Politics & media · Media ownership & influence

Who funds Britain’s political parties

£1.51bn across 80,993 reported donations, 2001 to 2026. Who gave it, who got it, and what it does and does not prove.

View shareable visual summariesMedia sectionThe largest donorsDo media owners donate?The three-level test

Headline figures

£1.51bn

reported since 2001

Donations and public funds accepted by registered parties.

80,993

individual donations

From 81,375 records, after removing 382 returned or forfeited.

£655.7m

from individuals

The largest single source of party money in Britain.

£28,952

from national newspaper publishers

Two donations, in 2003 and 2004. That is the complete total.

Reporting thresholds

Read the thresholds before the totals

Only donations above £11,180 to a central party — or £2,230 to a local accounting unit — are individually reported. Everything smaller is invisible here and appears only in party annual accounts. A party funded by 50,000 members giving £20 each looks poorer in this data than one funded by six people giving £2m.

Twenty-six years of party funding

Built from the Commission’s own database export rather than from press releases, so every year is on the same basis. The pattern that dominates it is electoral: money arrives when there is an election to fight, and 2019 — a snap December election following three years of Brexit deadlock — is the largest year in the record.

Donations and public funds accepted by UK political parties, by year and donor type

Each column is one calendar year, on a common scale topping out at £134.6m. Years marked GE contain a general election.

  • Individuals
  • Companies
  • Trade unions
  • Unincorporated associations
  • Public funds
  • Trusts and friendly societies
  • Other
Show the numbers as a table
YearIndividualsCompaniesTrade unionsUnincorporated associationsPublic fundsTrusts and friendly societiesOtherTotal
2001£13.2m£3.9m£9.8m£0.6m£3.9m£0.6m£0.1m£32.1m
2002£6.7m£2.5m£6.7m£0.6m£4.6m£0.7m£0.0m£21.8m
2003£9.2m£3.8m£8.1m£0.8m£6.0m£0.7m£0.1m£28.6m
2004£12.8m£6.6m£10.9m£1.2m£5.7m£0.6m£0.1m£37.9m
2005£19.8m£9.4m£12.0m£2.3m£6.7m£0.7m£0.2m£51.1m
2006£15.0m£9.8m£8.6m£2.5m£8.0m£0.8m£0.1m£44.9m
2007£23.2m£10.3m£11.4m£2.1m£8.6m£1.1m£0.1m£56.7m
2008£20.8m£8.7m£9.4m£2.4m£9.1m£0.9m£0.1m£51.5m
2009£26.7m£9.9m£9.8m£2.9m£9.3m£1.2m£0.2m£60.0m
2010£29.9m£13.7m£13.6m£2.8m£8.2m£1.3m£0.2m£69.6m
2011£14.0m£5.7m£10.0m£2.5m£9.1m£2.4m£0.1m£43.9m
2012£13.3m£5.7m£9.0m£2.0m£8.8m£1.1m£0.2m£40.1m
2013£17.9m£6.2m£8.2m£2.2m£9.4m£1.2m£0.1m£45.3m
2014£35.9m£14.9m£11.0m£3.0m£8.9m£1.0m£0.3m£75.0m
2015£32.9m£15.0m£15.2m£3.0m£10.2m£1.2m£0.2m£77.7m
2016£21.4m£8.1m£9.2m£2.2m£10.9m£1.0m£0.2m£52.8m
2017£43.0m£17.3m£17.2m£2.7m£11.7m£1.0m£0.1m£93.0m
2018£17.5m£8.0m£6.2m£2.4m£13.6m£0.9m£0.0m£48.6m
2019£74.0m£24.4m£19.9m£2.5m£12.7m£1.0m£0.1m£134.6m
2020£13.5m£5.6m£6.0m£1.8m£13.9m£1.3m£0.1m£42.2m
2021£21.0m£6.2m£6.8m£3.0m£13.2m£1.0m£0.2m£51.4m
2022£22.0m£6.6m£5.2m£3.7m£13.8m£0.9m£0.1m£52.3m
2023£55.1m£14.4m£5.9m£2.9m£15.0m£1.0m£0.1m£94.4m
2024£48.5m£33.8m£12.2m£3.5m£15.8m£1.3m£0.2m£115.3m
2025£32.0m£9.3m£5.0m£2.6m£15.3m£1.0m£0.1m£65.2m
2026£16.1m£1.9m£1.4m£1.1m£3.4m£0.3m£0.0m£24.1m

Electoral Commission, political finance database — donations to political parties ↗

£134.6m

in 2019

The largest year on record — the December general election, after three years of parliamentary deadlock.

£115.3m

in 2024

The most recent general election year.

£21.8m

in 2002

The quietest year in the series — the trough between election cycles.

Where the money comes from

Totals across the whole period. Public funds are separated out because the Commission reports Short and Cranborne money — taxpayer support for opposition parties — inside the same donation totals as private giving.

  • Individuals£655.7m (43%)
  • Companies£261.6m (17%)
  • Public funds£255.6m (17%)
  • Trade unions£248.6m (16%)
  • Unincorporated associations£59.2m (4%)
  • Trusts and friendly societies£26.0m (2%)
  • Other£3.4m (0%)

Who received it, 2001 to 2026

  • Conservative and Unionist Party£632.4m
  • Labour Party£529.9m
  • Liberal Democrats£164.7m
  • Reform UK£51.8m
  • Scottish National Party (SNP)£31.8m
  • Co-operative Party£21.4m
  • UK Independence Party (UKIP)£18.2m
  • Green Party£10.8m
  • Plaid Cymru - The Party of Wales£8.4m
  • Sinn Féin£7.6m
  • Democratic Unionist Party - D.U.P.£4.6m
  • The Reclaim Party£4.3m

Includes public funds. Bars share one scale. Electoral Commission, political finance database — donations to political parties ↗

The twenty largest donors since 2001

Private money only — public funds excluded. The register files the same donor under many spellings, so these totals merge name variants; the method and its risk are set out at the foot of this page.

Largest donors to UK political parties, 2001 to 2026, public funds excluded
DonorTypeTotalActiveMain recipientScale
Unite the UnionTrade Union£59.0m2009–2026955 donationsLabour Party100% of their giving
UNISONTrade Union£46.6m2001–20261811 donationsLabour Party100% of their giving
GMBTrade Union£40.5m2001–20261760 donationsLabour Party100% of their giving
Union of Shop Distributive and Allied WorkersTrade Union£31.9m2001–20261060 donationsLabour Party100% of their giving
Lord David Sainsbury of TurvilleIndividual£31.6m2005–202638 donationsLabour Party68% of their giving
Mr Christopher HarborneIndividual£29.0m2001–202641 donationsReform UK99% of their giving
Communication Workers UnionTrade Union£18.4m2001–20261743 donationsLabour Party100% of their giving
National Conservative Draws SocietyUnincorporated Association£16.3m2003–2026217 donationsConservative and Unionist Party100% of their giving
THE PHOENIX PARTNERSHIP LTDcompany 04077829 ↗Company£15.3m2023–202411 donationsConservative and Unionist Party100% of their giving
Co-operative Group Ltdcompany 00925267 ↗Friendly Society£13.6m2001–2026155 donationsCo-operative Party98% of their giving
Lord John SainsburyIndividual£12.4m2007–202318 donationsConservative and Unionist Party100% of their giving
UniteTrade Union£11.1m2007–2009442 donationsLabour Party100% of their giving
THE JOSEPH ROWNTREE REFORM TRUST LIMITEDcompany 00357963 ↗Company£9.7m2001–2026338 donationsLiberal Democrats94% of their giving
Lord Michael S FarmerIndividual£9.2m2001–202596 donationsConservative and Unionist Party100% of their giving
Mr Gary LubnerIndividual£8.5m2022–202642 donationsLabour Party91% of their giving
AmicusTrade Union£8.4m2002–2007460 donationsLabour Party100% of their giving
Mr JEREMY HOSKINGIndividual£7.5m2005–2026126 donationsThe Reclaim Party57% of their giving
Transport and General Workers UnionTrade Union£6.8m2001–2007287 donationsLabour Party100% of their giving
IPGL Ltdcompany 02011009 ↗Company£6.7m2005–2025156 donationsConservative and Unionist Party100% of their giving
Mr John E GoreIndividual£6.6m2017–202220 donationsConservative and Unionist Party100% of their giving

The largest donors on the register are not media owners. Individuals supply the largest share of party funding overall — £656m since 2001, 43% of everything reported — followed by companies, public funds and trade unions. The largest single donor of the whole period is Unite the Union at £59m; the largest individual is Lord Sainsbury at £31.6m. Nobody in the top twenty owns a newspaper.

Do media owners fund political parties?

All 93,277donation records — to parties, to individual politicians, to members’ associations and to referendum campaigners — were matched against the ownership registry two ways: by exact Companies House number, and by donor name against the media groups and the individuals who control them.

Two donations, £28,952, both more than twenty years ago. That is the entire contribution of Britain’s national newspaper publishers to its political parties across the whole public record — 0.002% of the £1.5bn reported since 2001. Reach plc, DMG Media, Guardian Media Group and every other major publisher appear nowhere in it at all.

Every donation from a national newspaper publisher on the register

Complete list of donations to political parties from national newspaper publishers, 2001 to 2026
Donor as filedPublisher todayRecipientAmountDate
News International Ltd.company 00081701 ↗News Corp UK & Ireland — publisher of The Sun, The Times and The Sunday TimesConservative and Unionist Party£18,952Non-cash31 March 2004
Telegraph Group Ltdcompany 00451593 ↗Telegraph Media Group — publisher of The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday TelegraphConservative and Unionist Party£10,000Cash19 March 2003

One genuine media-sector pattern does show up, and it is not about proprietors: publishers donate advertising space rather than money. H Bauer Publishing gave £303,867 in non-cash donations between 2006 and 2010, all of it to three small, now de-registered parties, in the form of magazine space. News International’s single 2004 donation was also non-cash. Nothing in the register suggests this was more than commercial in-kind support, but it is the shape media-sector political giving actually takes.

Searched against the full register, Britain’s national newspaper publishers gave political parties £28,952 in twenty-five years — two donations, in 2003 and 2004. Where media proprietors matter politically, the mechanism is publication and access, not party donation. A donations-only account of media power would miss almost everything that is actually going on.

Before calling any of this influence

The temptation with donation data is to draw a line from a donor to an outlet to a policy and call it corruption. Each link may be real while the chain is unevidenced. This site separates the levels and refuses the third unless all three are documented.

  1. 1

    Verified financial relationship

    Did money actually change hands, and is it on the record?

    Evidence needed
    A named entry in the Electoral Commission database: donor, recipient, amount, date, and whether it was accepted.
    What it proves
    That a specific person or company gave a specific party a specific sum on a specific date.
    What it does not prove
    Anything at all about why, or what followed.
  2. 2

    Ownership or control relationship

    Does that donor actually control a media outlet?

    Evidence needed
    A Companies House persons-with-significant-control record, or a filed shareholding, linking the donor to the publisher.
    What it proves
    That the same party holds a controlling or significant interest in an outlet.
    What it does not prove
    That they direct or see editorial decisions. Many owners genuinely do not, and some are contractually barred from doing so.
  3. 3

    Documented editorial alignment

    Did the outlet separately and publicly take the position in question?

    Evidence needed
    A dated, quotable leader column, endorsement or sustained campaign in the outlet itself.
    What it proves
    That the outlet took the position. Combined with levels 1 and 2, that all three facts are true of the same people.
    What it does not prove
    Causation. An owner may donate to a party because they already believe what their paper already argued. Alignment is consistent with influence and equally consistent with shared prior conviction, and no amount of database work distinguishes the two.

The rule. This site describes a relationship as influence only where all three levels are separately documented, and says so explicitly when it is describing levels one and two alone. A donation by a media owner is a fact about money. It is not, on its own, evidence of editorial interference, and the page will not imply that it is.

The two cases the register produces

Individuals who own media, donating personally, is a different matter from publishers donating corporately. Run the test across the full register and it returns exactly two substantial cases — including one where the sequence of events undercuts the obvious reading.

The proprietor of the Daily Express gave UKIP £1.3m, and the Express endorsed UKIP. All three levels hold at the same time.

  1. 1Verified financial relationshipDocumented

    Northern & Shell Media Group Ltd gave £1,300,000 to the UK Independence Party in two donations — £300,000 accepted in December 2014 and £1,000,000 in April 2015, both cash. A separate £10,000 from Northern & Shell PLC went to the Conservatives in 2017.

    Electoral Commission political finance database ↗
  2. 2Ownership or control relationshipDocumented

    Northern & Shell was Richard Desmond’s company and owned the Daily Express, Sunday Express, Daily Star and Star on Sunday at the time. It sold the titles to Reach plc in 2018, so the ownership and the donations overlap precisely.

    Companies House register ↗
  3. 3Documented editorial alignmentDocumented

    The Daily Express endorsed UKIP at the 2015 general election — the only national newspaper to do so. It went on to back Leave at the 2016 referendum, and published 33 referendum front-page leads across the Daily and Sunday titles, second only to the Telegraph.

    Contemporaneous leader columns; KCL content analysis of the referendum campaign ↗

Verdict. All three levels are documented, of the same person, over the same period. On this site’s test this is the one clear case in the register where a media owner’s money, ownership and editorial position line up completely.

What still cannot be concluded. Even here, causation is not established and the direction of travel is genuinely ambiguous. The paper took its position first: on 25 November 2010 the Daily Express became the first national newspaper to campaign for leaving the EU, declaring it would direct its energies to the cause — four years before the first donation. A proprietor funding the party his paper already agreed with looks identical, in this data, to a proprietor buying an editorial line, and the register cannot separate the two.

Britain’s most acquisitive media owner is a substantial political donor — but he bought the outlets after he wrote the cheques.

  1. 1Verified financial relationshipDocumented

    Sir Paul Marshall gave £100,000 to Vote Leave Limited in June 2016, £500,000 to the Conservative Party in 2019, and £13,250 to Michael Gove as a regulated donee in 2016 and 2019. Earlier, between 2003 and 2015, he gave £159,361 to the Liberal Democrats and a further £14,000 to senior Lib Dem figures including Nick Clegg, Menzies Campbell, David Laws and Steve Webb, plus £90,000 to the Yes campaign at the 2011 AV referendum.

    Electoral Commission political finance database ↗
  2. 2Ownership or control relationshipDocumented, but not contemporaneous

    Marshall is one of four persons with significant control of All Perspectives Ltd, which operates GB News, holding 25–50% of shares and voting rights. He also owns UnHerd, and bought The Spectator for £100m in September 2024. But GB News launched in 2021 and the Spectator purchase completed in 2024 — years after the donations above.

    Companies House persons-with-significant-control record, All Perspectives Ltd (12227760) ↗
  3. 3Documented editorial alignmentDocumented

    The Spectator and UnHerd take editorial positions freely and are under no impartiality duty. GB News is a licensed broadcaster and is bound by Ofcom’s due impartiality rules like any other.

    Ofcom Broadcasting Code, Section Five ↗

Verdict. All three levels exist, and they do not overlap in time. The donations came first and the media ownership followed. Presenting this as a proprietor funding parties to protect his titles would reverse the chronology; the more defensible reading is of someone who held political views, funded them, and later bought outlets that reflect them.

What still cannot be concluded. His trajectory from substantial Liberal Democrat donor to Conservative and Vote Leave donor to owner of three right-leaning outlets is a real and documented sequence. What it is not is evidence that any donation bought any coverage, and nothing in the register speaks to what his outlets publish now.

Two cases in twenty-five years of a complete public register. In one, every level holds and the causation still cannot be established. In the other, the levels hold but not at the same time. That is what a rigorous look at "media owners buy political influence through donations" actually returns — which is a long way from both the version where it is rampant and the version where nothing is there.

The most recent quarter

January to March 2026, from the Commission’s own published release. Every party that reported is listed: which parties run almost entirely on public money is as informative as which attract the largest donations.

Donations and public funds accepted by UK political parties, January to March 2026
PartyPrivate donationsPublic fundsTotalRelative size
Reform UK£9,262,000£674,393£9,936,393
Conservative and Unionist Party£4,225,354£1,837,607£6,062,961
Labour Party£4,046,640£56,216£4,102,856
Liberal Democrats£2,291,101£727,134£3,018,235
Co-operative Party£439,300£0£439,300
Green Party£163,020£98,764£261,784
Scottish National Party (SNP)£125,000£92,758£217,758
Open Party£129,556£0£129,556
Sinn Féin£0£126,845£126,845
Democratic Unionist Party£0£104,347£104,347
SDLP£0£79,536£79,536
Alliance Party of Northern Ireland£20,535£41,336£61,871
Plaid Cymru£25,500£33,967£59,467
Ulster Unionist Party£0£40,303£40,303
Advance UK£28,000£0£28,000
The Reclaim Party£20,000£0£20,000
Social Democratic Party£15,000£0£15,000
Scottish Green Party£0£12,590£12,590

Dark blue: private donations. Grey: public funds. Bars share one scale. Electoral Commission, Political parties accept £24.7m in donations in Q1 2026 ↗ (published 4 June 2026)

Reform UK accepted £9.3m in private donations in the first quarter of 2026 — more than the Conservatives and Labour combined, and more than twice either of them individually. It received almost no public funds, because Short money goes to parties by their strength in the Commons, not by their support in the country. The Conservatives, by contrast, took £1.8m of public money in the same quarter.

What “public funds” means here. Public funds here are Short money (Commons) and Cranborne money (Lords) — taxpayer support for opposition parties to do their parliamentary work, allocated by seats and votes at the last general election. Several Northern Ireland parties in this table received no private donations at all above the reporting threshold and appear solely because of public funding. Counting that as a "donation" in a headline is technically what the release does and rhetorically misleading.

And the referendum, which most people misremember

£19.3m

reported spending by Remain campaigners

£13.3m

reported spending by Leave campaigners

Remain outspent Leave by 45% on the Electoral Commission’s own record, and lost. The full referendum funding breakdown is in the Brexit section.

How this was built, and where it could be wrong

Every figure above the quarterly table comes from the Commission’s own CSV export of the political finance database, retrieved on 2026-08-16: 81,375 reported donations to registered parties, of which 80,993 are used here. 382 records marked Returned or Forfeited are excluded — money the party did not keep should not sit inside a total described as funding received.

Donor names are merged, and this is the weak point.The register holds the same donor under many spellings — “Communication Workers Union”, “Communications Workers Union (CWU)”, “Communication Workers Union CWU - Sponsorship”. Totals here merge on a normalised key that strips parenthetical aliases, sponsorship suffixes, titles, peerage territorial designations, company suffixes and single-letter middle initials. Merging cannot understate a donor, but it can over-merge two different people who share a name, and the register carries no stable donor identifier to check against — its own internal ID changes between reports for the same person. Treat individual donor totals as very good rather than certified.

The two sources do not reconcile exactly.The database export and the Commission’s published quarterly releases disagree by small amounts, because the releases are snapshots taken on a publication date while the database keeps moving as late reports and corrections arrive. Both are shown, labelled, rather than blended into one number.

What this data still does not show

  • Anything below the reporting thresholds — £11,180 to a central party, £2,230 to an accounting unit. Small-donor and membership funding is invisible here.
  • Where unincorporated associations get their own money. They appear as donors in their own right, and the people behind them are not disclosed — which is the single largest transparency gap in the register.
  • Anything about what donations bought. The register records that money changed hands, not why.
Search the political finance database yourself ↗