The hour is getting late. The noble Lord, Lord Rennard, raised the issue of expenditure limits. We feel bound by those. We believe that they are right and proportionate. In conclusion, political parties have a vital role to play in our representative democracy.
Parties provide the link between the citizen and the government of the day.
It is the political parties which formulate and articulate the clear choice between competing values and their practical manifestation in a coherent set of policies as set out in a manifesto. By presenting these competing choices at elections, political parties offer the people that fundamental right in a democratic society to determine for themselves how they are governed. These are onerous responsibilities. People place their trust in politicians and political parties and it is incumbent on them not to abuse that trust. The secretive funding of political parties, including by foreign donors with no direct stake in how we run our national affairs, has served, we believe, to undermine that trust and weaken the compact between the citizen and the state.