Political parties

A political party is an organised group of people with broadly shared values who seek to win elected office in order to form, or influence, government. In the UK’s representative democracy parties are the main link between voters and those who govern: almost every MP is elected under a party label, and the party with a Commons majority (or the support of one) forms the government.^[3]

Parties carry out several functions. They represent groups of voters and their interests; they formulate policy, turning broad ideas into a manifesto; they recruit and select candidates and leaders, so most ministers have risen through a party; they encourage participation by giving members a way to campaign, debate and vote on leaders; they educate the public by explaining issues at elections; and they provide government and opposition, giving the Commons a clear governing team and an alternative government in waiting.^[3]

Parties also share common features: a leader, an organisation (members, local associations, a head office and conference), a body of ideas or ideology, and a set of policies. They must register with the Electoral Commission to stand candidates under a party name and to accept donations, which brings them under the political finance rules explained below.^[4][5]

Choosing a leader is one of the most important things a party does, and the rules differ. Labour uses one member, one vote among party members and affiliated members (such as trade unionists who opt in), but a candidate first needs nominations from 20% of Labour MPs; if only one candidate reaches the threshold, they become leader without a ballot. That is what happened in July 2026: Andy Burnham was nominated by 379 Labour MPs, no one else could reach the threshold, and he became leader on 17 July and Prime Minister on 20 July 2026.^[6]

The Conservatives let MPs narrow the field to two candidates and then ask members to choose. In November 2024 Kemi Badenoch beat Robert Jenrick by 53,806 votes to 41,388, on a turnout of 72.8% of 131,680 eligible members. Leadership contests show the participation function at work, but critics point out that a small, unrepresentative membership can choose a Prime Minister or Leader of the Opposition.^[7]

UK parties rely mainly on private money: donations from individuals, companies and trade unions, plus membership fees and loans. There is no cap on how much one donor can give. Donors must be ‘permissible’: individuals on a UK electoral register, or companies, unions and other organisations registered in the UK. Parties must report donations over £11,180 to the Electoral Commission, which publishes them each quarter.^[4][8]

There is also some state funding, mostly for opposition parties. Short money (named after Edward Short, the Labour minister who proposed it in 1974) is paid by the Commons to opposition parties according to seats and votes won at the last general election. After the 2024 election the Conservatives were allocated about £3.2 million for the rest of 2024/25, plus £771,251 for the Leader of the Opposition’s office; the Liberal Democrats about £1.8 million; and Reform UK and the Greens about £288,000 each.^[9][10]

Cranborne money is the House of Lords equivalent. In 2025/26 it gave £887,939 to the Conservatives and £443,340 to the Liberal Democrats, with a smaller sum to the Convenor of the Crossbench Peers. Policy development grants share £2 million a year among parties with at least two sitting MPs to help them prepare manifestos: in 2024/25 Labour, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats received £432,801 each.^[11][5]

The sums raised privately are large and uneven. Parties accepted almost £65 million in donations in 2025, and £24.7 million in donations and public funds in the first quarter of 2026 alone, about 80% more than in the same quarter of 2025. In the second quarter of 2026 Reform UK reported about £5.3 million in donations, ahead of Labour (about £3.6 million) and the Conservatives (about £2.8 million).^[12][13][14]

Critics argue the current system lets a few very rich people gain influence; supporters reply that donations are legal, published and let new parties compete. In September 2026 two cryptocurrency investors, Christopher Harborne and Ben Delo, each gave Reform UK £36 million, which ITV News reported as the largest donations in British political history. Reform said its donors ‘want nothing’ in return, and both men said their gifts were lawful.^{[15][16][17][18]}

Concern about foreign money has driven change. The Elections Act 2022 removed the 15-year limit on overseas voters from January 2024, which also made more British citizens abroad eligible to donate. After the former Reform UK leader in Wales, Nathan Gill, was jailed for taking bribes linked to Russia, the government commissioned the Rycroft Review, published in March 2026. On 25 March 2026 ministers announced a £100,000 annual cap on donations from overseas electors and a pause on cryptocurrency donations; the government said the crypto pause would apply from that date once Parliament approved it.^[19][20][21]

These measures are in the Representation of the People Bill, which had reached Lords committee stage by November 2026. As well as votes at 16, it would ban crypto donations, require company donors to show a genuine UK or Irish connection, link company donations to profits rather than turnover, and keep the overseas cap for returning electors until they have lived in the UK for a full calendar year. The Electoral Commission says the UK system has ‘high levels of transparency’ but that parts of it need strengthening, and that the Bill could strengthen donation controls.^[22][13]

Reform has divided the parties. The Liberal Democrats’ 2024 manifesto backed a cap on donations alongside proportional representation, while Rycroft said general donation caps and spending limits were outside his remit and left them for politicians to consider. Campaign groups such as Spotlight on Corruption want the Bill to go further, with annual spending limits and wider caps.^[23][24]

The specification asks for the origins and development of the three established parties, and how their history has shaped their ideas and current policies on the economy, law and order, welfare and foreign affairs. Each card sets out the party’s history, its main strands of thought and its current policies; a table at the end compares all three.

‘Minor’ parties are those outside the Conservative–Labour duopoly that rarely or never form a UK government. They matter in several ways even when they win few Westminster seats: they give voters a wider choice, they can pressure larger parties to change policy, they can hold the balance of power, and they can govern in devolved institutions and councils.^[3]

At the 2024 general election Reform UK won 14.3% of the vote and the Greens 6.7%, but it took over 823,000 votes to elect each Reform MP and nearly 486,000 for each Green MP, compared with about 23,600 for each Labour MP. The Electoral Reform Society, a campaign group for proportional representation, calculated that this was the most disproportional result in UK history on the Gallagher index.^[116]

Minor parties are much stronger beyond Westminster. In May 2026 Plaid Cymru won 43 of 96 Senedd seats and Rhun ap Iorwerth became First Minister with Green support, while Reform won 34 seats and Labour only nine. In Scotland the SNP formed a minority government with 57 MSPs once the Presiding Officer had been chosen. In the English local elections Reform gained more than 1,200 councillors.^{[117][118][119]}

They can also shape the agenda. Reform’s pressure on immigration has been matched by tougher Labour and Conservative policies, such as temporary refugee status and the Conservative pledge to leave the ECHR, while the Greens’ wealth-tax message has pushed debate on the left. By-elections show their power too: the Greens won Gorton and Denton from Labour in February 2026, with Reform second.^{[95][64][120]}

Several other parties are worth knowing. The SNP and Plaid Cymru are nationalist parties seeking independence for Scotland and Wales; after the 2026 election John Swinney said he would seek to follow what he described as the public’s wish for independence. Your Party, a left-wing party, elected Jeremy Corbyn as its parliamentary leader in February 2026 with 61% of members’ votes. Restore Britain, a right-wing party founded in 2025 by Rupert Lowe, who was elected as a Reform MP in 2024, says it stands for ‘low tax, small government, secure borders’ and polled 4% with YouGov in late October 2026.^{[119][121][122][26]}

The specification asks for the ideas and policies of two minor parties. Reform UK and the Green Party of England and Wales are the two main case studies here, with the SNP as a third: a nationalist party that is minor at Westminster but has governed Scotland since 2007. A table at the end compares all three.

A party system describes how many parties seriously compete for power and how they relate to each other. In a two-party system two parties dominate and alternate in government; in a dominant-party system one party wins repeatedly; in a multi-party system several parties win significant support and governments often need coalitions or deals.^[3]

For most of the twentieth century Labour and the Conservatives shared the great majority of votes. In 2024 their combined share fell to 57.4%, the lowest in the era of universal suffrage. Researchers at Nuffield College described 2024 as the most fragmented election on record. Yet Labour still won 411 of 650 seats, because first-past-the-post rewards concentrated support.^[116][155]

Fragmentation has had clear effects on government. Hung parliaments produced the 2010–15 Conservative–Liberal Democrat coalition and, in 2017, a Conservative minority government after Theresa May lost her majority. In the devolved bodies, where proportional systems are used, minority government is normal: the SNP governs Scotland as a minority, and Plaid Cymru’s Rhun ap Iorwerth was chosen as First Minister with Green votes while Labour and the Liberal Democrats abstained. See the Power Map for the current shape of all four legislatures.^{[99][28][119][118]}

At Westminster the picture is mixed. In November 2026 Labour and the Conservatives held 523 of 650 Commons seats between them, and the Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition still come from those two parties. But national polls show five parties in double figures or close to it: YouGov’s 25–26 October 2026 poll had Labour 27%, Conservatives 22%, Reform 20%, Liberal Democrats 11% and Greens 10%.^[26]

The implications for government are significant. With support split many ways, a party can win a large majority on a modest vote share, which raises questions about legitimacy, while a small shift in votes could produce a hung parliament. Multi-party competition also makes leadership changes, by-elections and defections more frequent, as 2026 showed.^[116][6]

Party success depends on several interacting factors: leadership (image, competence and unity), policies and ideas that match voters’ priorities, organisation and money, the electoral system, events and performance in office, and the media. Strong answers weigh these against each other rather than listing them.^[3]

Leadership. Leaders can transform a party’s fortunes. The Greens’ membership roughly tripled within six months of Polanski becoming leader. Labour replaced Starmer after poor results in May 2026, and Ipsos’s poll of 15–22 October 2026 had Labour eight points ahead on 32%, with Burnham’s satisfaction rating at 35%. Leaders can also do damage: Ipsos found 64% dissatisfied with Farage in October 2026.^[133][27]

Performance in office and events. Governing parties are judged on results. One academic analysis linked Starmer’s fall to party scandals, unpopular spending cuts and a weak economy, and New Labour’s 1997 win followed the Conservatives’ forced exit from the European exchange-rate mechanism. Money and organisation matter too: large donations let Reform build a national campaign quickly.^{[156][28][14]}

The electoral system can decide success regardless of popularity: in 1983 the SDP–Liberal Alliance won about a quarter of the vote but only 23 seats, and in 2024 Reform needed over 800,000 votes for each MP. Parties with concentrated support, such as the SNP, Plaid or the Liberal Democrats in their target seats, do better than those whose votes are spread evenly.^[99][116]

The media. Newspapers once seemed decisive, but their influence is debated. In 2024 the Sun, the Sunday Times, the FT and the Economist all backed Labour, while the Telegraph and Express backed the Conservatives; many argue the papers followed public opinion rather than leading it. News habits are changing: Ofcom found in 2024 that 71% of adults used online sources for news, slightly more than TV (70%), and 88% of 16–24-year-olds got news online. During the 2024 campaign Reform had almost as many TikTok followers as Labour and three times as many as the Conservatives.^{[157][158][159]}