Labour Future on its donations and activities

Over the past few days, the SKWAWKBOX has revealed emails sent by private company Labour Future (LF) asking for funds and volunteers – and the unauthorised use by the company of the logos of Momentum, Progress and Keep our NHS Public – and, subject to confirmation, that of the Labour Party – on its website, as well as the risks to anyone submitting their details via the NationBuilder system that the company uses for its contact management.

Yesterday, the company provided a response of sorts to a series of questions posed by this blog. That response triggered a number of other questions submitted by SKWAWKBOX readers, which we put to LF for their response.

Those questions were:

1. How much has Labour Future as a company donated to the Labour Party?
2. Has Labour Future donated to any other parties or political organisations/causes?
3. If the answer to 2 is yes, which and how much?
4. Can you provide concrete examples of Labour Future supporting the Labour Party?

LF has sent its response to these additional questions, which will be of interest to our readers. Emphases added by the SKWAWKBOX to the sections that directly address the questions posed, including the sole donation the company has made since its formation in July 2016:

Labour Future is an independent campaigning organisation, fighting alongside allies across the Labour movement for the next Labour government. As such Labour Future has not donated money to the Labour Party directly. The organisation donated £500 to Stand Up For Labour ahead of the 2017 Labour Party Conference. It has not donated money to any other political party or organisation.

During the 2017 general election campaign, Labour Future used all funds raised to run a national digital campaign which supported the election of a Labour government. In particular, it promoted major campaign events across the country. The campaign reached 5.266 million people on Facebook in the 28 days prior to polling day. There were 1.9 million engagements with Labour Future posts.

Labour Future also heavily promoted Labour Party campaigns and canvassing events, created unique content and videos which were widely shared, and ran a efficient digital GOTV campaign, targeted at younger voters.

The details and costs of the contributions outlined above are not yet known. However, the fact that LF has not donated to the Labour Party will be of material interest to those who have considered donating in the past in the mistaken belief that LF is in some way affiliated with the party.

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