Data on the origin of almost three quarters of donations to political parties in the European Union are not available to the general public, while only seven out of 27 member states require parties to disclose the identity of all private donors, reveals a new survey published today.
A quarter of all private money donated to political parties in the EU went to far-right, far-left and populist parties.
The investigative journalism portal Follow the money (FTM) in cooperation with the British Guardian and 26 other European media partners analyzed how more than 200 political parties in 25 countries were financed from 2019 to 2022.
The results of the research show that political parties in the EU received 941 million euros in donations during that period, but that the public does not know who gave 71 percent of that money, or 664 million euros. Among European countries, there are large differences in laws and practices when it comes to the transparency of political donations, and it is the least in Western countries such as Germany, France and Spain.
From 2019 to 2022, German parties received donations in the amount of 641 million euros from companies, private individuals and politicians, of which 495 million (78 percent) is unknown.
The right-wing Alternative for Germany reported 6.4 million euros in private donations in 2022, of which the origin of only 1.3 million is known.
In France, Spain and Belgium, no name of the donor has been published.
In France, donations take place completely behind closed doors and the public has no right to know who finances the parties, and the reason given is the privacy of the donors, as the donations would probably reveal their political views.
However, strict rules in France prohibit foreign and anonymous donations of more than 150 euros, while individual donations are limited to 7,500 euros. All payments over 150 euros must have a paper trail that can be investigated by the competent authority.
Parties in Spain are also obliged to report the identity of donors to the supervisory authority, the Court of Auditors, but the court does not have to publish this information.
In 16 EU member states, all or some donors are allowed to remain unknown to the general public and the media, but the amount over which parties must reveal the identity of donors varies from country to country, from 500 euros in Cyprus to 25,000 euros in Spain.
On the other hand, the countries of Central and Eastern Europe are much more transparent when it comes to party financing.
Only Croatia, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Greece, Latvia and Poland require that the sources of all private donations be publicly available.
Estonia is probably the most transparent country in the EU. The names of almost 50,000 members of 13 parties, their monthly membership fees, as well as every donation are published every three months and are available to everyone. Estonia also bans foreign donors, while five EU members, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, do not have a direct ban on foreign donations, and in Germany they are limited to 1,000 euros.
Extreme political groups on both the right and the left of the political spectrum have received higher numbers and amounts of donations since 2019.
Data from the investigation reveal that at least 150 million euros of private donations went to populist parties, while more than 97 million euros went to far-right parties.
While most political parties still rely on public funding, in countries such as France, Hungary and Italy, for example, private donations now account for more than half of the income of parties with more extreme views, FTM reported, adding that ahead of European Parliament elections next week, polls also predict more support for extremist and populist parties across the EU.
The three extremist parties in France, including Marine Le Pen’s National Rally, had a drastic increase in financial support – from 13 percent of income from donors, membership fees and contributions from their party candidates and officials in 2019 to 38 percent in 2022.
In Latvia, where a larger number of anti-European and populist MEPs are expected after the elections in June, those revenues increased from nine percent to 36 percent in four years.
The analysis shows that right-wing, left-wing and populist parties in total received more than half of the donations in Slovenia, Italy, Poland, Hungary, Portugal and Greece, Beta writes.
