Political parties

- group of people drawn together by a smiliar set of views, or ideologies 

- aspire to form a government 

- adopt an agreed set of policies, commitments and core ideas

- help perform a number of functions within a democratic system: 

Representation 

Participation 

Recruiting office holders 

Formulating policy 

Providing government 

LEFT WING 

-communism 

-socialism 

-the green party 

-centre left mainstream labour 

-liberal democrats

-centre right mainstream conservative

-thatcherite/ new right conservative 

-UKIP

-Fascism 

RIGHT WING 

-MPs are paid from general taxation 

-basic annual salary in april 2017 was 76,000 

-claim expenses to cover cost of running office, living in westminster and constituency and travel 

-public resistance to MPs allowances 

-resistance to state funding of parties 

-each party gets funding from subscriptions and fundraising 

-oposition parties get "short money" 

-political parties critisised for giving out "Political honors" giving lordshops to big donaters 

-an independant electoral comission was set up to supervise party spending on election campaigns 

-the amount that a party could spend was capped at 30,000 per constituency 

-donations more than 5000 nationally, or 1000 to a constituency had to be declared, and parties had to publish details of donations at regular intervals 

-donations from individuals not in the UK electoral system were banned 

For state funding: 

-parties play an important role in representative democracy 

-public funding would remove the great disparity in resources available to different sized parties 

-if the state matched donations by party members, it might encourage participation by the public and recruitment to parties 

-it would curb the posibility of corruption from private bankers on party policy 

Against state funding: 

-increased state funding could lead to calls for greater state regulation, possibly reducing parties independance 

-it is hard to decide hwo much support a party should have to qualify for funding 

-public funding could isolate parties from the wishes of the voters 

-taxpayers resent compulsory contributions to parties of which they disaprove 

Margaret Thatcher 1975-1990 

John Major 1990- 1997

William Hague 1997- 2001 

Iain Duncam Smith 2001- 2003

Michael Howard 2003- 2005

David Cameron 2005- 2016 

Theresa May 2016- Present 

Michael Foot 1980- 1983

Neil Kinnock 1983- 1992 

John Smith 1992- 1994 

Tony Blair 1994- 2007

Gordon Brown 2007- 2010 

Ed Milliband 2010- 2015 

Jeremy Corbyn 2015- Present 

Paddy Ashdown 1988- 1999

Charles Kennedy 1999- 2006 

Menzies Campbell 2006- 2007 

Nick Clegg 2007- 2015 

Tim Farron 2015- 2017 

Vince Cable 2017- Present 

-founded in 1934 

-centre left party, wants independance for scotland 

blair government pushed for devolution in the 1997 election 

-2007 alex salmond formed a minorty SNP gov in Scotland 

-2011 changed to a small majority for the SNP 

-2016 referndum for Scottish independance failed 

-english votes for english laws 

-2017 elections lost the SNP some seats in parliament, lost influence in paliament 

 -began as a fringe nationalist party in 1991 

-main aim was to get the UK out of the EU 

-radical right wing populist party 

-tend to have older, traditional supporters 

-gained votes following large influx of eastern european immigrants in the early 2000s 

-want to restrict immigration 

support grammar schools, "green taxes" which raise enegery bills, and increase spending on NHs but not allow migrants or visitors have to pay 

-founded in 1973 

-presumed it current name in 1985 

-won its first seat in westminster in 2010

-cnetre left party

-environmental issues, but also social inequality 

-strongly pro-european 

The strength of a parties leadership 

The extent to which parties are united or divided between different party factions 

The role of the media in projecting a particular image of a party