More than half of election campaign contributions from trade unions

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Political parties received more than NOK 67 million in contributions from their supporters during this year’s general election campaign, of which almost NOK 36 million was donated by the labour organisations to the Labour Party, Socialist Left Party, Centre Party and Red Party.

Of the total NOK 67 million, NOK 30 million was donated to Labour alone. Ninety per cent of the NOK 30 million was donated by trade union organisations, i.e. almost NOK 27 million. The Socialist Left Party and the Centre Party also received the main part of their donations from trade union organisations, i.e. around 90 per cent. The Red Party, however, received 90 per cent of their contributions from private donors, totalling more than NOK 1 million.

After Labour, the Conservative Party was the main recipient of election campaign contributions this year. The Conservatives received some NOK 15 million, of which NOK 13 million was from commercial enterprises. Thus, the Conservatives received approximately half the amount received by Labour, while the Socialist Left Party received NOK 6 million and was the third biggest recipient.

Figure 1. Election campaign contributions 2017 by party and group of contributors

Private donors Employers' and labour organisations Commercial enterprises Other donors
Labour Party 2862655 26815452 0 10316
Conservative Party 2014600 0 13149000 200000
Socialist Left Party 1071241 5033631 100000 24335
Progress Party 1027200 0 3312000 0
Centre Party 0 3937657 100000 0
Liberal Party 443991 0 3090000 100000
The Greens 906255 0 256221 50000
Red 1059862 90000 0 0
Other¹ 1484630 0 170246 40000

The Conservatives and Socialist Left stand out as the parties with many local branches receiving donations. In addition to the central party organisations, 20 and 15 branches respectively received contributions from their supporters.

Obligation to notify contributions

According to the Political Party Act, all political parties registered in the Party register in Brønnøysund and their local branches have to report any contribution received in election years up to the last Friday before the election day, provided that the contribution or sum of contributions per donor exceeds NOK 10 000. Donor in this connection is defined as any contributor, excluding other parts of the party’s own organisation, public authorities and governmental organisations. The statistics only include these donations.

 

 

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