{
  "url": "https://openlegislation.uk/senedd-cymru-representation-of-the-people-order-2025/article-47",
  "json_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/senedd-cymru-representation-of-the-people-order-2025/article-47.json",
  "legislation": "wsi/2025/864",
  "legislation_title": "The Senedd Cymru (Representation of the People) Order 2025",
  "legislation_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/senedd-cymru-representation-of-the-people-order-2025",
  "path": "article/47",
  "kind": "article",
  "number": "47",
  "heading": "Individual candidates: prohibition of expenses not authorised by election agent etc.",
  "text": "(1) During the regulated period, the expenses referred to in paragraph (2) and which are incurred with a view to promoting or procuring an individual candidate’s election, may only be incurred by that candidate, their election agent and persons authorised in writing by that candidate or their election agent.\n(2) The expenses are those incurred in connection with—\n(a) holding public meetings or organising any public display,\n(b) issuing advertisements, circulars or publications, or\n(c) otherwise presenting to the electors the candidate or the candidate’s views or the extent or nature of the candidate’s backing or disparaging another individual candidate, or a registered political party or any or all of its party list candidates.\n(3) Paragraphs (1) and (2)(c) do not restrict the publication of any matter relating to the election in—\n(a) a newspaper or other periodical,\n(b) a broadcast made by the British Broadcasting Corporation or by Sianel Pedwar Cymru, or\n(c) a programme included in any service licensed under Part 1 or 3 of the Broadcasting Act 1990 or Part 1 or 2 of the Broadcasting Act 1996.\n(4) Paragraph (1) does not apply to any expenses incurred by any person—\n(a) which do not exceed the permitted sum, and which are not incurred by that person as part of a concerted plan of action, or\n(b) in travelling or living away from home, or similar personal expenses.\n(5) For the purposes of paragraph (4)(a)—\n(a) expenses will be regarded as incurred by a person “as part of a concerted plan of action” if they are incurred by that person in pursuance of any plan or other arrangement whereby that person and one or more other persons are to incur, with a view to promoting or procuring the election of the same candidate, expenses which, disregarding paragraph (4)(a), fall within paragraph (1), and\n(b) “the permitted sum” is £1000.\n(6) Where a person incurs any expenses in respect of an individual candidate which are required by this article to be authorised by the candidate or the election agent—\n(a) that person must, within 21 days after the day on which the result of the election is declared, deliver to the returning officer a return setting out—\n(i) the amount of the expenses;\n(ii) the constituency in respect of which the expenses were incurred;\n(iii) the individual candidate in whose support the expenses were incurred, and\n(b) the return must be accompanied by a declaration made by that person, or, in the case of an association or body of persons, by a director, general manager, secretary or other similar officer of the association or body, verifying the return and giving particulars of the matters for which the expenses were incurred.\n(7) Paragraph (6) does not apply to any person engaged or employed for payment or promise of payment by an individual candidate or an individual candidate’s election agent.\n(8) The return and declaration required by paragraph (6) must be in forms 25 and 26 set out in Welsh and English in Schedule 10, and the authority received from the candidate or the election agent must be annexed to and is deemed to be part of the return.\n(9) The returning officer must forward to the relevant registration officer every document submitted in pursuance of paragraph (6), and rule 70(1) of Schedule 5 (retention of documents) applies to any document sent to the relevant registration officer under this paragraph.\n(10) A person is guilty of a corrupt practice if that person—\n(a) incurs, or aids, abets, counsels or procures any other person to incur, any expenses in contravention of this article, or\n(b) knowingly makes the declaration required by paragraph (6) falsely.\n(11) If a person fails to deliver or send any declaration or return, or a copy of it as required by this article, that person is guilty of an illegal practice.\n(12) Where a court before whom a person is convicted under paragraph (10) or (11) thinks it just in the special circumstances of the case, they may mitigate or entirely remit any incapacity imposed by virtue of article 124.\n(13) An individual candidate will not be liable, nor will the candidate’s election be avoided, for a corrupt or illegal practice under paragraph (10) or (11) which is committed by an agent without the individual candidate’s consent or connivance.\n(14) Where any act or omission of an association or body of persons, corporate or unincorporate, is an offence declared to be a corrupt or illegal practice under paragraph (10) or (11), any person (“P”) who at the time of the act or omission was a director, general manager, secretary or other similar officer of the association or body, or was purporting to act in that capacity, is deemed to be guilty of that offence, unless P proves—\n(a) that the act or omission took place without P’s consent or connivance, and\n(b) that P exercised all such diligence to prevent the commission of the offence as P ought to have exercised, having regard to the nature of P’s functions in that capacity and to all the other circumstances.",
  "extent": "E+W",
  "status": null,
  "version": "current",
  "annotations": [
    {
      "type": "I",
      "label": "I1",
      "text": "Art. 47 in force at 18.7.2025, see art. 1(2)"
    },
    {
      "type": "footnote",
      "label": "f1",
      "text": "1990 c. 42."
    },
    {
      "type": "footnote",
      "label": "f2",
      "text": "1996 c. 55."
    }
  ],
  "outstanding_effects": [],
  "provenance": {
    "source": "legislation.gov.uk",
    "source_url": "https://www.legislation.gov.uk/wsi/2025/864/article/47",
    "retrieved_at": "2026-10-28T22:57:06.457930+00:00"
  },
  "licence": "Open Government Licence v3.0",
  "licence_url": "https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/",
  "attribution": "Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: legislation.gov.uk, The National Archives."
}