Political Parties: Finance
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the sufficiency of corporate information published on Companies House to help political parties meet the proposed (a) ‘revenue’ test and Person of Significant Control tests and (b) due diligence requirements for political donations.
Answered by Samantha Dixon
In most cases, sufficient information will be publicly available on Companies House to determine the permissibility of companies and limited liability partnerships wishing to make political donations.
The revenue test requires recipients to check that the company or Limited Liability Partnership (LLP) has made sufficient revenue to cover their donation. This information can generally be found in the accounts published on Companies House. Where these are not publicly available, for example for small and micro companies, the recipient will need to request the information in order to carry out the check.
The Person of Significant Control register on the Companies House website contains the information required for the recipient of a donation to carry out this test. The register also includes notices where the information is in the process of being updated.
We will work closely with the Electoral Commission on the development of the statutory guidance for the know your donor scheme, to ensure it provides sufficient support to recipients of donations to undertake their know your donor risk assessment.
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