The UK Electoral Commission has
posted a warning on its website saying that “Candidates and their agents must
follow certain rules set out in legislation. We provide guidance to help
candidates and agents comply with the rules. You do not have to follow this
guidance, but if you do, you will normally be doing enough to comply with the
law.”
The Electoral Commission has a team
who is in charge of publishing written guidance and training political parties
prior to the start of the electoral campaign. To that purpose, the Electoral
Commission regularly posts updated guidance documents on its website. Reporting
forms, power-point presentations regarding main campaign finance regulations,
and a webcast to explain how to fill in and submit financial reports are made
available and can be accessed anytime.
In
the run-up to major elections and referenda, the Electoral Commission also
carries out targeted campaign monitoring to check that candidates are complying
with the rules on spending and donations and evaluate the risk of possible infringements of campaign finance
regulation. Monitoring compliance with the rules during the campaign also aims
at obtaining information on activity that the Electoral
Commission may refer to when looking at the financial disclosures submitted by
candidates.
The Electoral Commission also has enforcement powers to
investigate allegations of potential breaches of the rules, as well as breaches
it identifies proactively and can impose a range of sanctions. If the Electoral
Commission believes that the breach has a significant impact on confidence in
the transparency and integrity of party and election finance, it can pass the
matter to the police or prosecuting authority.[1]
