The BBC reports today:
Labour’s chief fundraiser Lord Levy has been re-arrested by police looking into cash-for-honours allegations.
He was questioned on suspicion of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice and later bailed.
The cash-for-honors probe and scandal seem to be intensifying. The suspicion that Lord Levy tried to obstruct the investigation has lead some to compare [...]

Earlier this month reduced contribution limits for individuals took effect in Canada, and contributions from corporations and trade unions have been banned. Elections Canada has a summary of the provisions of the new Federal Accountability Act:
Amendments to the Canada Elections Act that came into effect on January 1, 2007

New, lower limits on the annual contributions [...]

Just this week I was looking into the campaign finance regulations in Malta, so the editorial that appeared in the Times of Malta on Thursday was timely. The editorial argues that disclosure of party finance and public financing are in order, especially following legislative action this week that looks like construction magnates and other suppliers [...]

With the news from Bangladesh lately, including the collapse of the caretaker government put in place to oversee an election, one hopes only that a peaceful election will occur sometime in the near future. A local institute and the World Bank recommend campaign finance reform as well. The New Nation writes:
The World Bank has prescribed some specific mechanisms for an [...]

The continuing cash-for-honors investigation this week saw the questioning of the Scottish Prime Minister, John McConnell. Though the BBC coverage mentions nothing of the “cash” involved, the timing of Loyd Boyd’s peerage – who PM McConnell was questioned about – seems suspicious.
Officers quizzed him about his nomination of Colin Boyd, the then Lord Advocate, for a [...]

From the Washington Post:
The public financing system designed to clean up presidential campaigns in the wake of the Watergate scandal may have died on Saturday when Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) announced her bid for the White House.
Little noticed amid the announcement rollout was a page on her Web site in which she asked potential [...]

All Africa reprinted an article from The Nation (Nairobi) yesterday that describes campaign finance law and practice in Ghana in some details and describes the campaign finance initiative of the National Democratic Institute, whose site has reports and recommendations on campaign finance in Ghana, Kenya, Senegal, and South Africa.

ABS-CBN news reports that the House will consider a delayed campaign finance bill starting monday and that it considers the bill a priority. If it were to pass soon, it would regulate the midterm elections in May.
The bill bans and penalizes turncoatism or the practice of changing political parties, and proposes the creation of a P500-million [...]

I have not found a copy of the text, but the TSE (Tribunal Supremo Electoral) has introduced a new campaign finance law for campaigns and elections in Guatemala. A draft version of the new regulations included: endowing the inspector general of the TSE to establish if electoral propoganda follows the law and to allow the inspector [...]

A new law, Ley 26.215 “Political Party Finance Law,” went into effect on Wednesday in Argentina, modifying the 2002 campaign finance reform that introduced spending limits and the disclosure of campaign spending. The new law raises the spending limit to 1.5 pesos per registered voter (from 1 peso).
According to Agencia Nova, the law also raises the budget [...]

A report released by the Committee on Standards in Public Life (and a concurring editorial in the Times) criticizes the Electoral Commission for “lacking the leadership, knowledge and courage to enforce its regulatory duties in relation to political party funding and campaign expenditure.” If they were more pro-active, the editorial goes, the cash-for-peerages and postal [...]

To little surprise, the Supreme Court of the US has announced it will hear two cases on the Wisconsin Right to Life campaign ads under expedited review. The fundamental issue they will consider is whether election advertisements during campaign periods (even if financed by corporate or union contributions) are constitutionally regulatable if they do not [...]

An aide of Tony Blair was arrested and subsequently released after answering questions about the cash-for-peerages scandal. No details about what was learned or why she was arrested were released. Full coverage at the BBC.
The story does mention, however, that the Lord Chancellor has said he will not necessarily stand aside if any prosecutions are [...]

Following revelations that the Thüringer wing of the extreme right NPD manipulated their financial records in 1998-99, direct state subsidies of 277,000 Euro have been cut off (since November) and the party has been ordered to return another 870,000 Euro, a signficant financial financial blow to the party, according to news reports. The party is challenging [...]

Brazilian political parties today must submit to the electoral authority their date-requests for free media time for the upcoming year. Following a resolution reducing their amount of free media time, major parties will now get 20 minutes of free national tv time for the year, allocated in spots of 30 seconds to a minute for [...]

In 2003, Chile introduced a campaign finance reform that introduced for the first time disclosure of candidates’ campaign income and expenditure, expenditure and donation limits, and direct public financing of parties and candidates. The most interesting feature of the reform were the confidential donations (aportes reservados), one of three categories of permissible sources of income to competitors [...]

Yes, the US Senate still files campaign finance statements the old-fashioned way, on paper. Suzanne Gamboa of the AP writes:
Although senators stay in touch with staff through hand-held Blackberrys and many of their hearings are broadcast on the Internet, they still turn in stacks of paper when it’s time to tell the public who is contributing [...]

Reports from India detail that a few “dummy” parties – parties that are registered as such but have not competed in the elections – have been using their electoral income to buy stock, jewelry, and other things. It seems that the problem is that because these parties have not really served as political parties, their [...]

How do you go about raising the requisite millions (or hundreds of millions) of dollars to run a serious presidential campaign when you can only raise $2100 a year per individual?
You might enlist a large team of fundraisers to do it for you, give them state-of-the-art software that allows them access to all kinds of [...]

By most accounts Zimbabwe is not a democracy (e.g. Freedom House gave them the lowest and second lowest ranks on political and civil freedoms, respectively), but they hold elections, and apparently still have party finance regulations, including prohibitions on foreign donations and public subsidies, according to an interesting editorial appeared in the state-run Zimbabwe Herald [...]