Structures, Functions, and Funding of the Main Parties (AQA A-Level Politics): Revision Notes

Structures, Functions, and Funding of the Main Parties

Political parties require organised structures to carry out essential functions such as developing policy, creating manifestos, selecting candidates for elections, and choosing leaders. The way each party approaches these tasks reflects its history and political philosophy. Among the three main UK parties, the Liberal Democrats are generally viewed as the most internally democratic, the Conservatives historically had the least direct membership involvement, and Labour falls somewhere in between. However, all three parties have shown a trend towards centralising power in their leadership, though the Conservatives have recently moved towards slightly greater internal democracy—ordinary members now have the final say in choosing their leader, not just MPs.

Local party structures

Each of the three main parties organises differently at the local level, reflecting their distinct traditions and approaches to grassroots involvement.

Conservative Party local organisation centres on Local Conservative Associations, which sometimes include ward branches beneath them. These associations play a crucial role in organising grassroots activities, planning local campaigns, and selecting candidates. However, central party control over candidate selection has increased in recent years, giving local associations less autonomy than they previously enjoyed.

Labour Party local organisation is based on the Constituency Labour Party (CLP), which exists in each constituency. Many constituencies also have Branch Labour Parties (BLP) operating at council ward level. The CLP leads both local and national election campaigns within its area. This structure allows Labour to maintain strong connections with local communities whilst coordinating activity across the constituency.

Liberal Democrats maintain local branches but organise along federal lines, with separate national parties for England, Wales and Scotland. Local branches take the main responsibility for running constituency-level campaigns and can submit motions to conference for debate. This federal structure reflects the party's commitment to devolved decision-making and regional autonomy.

National party structures

At the national level, each party has established headquarters and governing bodies that oversee day-to-day operations and strategic direction.

Conservative Party national headquarters is Conservative Campaign Headquarters (CCHQ) at Millbank, Westminster. The Board of the Conservative Party undertakes day-to-day running of the party machine. This board comprises representatives from each section of the party, including MPs and local associations. However, only three of its approximately 18 members come from the grassroots party, which is overseen by the Annual Convention. This structure concentrates significant power in the hands of parliamentary and organisational leadership.

Labour Party has its national base in Victoria Street, London. Day-to-day party operations are managed by the National Executive Committee (NEC). The NEC enforces party discipline and can expel members for breaking party rules. It holds final authority over the selection of parliamentary candidates. The NEC comprises around 40 members, including automatic representatives from the parliamentary party, affiliated trade unions, CLPs, local councillors and Young Labour. Elections to the NEC are often highly factionalised, reflecting different ideological tendencies within the party.

Liberal Democrats maintain national headquarters in Great George Street, London. The Federal Board (FB) serves as the national governing body. It comprises 35 voting members, including the party president (who chairs it), the leader and three other MPs/peers, the chairs of the three national parties, a councillor, a Young Liberals representative, and 15 members directly elected by party members. This structure reflects the party's commitment to balanced representation across different sections of the party.

Policy-making processes

How parties develop policy varies significantly, reflecting different philosophies about where power should lie.

Conservative Party established the Conservative Policy Forum in 1998 to enable greater grassroots participation in policy-making. However, its role remains advisory rather than binding. Generally, the Conservatives have left manifesto writing to their leader and trusted advisers. For instance, John Major boasted of the winning 1992 manifesto: "It was all me". More recently, much of the 2019 manifesto was co-written by Rachel Wolf, who had been an education and innovation adviser at Number 10 during David Cameron's premiership. This top-down approach reflects Conservative tradition of trusting leadership judgement.

Labour Party policy-making has changed significantly over time. Until the 1990s, the annual conference was the sovereign policy-making body, but its role has since diminished. This shift reduced the direct influence of party members and trade unions over policy direction, concentrating more power in the parliamentary leadership's hands.

Liberal Democrats maintain a policy-making process that largely replicates their federal structure. Motions debated and passed at conference become official national party policy. Policies affecting the whole UK or just England are voted on by the Liberal Democrat Federal Conference, whilst Scottish, Welsh and regional conferences set policy that only affects their own area. This democratic approach gives members genuine influence over party policy.

Candidate selection

All three main parties follow a similar three-stage process for selecting parliamentary candidates.

All main parties have recently sought to increase the diversity of their candidate pool, particularly regarding gender and ethnicity. Labour pioneered the use of all-women shortlists. The Conservatives have occasionally used open primaries (for example in Gosport) and priority lists, often called A-lists.

Leadership elections

The main parties share some similarities in how they choose their party leader. All operate a two-stage system, whereby candidates must initially be nominated by a certain number of MPs or local parties. The final choice then lies with party members and, in Labour's case, registered supporters.

Conservative Party leadership selection

Selection by MPs: MPs vote in a series of ballots to narrow the choice of candidates down to just two names. In 2019, nine MPs secured enough support to stand, but after a succession of votes by Conservative MPs, seven were eliminated, leaving just Jeremy Hunt and Boris Johnson on the ballot for party members to make their choice.

Election by party members: Party members make the final pick on a one member, one vote (OMOV) basis. Johnson won a clear victory in 2019 with around two-thirds of the vote, after 16 regional hustings before party members and several televised debates.

Labour Party leadership selection

Selection by MPs: Candidates must first secure the backing of at least 10% of Labour MPs/MEPs, and also either 5% of constituency parties or at least three affiliates (two of which must be trade unions). In 2020, in the race to succeed Jeremy Corbyn, Emily Thornberry failed to get sufficient support from the affiliates section so was unable to proceed to the first round of the vote. Keir Starmer, Rebecca Long-Bailey and Lisa Nandy all qualified to stand in the first round.

Election by party members: Party members and registered supporters vote on an OMOV basis using the alternative vote system to make the final choice. In 2020, as Keir Starmer won over 50% of the vote in the first round, there was no need for a second round of voting.

Liberal Democrat leadership selection

Selection by MPs: Candidates must gain support from at least 10% of other Liberal Democrat MPs, and be supported by at least 200 members from more than 20 local parties.

Election by party members: Party members vote on an OMOV basis using the alternative vote to make the final choice. Ed Davey won the leadership race in 2020, securing 63.5% of the vote by party members in the first and only round.

Unopposed elections

On occasion, a new leader can be elected unopposed, as happened with Theresa May in 2016 after Andrea Leadsom withdrew from the race, whilst Gordon Brown won the Labour leadership unopposed in 2007. Vince Cable was similarly unopposed when he stood for leadership of the Liberal Democrats in 2017. In such situations, the leader is not so much elected as crowned.

Balancing participation and effectiveness

With both policy-making and leadership selection, there is a balance between grassroots member participation and the input of the party's MPs and institutional stakeholders, such as Labour's affiliated unions. If ordinary members are not involved in the selection process, they risk becoming disillusioned and less willing to volunteer and campaign at election time. Yet, without peer review by those who probably know the candidates best, the chosen leader may lack sufficient support from their parliamentary group—a problem that often affected Jeremy Corbyn during his Labour Party leadership.

Membership growth

Contrary to impressions of consistent decline, each of the main parties has had some success improving supporter numbers in recent years. Labour's membership had grown to just over 550,000 by the time of the 2020 leadership election, making it the largest political party in Europe, with around an additional 230,000 affiliated supporters. The Conservative Party also enjoyed a membership boost, with around 160,000 eligible to vote in the 2019 leadership contest. Liberal Democrat numbers in 2020 were just over 100,000.

The funding of political parties

Party funding refers to the methods by which political parties raise money to finance their activities, such as campaigning, advertising, and policy research. Most funding comes from private donations rather than the state. Party funding is one of the most controversial issues relating to political parties.

Current state of regulation

Unlike the USA, campaign finance is tightly regulated in the UK through two key pieces of legislation: the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act (PPERA) 2000 and the Political Parties and Elections Act (PPEA) 2009.

Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000

Under this Act, all political parties must register with the Electoral Commission and provide regular returns of their income and expenditure. In addition, strict limits are placed on the amount each party can spend in the run-up to the election—£30,000 per constituency. Finally, parties must declare all large donations, defined in 2020 as those over £7,500.

The Act also regulates campaign expenditure for national referendums and can issue fines to parties and groups that break the rules. In 2018, for example, Leave.EU was fined £70,000 for breaches of electoral law.

Political Parties and Elections Act 2009

This measure strengthened the provisions of PPERA by increasing the powers of the Electoral Commission and placing further requirements on parties and donors to clarify the source of donations. Major donations or loans can only come from UK residents.

Sources of party funding

Whilst these laws regulate some funding, they do not resolve the thorny issue of how parties should be funded. Several proposals exist, all problematic in their own way.

Membership subscriptions

These are agreed to be the fairest and most transparent method of funding. Large numbers paying small amounts ensures that no single donor gets undue influence. The problem is that party memberships alone are not large enough to sustain the level of finance required to fund professionally run national campaigns, post advertisements on billboards and increasingly on social media, or organise effective policy research.

Individual donors

All main parties have often relied on generous individual or institutional donors. In the Blair years, Labour benefited from wealthy individuals such as Bernie Ecclestone (chief executive of the Formula One Group) and Lord Sainsbury. However, traditionally—and more recently under Jeremy Corbyn—the party has been heavily bankrolled by affiliated trade unions, including GMB and Unite (which gave over £3 million in 2019).

The Conservatives have also benefited from generous donors, with the party raising more than £5.67 million in large donations in the first week of the 2019 election campaign, including £200,000 from Lubov Chernukhin, the wife of a Russian business person. Smaller parties can also receive large donations on occasion—business person Christopher Harborne donated £2 million towards the Brexit Party's 2019 campaign.

2019 general election donations

During the 2019 general election campaign, registered donations to political parties totalled over £30.7 million:

Party	Individual	Company	Trade Union	Other	Total Value	% Share
Conservative	£13,265,157	£5,997,751	£108,000	-	£19,370,908	63.1%
Labour	£159,442	£201,600	£5,039,754	£10,500	£5,411,296	17.6%
Brexit	£4,150,000	-	-	-	£4,150,000	13.5%
Liberal Democrats	£1,004,998	£241,000	-	-	£1,245,998	4.1%

State funding

The final option for party funding is state funding based upon "pence-per-vote" or "pence-per-member". Parties can currently receive public funds through:

• Policy Development Grants (£2 million in total annually), available to parties with at least two sitting members of the House of Commons who have taken the oath of allegiance
• Short (Commons) and Cranborne (Lords) money, paid to opposition parties to help with their administrative work in providing effective scrutiny of the government in parliament
• Indirect help through free television airtime for party election broadcasts and free postage for one piece of campaign literature during elections

However, some have argued that there should be greater state funding of political parties.

The state funding debate

Arguments for state funding

Reducing corruption: State money would be "clean" without dependence on wealthy donors and interest groups who may expect something in return, whether in the form of honours or policies. It would enable politicians to focus on representing constituents and developing policies that benefit the entire nation as opposed to cosying up to potential donors.

Greater equality: It could provide a greater sense of equality between the parties. The Conservatives considerably outraised all their rivals in 2019.

Reform attempts have failed: Other attempts to regulate party funding and eradicate allegations of corruption have largely failed. Both the independent 2007 Phillips report "Strengthening Democracy" and the 2011 Committee on Standards in Public Life recommended greater state funding of parties.

Encouraging wider campaigning: If parties had state funding that matched their vote, it would encourage them to campaign in all seats to increase the party vote and not just in the key marginals, which would help democracy overall.

Controlling spending: State funding would make it easier to limit overall spending on elections, much of which goes on advertising and could be reined in.

Encouraging small donations: If funding was matched to small donations, it would encourage parties to seek more money from all their supporters, not just the wealthiest.

Arguments against state funding

Taxpayer concerns: Voters should not fund parties with which they disagree, and there are many better areas on which to spend taxpayers' money, such as health and education.

Isolation from reality: Parties could become isolated from the "real world" if links and donations with interest groups were cut.

Natural inequality: There will always be inequality in party funding. Some parties are larger and more popular than others. What matters is that everyone is equally able to join and give as they wish.

Free market principle: Politics should be treated as an extension of the free market and the right to donate is a basic democratic right, provided it is made openly and major donors are identified.

Disadvantaging smaller parties: Funding based on the existing share of the vote merely strengthens the larger parties and makes it more difficult for smaller parties to get off the ground. Smaller parties, already disadvantaged by FPTP, would be hit again.

State dependency: State funding would make parties too dependent on the state and less incentivised to actively recruit members. Funding could also be manipulated by the governing party for its own benefit.