Political strategists hoping to refill party war chests with the eye-watering amounts they raised in the run-up to the 2008 election will have to make the pennies count this time round.

Fundraising telethons held some weeks ago saw the Nationalist Party rake in €490,000 and the Labour Party collect €415,000 – significant amounts in their own right.

But both parties’ fundraising income is 40 per cent lower than it was this time five years ago.

In December 2007, the PN managed to raise €821,000 during its annual end-of-year activity. The PL had collected €246,000 in its Christmastime telethon but other fundraisers held earlier in the year bumped its 2007 total up to €724,000.

According to economist Lawrence Zammit, the sharp drop in funds this year is simply a reflection of the political uncertainly that has kept the country on tenterhooks for the past 12 months.

“An election has been looming for quite some time, so I suspect both parties were busy raising money throughout the year,” Mr Zammit said.

“In 2007, both parties knew with certainty there would be an election the following year and could therefore save their fundraising drives till the end of the year. That wasn’t an option this year.”

Fellow economist Lino Spiteri compared the reduced totals to the record €3.3 million raised by charity bonanza L-Istrina, saying the figures suggested “people are finally setting themselves the right priorities”.

A look at the Christmas fundraising totals is likely to be of more comfort to Labourite strategists than their Nationalist counterparts, with the PL gradually narrowing its fundraising gap with the PN over the past three years.

Labour only started having one end-of-year fundraising appeal in 2010. Prior to that, its Christmas telethon was part of a number of such events held throughout the year.

A PL spokesman did not provide year-round fundraising totals, making it difficult to compare one party’s fundraising income with the other’s during those years.

But the figures show that although the PN still managed to raise more money than its direct rival, the €200,000 funding chasm that existed between the two parties in 2010 has now shrunk to €75,000.

Neither party answered a request to comment on their respective fundraising totals or explain why amounts this year are so much lower than they were in 2007.

The Public Collections Act specifically exempts political parties from requirements imposed by the law, includ-ing the need to obtain a police permit to solicit funds from the public.

In the absence of a party financing law with adequate regulation, Mr Spiteri said it was difficult to properly debate fundraising totals.

“The question is: are all contributions being revealed? We can’t objectively answer that without a proper law obliging parties to divulge funding sources, including relatively small contributions of, say, €10,000 or more,” he said.

Mr Spiteri was disappointed that political parties had yet to improve their practices.

“We’re entering another general election with the same old schemes, broken by politicians every step of the way, still in place,” he said.

According to NGO Commissioner Kenneth Wain, in the absence of a financing law political parties should be classified as voluntary organisations.

“Legal advice I’ve received has suggested that political parties technically qualify as voluntary organisations. But they’re apparently not willing to enrol as such,” Prof. Wain said.

Enrolling with the NGO Commissioner would oblige parties to, among other things, submit yearly audited accounts that would then be made publicly available.

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