Toti investigation, here is how much political parties earn from funding

'Let's reintroduce public financing for parties,' said the deputy Lega Nord minister Edoardo Rixi commenting on the judicial investigation that has swept through Liguria's political system, bringing the governor Giovanni Toti under house arrest on corruption charges. A joke? No, because after what is happening in Genoa, the voice of those who are calling for a review of a system introduced in 2013 that has progressively wiped out state support for the party system, forcing them to look elsewhere for their sources of sustenance. That is, among private individuals. But, was Rixi's reasoning, 'if speeding up a necessary measure can become a criminal offence just because I once crossed the entrepreneur, then let's get rid of the funding dinners and that bad law'.

Under the lens of the public prosecutor's office of Genoa are precisely the funds received by Toti from builders, maritime entrepreneurs and oil companies that accompanied and favoured the rise of Silvio Berlusconi's former dauphin. Donations on which, as early as 2020, the Genoa Public Prosecutor's Office began investigating with the hypothesis of illicit financing to political parties, prompted by suspicious transactions reported by the Bank of Italy's Anti-Money Laundering Office.

Through donations from individuals and companies, Toti's committees have raised funds of around two million. In the 2022 accounts (last published on the site and approved on 28 March 2023) of the Giovanni Toti-Liguria Committee, the cash contributions collected amounted to 466,532 euro (352,050 from companies and 114,482 from individuals). The previous year it was 159,500. In 2020 599,000.

In the fundraising from the private sector it is the League that does best among the parties. In 2023, according to the Sole 24 Ore's elaborations of the declarations that political forces must publish on their websites, the Carroccio collected EUR 1.1 million from companies. The liberal donations that have flowed into the coffers of the party led by Matteo Salvini, including those secured by elected members (deputies, senators and councillors), total 8.83 million. This figure is decidedly higher than that of the centre-right ally Fratelli d'Italia (5.09) and Forza Italia (2.42 million): voluntary contributions for the Azzurri came to 2.424 million (-18.5%) in 2023, the year of Silvio Berlusconi's death. Just under a third came from the founder's family: one hundred thousand euros (the maximum sum allowed by law) from each of his five children, his younger brother Paolo and Finivest.

In the opposition, the Democratic Party collected EUR 5.7 million from donations from individuals and elected representatives. But the party of the secretary Elly Schlein is the one that can boast the highest amount coming from taxpayers who have destined two per thousand of their income tax, a form of indirect public financing provided for by the 2013 law: 8.11 million euros, almost twice as much as the second in this ranking, namely Fratelli d'Italia (5.09 million).