The watchdog has notified the police of a possible electoral offence after 307 payments totalling £184,676 were found to be missing from the Liberal Democrats’ spending return “without a reasonable excuse”.

In addition, invoices supporting 122 out of the 307 payments were
missing from the return. It found the declaration to the Electoral Commission may have been signed recklessly, as there was evidence indicating some people in the party knew it was incorrect. …

… It comes after Labour was hit with a £20,000 fine in October for similar missing election expenses, including more than £7,000 on the “Ed Stone”.

It found two payments totalling £7,614 missing from the party’s
election return that were spent on the stone tablet on which the then
Labour leader, Ed Miliband, had carved his six key election pledges, promising to display it in the Downing Street rose garden if he won the election. …

… Conservative spending at the election remains under intense scrutiny after a Channel 4 investigation alleged some local spending was allocated to the national account to avoid tight limits for each constituency. About nine police forces have been investigating the accusations of higher-than-permitted spending in a number of marginal seats, which could have helped the Tories gain a majority at the election.”