The Representation of the People Bill sits at its 9th Commons committee sitting on 16 April with no future stage scheduled, according to the Parallel Parliament tracker 1. The Hansard Society confirms Parliament is expected to prorogue no earlier than 29 April and no later than 6 May, with the Leader of the House signalling the earlier date 2. The four wash-up bills the government is pushing through are the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill, the Pensions Schemes Bill, the Crime and Policing Bill, and the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill. Those four together exclude the Representation of the People Bill from the polling-day statute book.
The wash-up convention is bilateral: government picks the bills it judges essential, and the official opposition agrees not to oppose them in exchange for amendments. A bill the opposition wants but the government has deprioritised falls because the government holds the order paper. After committee, the bill still needs Commons report stage, third reading, four Lords stages and any ping-pong before Royal Assent. None of that is scheduled.
Royal Assent before polling day was already arithmetically impossible . The prorogation timeline now confirms a sharper outcome: the bill may fall entirely and require reintroduction in the new session. Under its terms, parties would have 30 days from Royal Assent to return unlawful crypto receipts, alongside a £100,000 cap on overseas elector donations and the shell-company restrictions identified by the Rycroft Review . None of those provisions takes effect for 7 May.
Which means Reform UK enters polling day having received roughly £12m from Christopher Harborne in two quarters, having processed crypto donations through the Poland-based processor Radom Pay, and having no statutory obligation to return any of it. The Electoral Commission still cannot verify those donations because Reform has not provided wallet addresses . Spotlight on Corruption's 1 April report named three further enforcement gaps that survive the bill's passage or failure: crypto-to-fiat conversion before donation, direct personal contributions to MPs, and political memecoins. Those gaps now extend into the next Parliament.
