"My Lords, it will probably come as no surprise that the Labour Party supports reducing the cost of politics, not simply because that is right nor just because of the warnings sounded by the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, who is not in her place, on Monday and this morning, but …..." Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town - View Speech
"My Lords, we gave notice of our intention to oppose the Question in order to say some of the things that have now been covered, so the Committee will be pleased to learn that I shall not repeat them. One of them is the lack of rationale given for the …..." Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town - View Speech
"My Lords, we have talked about taking money out of politics. If I heard the noble Lord, Lord Horam, correctly, he received a donation from the noble Lord, Lord Ashcroft, of £6,000. It is Labour Party policy that donations should be limited to £5,000, so perhaps the most important thing …..." Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town - View Speech
"We are professionals in a party. It is our job to run elections. That is the whole point that we are making. It is core to us; it is what we are trained for. I ran European elections. We know about it; we train our agents; we have the systems …..." Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town - View Speech
"My Lords, I also join in wishing the absent noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, a speedy return—not that we do not feel safe in the hands of this noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace, but it would be nice to see them both running around again. I also declare …..." Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town - View Speech
"We have a clause stand part debate and the point is to argue that this increase in scope does not belong in the Bill. That is the purpose of this, and the clause stand part debate is in our name. It is absolutely because we do not accept the enormous …..." Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town - View Speech
"I do not think that any one clause quite does that, but it is interesting if that is the noble Lord’s interpretation. Assuming that we take the Government’s intention as genuine—we can perhaps agree that this should just be about transparency—our view is that the extension of the scope has …..." Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town - View Speech
"The NUS and other student groups have raised an interesting question about work done in the year before an election. Can the noble and learned Lord assure the student groups—and it is the Bangor student union that has been writing to noble Lords—that they can continue to campaign? The fact …..." Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town - View Speech
"I dread going on to other clauses, because I am going to get told off, but this is rather important. Registration is a threat to many of these organisations. They do not have the staff to fill in the forms. Charities are worried that by being registered with the Electoral …..." Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town - View Speech