduce legislation, which the democracy of the United States of America has shown can be framed on practical lines.