Trade unions have stopped short of backing a cap on political donations but called for further action on big money in politics, in a joint statement after Reform UK was given an unprecedented £72m from two donors.
General secretaries have been split on a call for unions to back a specific cap on individual donors to political parties while protecting trade union donations, which the TUC said were the “cleanest money in politics” because it came from workers’ subscriptions.
Unite’s general secretary, Sharon Graham, was among those who called on the unions to go further, warning about the dangers to democracy posed by billionaires buying influence.
In a statement at the TUC conference on Tuesday, general secretaries warned: “The scale of donations made to Reform in recent days is unprecedented in British politics and should deeply concern anyone who cares about the health and integrity of our democracy.
“We cannot afford to see the Americanisation of our politics, with out-of-control political spending, funded by stratospheric sums of crypto and corporate cash. These donations show clearly whose side Reform are on, with crypto billionaires, foreign and powerful corporate interests lining up to pour in eye-watering sums of money to advance their agendas.”
But the statement said trade union funding of political parties should not be put in the same category as donations from wealthy individuals. Trade unions that are affiliated to Labour, including Unite, Unison and GMB, are the biggest donors to the party.
“Trade union funding is the cleanest money in politics,” the statement said. “Union donations are made up of the collective subscriptions of care workers, teaching assistants, shop workers and millions of trade union members, democratically controlled and heavily regulated.
“We will continue to work with policymakers to clean up our politics and strengthen public trust in our democratic system. We expect our government to protect our democracy from being captured by the super-rich. Unions are committed to ensuring that working people have a strong, collective voice in the decisions that affect their jobs, their communities and their futures.”
Graham told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the £72m combined donations to Reform UK from the crypto billionaires Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne were not comparable to union funding. “There is a transparency issue, there is an individual versus collective issue, and I think it is quite worrying,” she said.
The communities secretary, Angela Rayner, speaking at the TUC conference, criticised Reform for suggesting its donations from cryptocurrency billionaires were equivalent to the contributions from trade union members to Labour.
“How dare they try to compare money from a couple of crypto billionaires to union members’ subs? The most highly regulated political funding we can have,” Rayner said.
“It couldn’t be more different from a couple of offshore billionaires trying to buy our democracy. We will never undermine the rights of working people to organise collectively and democratically.”
The TUC’s general secretary, Paul Nowak, said the donations to Reform were “a blatant attempt to affect a corporate takeover of our politics” and this should “ring alarm bells”.
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“In the years since corporate donations became unrestricted in the United States, we’ve watched with horror the corporate capture of that nation’s democracy,” he told the conference on Tuesday.
“As unions, we will continue to work with government to clean up our politics, to protect our democracy and to strengthen public trust.”
Later on Tuesday, Downing Street confirmed that work is under way to look at retrospectively tightening residency rules for donations in a bill already going through parliament, a move which could mean the money handed over by Delo and Harborne needing to be given back.
Delo formerly lived in Hong Kong, while Harborne spends much of his time in Thailand. Both are registered to vote in the UK, which allows them to donate. Under current rules, being resident for electoral purposes is a matter of voluntarily affirming you have a permanent home address in the UK.
A No 10 spokesperson said ministers were looking at a possible toughening of this system, which could come in amendments to the ongoing representation of the people bill.
“We are looking to introduce an enhanced residency test for political donors. These enhanced rules will mean you also have to demonstrate an ongoing presence in the UK, details of which will be set out shortly,” the spokesperson said.
Asked if this had been under consideration before the new donations, he declined to say. But asked if the idea was intentionally targeting Reform, he replied: “No, I completely reject that.”
