The judicial review into the Vote Leave donations may not be the end of the Electoral Commission's legal troubles. THREAD
Bear with me. It's complicated. But also quite interesting. /1
So election law generally opts in favour of transparency: we should know who is buying our democracy. /2
The rules do two things. They enable punters like us to see where the money is coming from. And they enable the Electoral Commission to check whether it's coming from people who are allowed to spend on our elections. /3
But Northern Ireland is excepted from the first principle. Because of security concerns - or some such - punters are not allowed to know where the money has come from. /4
But the law still requires, even in Northern Ireland, that the Electoral Commission check that donations are not coming from, y'know, Vladimir P or something. /5
[Checks to see if we've taken a wicket. Damn.] Now, one of the lingering mysteries of the Referendum is who paid a bit more than £400,000 to advertise to Londoners in the Metro about all the splendid things Brexit would bring. /6
What we do know is that they want to keep it a secret. And so they gave the money to some shady pro Brexit group called the "Constitutional Research Council" who gave it to Theresa's NBFs, the DUP, who spent it advertising in The Metro in London. /7
The CRC has also given money to our friend from the Darren Grimes story @SteveBakerHW [you watching the cricket too, Steve?] but that's another story. /8
[wicket] Why would they give it to the NI DUP so the DUP could spend it in London, you might wonder? Answer: to exploit the silly NI secrecy loophole. /9
Now, the brilliant @AdamRamsay and @PeterKGeoghegan have uncovered that the Electoral Commission appears to have levied a fine in connection with these shenanigans opendemocracy.net/uk/brexitinc/a… But for what? /10
Is the fine for not disclosing properly who the real donor is? Or not disclosing at all? /11
It's quite an important difference because if it's for not disclosing properly then at least the Electoral Commission knows who the money has come from. Even if you and I don't. /12
Even if the first principle wasn't observed, we would know the second principle was (see tweet 3 above). The Electoral Commission would know the money hadn't come from Uncle Vladimir. /13
No problem, right? You just ask the Electoral Commission whether *It* knows who the ultimate source of the money that @SteveBakerHW's pals (the CRC) funnelled through the DUP to buy our democracy with? They can tell us that, right? /14
Well, apparently not. If you say to the Electoral Commission 'I understand you can't tell me who the money came from. But help a fella out. Do you know?" they refuse to answer. /15
And the reason they give is this (from section 71E of the Act governing election law). Yo answer even that question, they say, would be to contravene this provision. /16 
But I just don't think that's right as a matter of language. Answering the question "do you know who the donor is?" doesn't disclose any information they've "obtained". It discloses information they know. /17
And it's also just nonsense as a matter of commonsense - which is also a good guide. What's the public interest in the Electoral Commission not being able to tell punters whether *they* know who the source of the dark money was? /18
Anyway. If the @ElectoralCommUK [hi guys!] continue to stonewall I can see another judicial review in their immediate future.
This is our future. It is not a game. /ENDS
This is our future. It is not a game. /ENDS
