Campaigning Guidance Booklet

2015 UK General Election

Contents

Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 3

Background to the 2015 General Election ......................................................................... 4

The Date ........................................................................................................................... 4

The Politics ........................................................................................................................ 4

The Policy Background ...................................................................................................... 4

The Legion’s campaign during the 2015 election ............................................................. 5

Your role in our campaign ................................................................................................. 6

How to find election candidates ......................................................................................... 6

Meeting with and writing to election candidates ................................................................. 6

Key messages to get across .............................................................................................. 7

What can you ask candidates to do? ................................................................................. 8

Things to consider: meeting our legal obligations ........................................................... 9

Charity and Electoral Law .................................................................................................. 9

The Lobbying Act 2014 ..................................................................................................... 9

Implications: the DOs and DON’Ts of Legion Campaigning .............................................. 9

Further Guidance ............................................................................................................ 10

Suggested Text: Meeting Request ................................................................................... 12

Introduction

Dear Members, supporters and friends,

With the last of our combat troops set to leave Afghanistan in December 2014, more than a

decade of British involvement in major conflicts will soon come to an end, and with that, a

great deal of public and media interest in the welfare of our Armed Forces.

However, the fact remains that our Servicemen and women will continue to be engaged in a

variety of military operations around the world, while their families, injured veterans and

recent Service leavers will continue to need specialist care and support back home. It is

vitally important, therefore, that each of us seeks to ‘do our bit’ to ensure that the welfare

needs of the Armed Forces community remain high on the political agenda.

To this end, the Legion has produced its own 2015 ‘Manifesto’, which outlines the key

actions that we would like the next government to take to improve the health, finances and

wellbeing of our serving personnel, veterans and their families. The task for each of us now

is to ensure that these policy recommendations feature in each of the political parties’ own

election manifestos, and that we generate as much support as possible for our proposals

among Members of Parliament, Prospective Parliamentary Candidates, local councillors,

Assembly Members and representatives of the devolved governments.

To aide you in your campaigning efforts, we have produced this helpful Campaigning

Guidance Booklet, which provides information on important dates, key lines to take, and how

to campaign within Charity and Electoral Commission guidelines. It also provides a template

campaign letter, which you can either choose to amend or send in its current form to your

local election candidates.

Next year’s General Election will without doubt be one of the most open and unpredictable in

recent political history. However, I am certain that, with your help, whoever forms the next

government will be committed to building a better future for our Armed Forces community.

Kind regards,

Laura Pett

Public Affairs and Campaigns Manager

Background to the 2015 General Election

The Date

The date of the next General Election is set for Thursday 7th May 2015.

The political party, or coalition of political parties, that wins the majority of the 650 seats up

for election in the House of Commons will go on to form the new government and be

responsible for the operation and welfare of our Armed Forces.

The Politics

Next year’s General Election is set to be one of the most open and unpredictable in post-war

political history. This presents both a challenging and exciting opportunity for the Legion to

exercise its campaigning voice.

Current polling suggests that if the election were held today, the opposition Labour Party

would likely win with a modest majority, given their small polling lead. However, the final

standings of the two main parties will also be dependent on their smaller rivals. This is

because the Labour Party is currently tussling for left-wing votes with the SNP in Scotland

and the Liberal Democrats and Green Party in England, whilst both the Conservative Party

and the Labour Party appear to be locked in a contest with the UK Independence Party

(UKIP) for votes in England and Wales, judging by the latter’s recent polling success.

All this has led many commentators to suggest that there could well be either a Conservative

minority/small-majority government or a Labour minority/small-majority government, or even

another coalition government involving any number of the smaller parties and either the

Conservatives or Labour.

The Policy Background

The 2015 General Election comes at a time of great transition for the UK Armed Forces

community.

The withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and rebasing of troops from Germany, along with

the restructuring of the Regular Armed Forces and projected increase in the numbers of

Reservists, means that the footprint, composition and needs of our beneficiary group is

changing.

As a result, a number of the Legion’s manifesto policy recommendations are designed to

support personnel who are just making the transition from Service to civilian life, or may be

struggling to adapt to a life in ‘civvy-street’ as a result of Service-related injuries.

The Legion’s campaign during the 2015 election

The Legion is calling for the next Government to adopt the policy recommendations

contained within our 2015 General Election manifesto, which is entitled Building a better

future for our Armed Forces community.

Our top five policy proposals (in no particular order) are to:

Enable all Armed Forces widows to retain their pension should they decide to later

remarry.

Ensure that all veterans with hearing problems caused by Service can have their

MOD-provided hearing aids serviced and replaced at no cost, and that working-age

veterans can access higher grade hearing aids, including ‘in-the-ear’ aids.

Protect the lifetime income of injured veterans by uprating their military compensation

by the higher of earnings, inflation or 2.5% (the ‘triple lock’).

Offer veterans evidence-based treatment for mental health problems within a

maximum of 18 weeks from referral, provided by practitioners with an understanding

of veterans’ needs, in line with the Government’s commitment to parity of esteem

between physical and mental health.

Include spouses and Early Service Leavers in the resettlement support provided by

the Career Transition Partnership, and its successor.

A further seven policy recommendations are contained within the extended, online-only

version of our manifesto. Both versions of this publication, along with supporting papers, can

be found on our website at www.britishlegion.org.uk/manifesto.

The proposals contained within the manifesto are the result of an extensive grass-roots

consultation with Legion members, volunteers and staff, whose expertise and close contact

with beneficiaries has been vital in helping the campaigns team put together a shortlist of

policy recommendations.

The Legion’s 2015 Manifesto was officially launched on Friday 19th September 2014, and

was later showcased at each of the three main UK political parties’ conferences in turn. In

addition to this, all members of Parliament have been sent a hard copy of the short

manifesto edition, and have been encouraged to visit our website to learn more about the full

list of recommendations.

Your role in our campaign

Why your voice is important

With the 2015 General Election impossible to predict, MPs and Prospective Parliamentary

Candidates (PPCs) will be paying particular attention to the views of individuals residing

within their constituency.

As one of the largest membership organisations in the UK and with thousands of committed

supporters spread up and down the country, we know that each and every one of you can

help us to get our message out there.

While the Legion’s campaigns team will continue to engage with Ministers, government

officials and members of the political parties’ policy teams at the national level, it is important

not to underestimate the power of your local campaigning voice. Remember; even if a

candidate appears to have very little chance of being elected, many MPs began their political

lives as ‘paper candidates’ and some candidates may already be local councillors.

How to find election candidates

If you are unsure who your current MP is, you can find lots of relevant information from

Parliament’s website: http://www.parliament.uk/mps-lords-and-offices/mps/.

If you would like to know who is standing for election within your local constituency, the three

main UK parties include lists of their confirmed PPCs on their websites:

For Conservative Party candidates, please visit:

www.conservatives.com/OurTeam/Prospective_Parliamentary_Candidates

For Labour Party candidates, please visit:

www.labour.org.uk/people/filter/c/candidate#main-content

For Liberal Democrat Party candidates, please visit:

www.libdems.org.uk/general_election_candidates

To find out which candidates are standing for other political parties, such as Plaid Cymru in

Wales, it is worth exploring their respective party websites for further details, although you

can probably find a list of your local candidates with a quick web search as well.

Meeting with and writing to election candidates

The best way to ensure that election candidates are fully aware of the Legion’s policy asks is

to meet with them face-to-face. This could be something as simple as a catch-up over

coffee with your local MP or a candidate that you know well.

If you decide that you would like to arrange something, remember to be quite formal in your

request or invitation, and to make it clear to the MP or PPC why a meeting to discuss our

manifesto would be helpful to them, for instance by learning more about the needs of our

Armed Forces community and the work that their local Legion branch or Area Office is doing

to help meet this need.

You can find some sample text for your meeting request, which you are encouraged to

personalise, at the end of this booklet.

Remember, MPs and PPCs will get a lot of meeting requests in the run up to the election, so

do not be disheartened if you get no response. There’s no harm in following up on your

request a couple of weeks after you sent your original letter or email to check that it was

received, and to ask directly whether a meeting will be possible.

If you are able to meet with your local MP and PPCs, it would be great if you could let the

campaigns team know about the meeting so that we can then record that information and

provide any supporting materials in advance of your meeting, including a hard copy of our

‘Top 5’ manifesto. We’d also be interested in hearing how your meeting actually went so that

we can follow up on any points raised, if necessary.

You can get in touch by emailing: publicaffairs@britishlegion.org.uk. If you are based in

Wales, please contact the Public Affairs Manager for Wales, Peter Evans, via

pevans@britishlegion.org.uk.

Key messages to get across

In addition to the manifesto background information given earlier in this document, and of

course the proposals outlined in our manifesto and supporting documents (which can both

be found on our website), you might want to consider mentioning some of the following

points, which provide additional context to our recommendations.

The Legion was formed almost a century ago, in the aftermath of the First World

War. In this Centenary period, it is fitting that we should continue our long and proud

campaigning tradition by launching our 2015 Manifesto and highlighting the

continuing need of our Servicemen and women, past and present, and their families.

Since the Legion last produced a manifesto back in 2010, a great deal has happened

in terms of Armed Forces welfare. For a start, the Legion successfully campaigned to

have the Armed Forces Covenant enshrined into law and this is now beginning to

have a real and positive impact across all government departments, in all sorts of

policy areas. The Legion has also overseen every local authority in Great Britain sign

a Community Covenant, which are bringing the principles of the Covenant to life at a

local level.

Whilst the welfare of our Armed Forces community is gradually improving, there

remains a lot more that we can, and must, do. The Legion’s 2014 household survey

of veterans and their families, for instance, revealed that working age veterans are

less likely than the general population to be employed and more likely to report

suffering from hearing difficulties, depression and back and limb pain. A small but

significant minority of the working age community are also struggling financially, and

there remain clear instances where those with a Service related illness or injury are

not receiving the special consideration that they deserve.

It is for this reason that the Legion has produced another manifesto, which contains a

number of policy recommendations that will help to address these very issues. Our

manifesto should therefore be seen as a blueprint for building a better future for our

Armed Forces community, with five key policies that will make a big difference to

thousands of people’s lives.

What can you ask candidates to do?

The main purpose of meeting with local election candidates is to inform them of our policy

recommendations and to raise-awareness of the ongoing needs of the Armed Forces

community. There are, however, a couple of specific asks that you can make of them.

For instance, you could ask that they consider:

Writing to their party leader to ask that the party formerly support our policy

proposals and adopt as many of our recommendations as possible;

Raising awareness of our manifesto and the recommendations contained within it by

speaking about our publication in the Chamber, holding a Parliamentary debate on

the issues raised in our manifesto, or asking a Parliamentary Question on a

recommendation of particular interest to them (this particular ask will obviously only

be applicable to sitting MPs).

Things to consider: meeting our legal obligations

Charity and Electoral Law

Charity Law dictates that charities cannot be established for political purposes and must

never engage in party political activities. However, charities can still be political in so far as

this enables them to achieve their charitable objectives e.g. by campaigning on issues that

directly affect the welfare of their beneficiaries.

There may, therefore, be circumstances when spending on activities that are in pursuit of

charitable purposes means that charities will also have to comply with Electoral Law, which

regulates how much ‘non-party campaigners’ can do and spend during an election period.

The Lobbying Act 2014

Part 2 of the Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union

Administration Act (Lobbying Act) came into force on 19th September 2014. The Act largely

builds on the provisions of existing Electoral Law, as set out in the Political Parties, Elections

and Referendums Act 2000 (PPERA), but it has a greater focus on what ‘non-party

campaigners’ (including charities, voluntary organisations and faith groups) are able to do

during the ‘regulated period’.

For General Elections, the regulated period usually applies for one full year before the date

of the election. However, because of the timing of the 2014 Scottish Referendum, the

regulated period for the 2015 General Election has been shortened and will instead apply

from Friday 19th September 2014 until Thursday 7th May 2015.

The Lobbying Act has brought in a couple of significant changes for non-party campaigners

in the run up to the 2015 General Election. Namely, the Act reduces the amount an

organisation can spend on campaigning activities, while increasing the range of activities

that count towards that spending limit. In addition, it also introduces a limit on what can be

spent in any one constituency.

Implications: the DOs and DON’Ts of Legion Campaigning

The two most important rules for ensuring legal charitable campaigning are:

Remain independent of any candidate or political party

Do not seek to influence, or be perceived to influence, voter intentions

Remain independent of any candidate or political party

This effectively means that you must be careful not to be seen as engaging with any one

particular candidate or political party over others.

Whilst campaigning that is directed at Parliamentarians, Prospective Parliamentary

Candidates, local councillors, Assembly members or representatives from the devolved

governments is not directly covered by the new rules, every effort should be made to uphold

the charity’s political neutrality and spirit of constructive engagement with politicians from

across the political spectrum.

In practice, this means:

Meeting with, and writing to, candidates and political party representatives from as

wide a political spectrum as possible, within reason. This does not mean that the

Legion must approach candidates from extremist parties.

Not using official Legion channels, such as branch websites or social media

accounts, to publicise support or opposition to individual candidates or political

parties, either explicitly or implicitly.

Not using branch premises to hold meetings for particular political parties, whether

these events are policy focused or not.

Do not seek to influence, or be perceived to influence, voter intentions

This essentially means that your local campaign should not engage in vote-seeking activities

such as rallies, speeches, or ‘hustings’, which are generally intended to persuade voters to

vote for a particular politician or party based on their support or non-support for our policies.

It also means that, should a candidate or political party express their support for one of our

manifesto policies, perhaps as a result of your local campaigning, you should not seek to

publicise their support, no matter how much we might welcome this endorsement. This is

because if one candidate or political party in your constituency has not declared their

support, we might ‘reasonably be regarded’ as intending to influence members of the public

to vote against that particular candidate or political party.

Finally, it also means that under no circumstances should individuals produce their own

Legion branded material based on our manifesto during the regulated period. This is

because such publications are considered ‘election material’, which means that if they are

aimed at or read by members of the public, and not just politicians, all costs associated with

its production – including staff time – must be formally accounted for. The Legion is already

required to comply with a strict spending limit of £9,570 per constituency for its manifesto,

which includes website hosting costs, staff time, print production costs, etc. If a branch were

to then produce its own manifesto material, these costs would need to be accounted for

centrally and would count towards this limit. Furthermore, if only one branch were to do this,

the Legion would then be involved in what is known as ‘focused constituency campaigning’,

which brings with it its own administrative difficulties.

Further Guidance

The Electoral Commission, which monitors UK elections and ensures compliance with

Electoral Law, has put together a number of helpful briefings on how to campaign within both

Electoral and Charity Law. You can find their full list of briefing papers on their website:

www.electoralcommission.org.uk.

However, if you follow the guidance given in this booklet, and focus your campaigning

exclusively on politicians, you should find yourself safely within the rules and well equipped

for campaign success!

Thank you for your support; and happy campaigning.

Appendix A

Suggested Text: Meeting Request

[Insert name of MP]

House of Commons

Westminster

London

SW1A 0AA

Dear [Mr/Mrs ………….]

You should by now have received a copy of The Royal British Legion’s 2015 Manifesto,

Building a better future for our Armed Forces community.

As a supporter of the Legion and the work that it does in support of serving men and women,

veterans and their families, I hope that you will have read the Legion’s policy

recommendations with interest and feel able to champion many, if not all, of their proposals.

Over the years, much has been to done to improve the welfare of our Armed Forces

community, but there remains more that politicians can, and must, do. The Legion’s 2014

household survey of veterans and their families, for instance, revealed that working age

veterans are less likely than the general population to be employed and more likely to report

suffering from hearing difficulties, depression and back and limb pain. A small but significant

minority of the working age community are also struggling financially, and there remain clear

instances where those with a Service related illness or injury are not receiving the special

consideration that they deserve.

It is for this reason that I write today to ask that you support the policy recommendations

made in the Legion’s 2015 Manifesto and do all that you can to seem them realised. With

your support, I’m confident that we can address many of the issues identified above and help

to improve the lives of thousands of serving and ex-Service people, as well as their

dependents.

I would very much like to meet with you to discuss some of the manifesto policy proposals in

more detail, and I would be grateful if you could suggest a convenient time to do so. I would

also be happy to update you on what the Legion is doing locally to assist veterans and their

families.

Members of the Armed Forces, and their dependents, are required to sacrifice much in the

service of their country; it is only right that politicians of all parties commit to ‘do their bit’ to

see that their welfare needs are properly met.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours sincerely,