Party funding law does not go far enough
If we want a strong democracy, how much money political parties get should depend on how many people support them, not on how much the people who fund them own.
Parliament has now passed the Political Party Funding Bill. Once it becomes law, parties will have to tell voters something about who funds them. There will also be limits on how much donors can give a party. The bill has been hailed as a breakthrough for democracy and, to a degree, it is. Given how much damage money does to politics, it is important that parties must say where they get their money and that there is a limit to how much a donor can give. But if we want politics that is about how good parties are at winning the support of voters, not the wealth of their donors, the new law falls far short.
First, parties do not have to disclose donations below R100,000, which leaves leeway for secret funding. Activists want this cut to R10,000. But if we agree that parties should say where they get their money, they should surely be forced to disclose all donations. Either we want disclosure or we don’t. If we do, parties should reveal all funding, however small.
Second, the maximum anyone can give to a party is set at R15m a year. That does not even vaguely do what curbs on party funding are meant to do: ensure that donors cannot give parties so much that the parties do what they want, not what voters want. Someone who gives R15m a year has scope to get parties to do what they want.
One way of countering this is public funding of parties, which should mean that they depend much less on private donors. The Constitution says parties must receive public funds. But 90% of that money has been paid in proportion to their last election result. This allows bigger parties to get more even if their support has dropped. The new law reduces the percentage paid to parties in proportion to election results to two-thirds, but that still gives previous winners a large advantage.
A really democratic funding system would try to ensure that the money parties receive from citizens reflects their support now, not the wealth of their supporters or the backing they enjoyed a couple of years ago. The way to do that is to limit drastically what anyone can give a party — to, say, R5,000 — and then to link public funding to how many people are willing to give to parties, not how much each funder gives: the donation of a person who gives R5,000 and that of someone who gives R10 would count the same.
In some countries, taxpayers indicate on their returns which party they want to get public money. That may not work here because millions of people don’t file returns, so public funding would probably need to depend on how many people parties can persuade to give to them.
If funding depended on the number of people willing to show support for a party by giving it money, funding would depend on active support on the ground. Parties would have a huge incentive to connect with voters and impress them enough to persuade them to give. Funding would reflect voter support, not connections to the wealthy.
One sign that this change would make democracy stronger is that parties are sure to fight it; so it will happen only if voters recognise that it offers them much more power — and begin to campaign for it.