My Lords, the purpose of this amendment is very simple. It is to increase transparency around third-party campaigners—not campaigning—by inserting a new clause entitled:
“Disclosure of status as a recognised third party”.
The amendment is not concerned with imprints on electronic or printed material, the complexities of which we shall wrestle with when we come to Clause 37 in Part 6. It is much simpler than that. I am extremely grateful to my noble friend and the Bill team for agreeing to address this issue now.
This amendment is confined to the contents of the homepage of a website—if it has one—of a registered third-party campaigning organisation. If the amendment were accepted, the homepage of that registered organisation would be required to carry a statement, along the lines of: “XYZ”—the name of the organisation—"is registered as a third-party campaigner under Part 6 of PPERA 2000”, or similar wording. This would alert a reader or viewer that the organisation was an active campaigner in the political sphere. It might mean that the viewer or reader might wish to make further inquiries before becoming more deeply engaged with this organisation.
Would such a provision bring about a sea change? Of course not, but it would serve for the small proportion of interested people as a way of increasing the transparency of what is going on. In these circumstances, it would be the desirable outcome fitting the purposes of this Bill as a whole. In my view, there is broad support for such a proposal. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Collins, that, after two minutes and 12 seconds, I beg to move.