Party finance: The death of the national campaign?

Abstract

Copyright © The Author 2015. Party finance in 2015 in many ways marked a continuation of previous trends observed in previous elections. First, the position of the Conservatives as the ‘wealthy party’ was firmly re-established, and second, constituency-focussed campaigning continued to dominate national campaigning, suggesting that national campaign expenditure as we have traditionally understood it, may well now be in terminal decline. There were however, some notable changes. First of all, spending on digital campaigning started to become more significant, though more traditional direct mail still dominated; and secondly, the period between the 2010 and 2015 elections marked a fundamental change in the future of Labour’s financial relationship with its affiliated unions. While the digital revolution will evolve, the change in Labour’s financial relationship with affiliated unions may have more profound effects on British party finance as a whole.