Parliamentary Updates

18 November 2024

I call the member for Warringah. I second member for Curtin's motion and strongly agree to the core that these two bills must go to inquiry and be properly examined. The hubris and hypocrisy from the government today in justifying their actions is breathtaking and bring forward this legislation. I call on every member of the government side and the opposition to think carefully about what you are doing if you put your name to this legislation. At a time of cost-of-living pressures, these two major parties have cooked up a new deal, on new political donation laws designed to keep them in power and they want the public to pay for it. The hubris is staggering. We need to reform our broken system of political donation. No one disagrees with that. It is wrong if the billionaire can spend $132 million on trying to get his candidate selected and that there are no limits on corporate donations, especially when companies actually have government contracts and that it takes months for donations to political parties to be disclosed, and when they are, they are not broken down in a seat-by-seat ways. But what we do want to see a scrutiny of the major piece of reform. This piece of legislation has taken a huge amount of time to bring it here and the government is proposing to table it today, force of debate this week and then have us vote on it by the end of the week. That is just the hide of just insult to the Australian people is the best way we can put it. No-one wants Australia to drift towards a US system where political campaigns have become multibillion-dollar exercises, forcing candidates into an unholy dance with big donors to raise the cash they need. We also don't want end to up like the US with only two poor choices that don't end up delivering good policy for the future. The bill introduced today, and I have the member for Perth has given the dud job of the government to have to table this bill and put your name to it, I've got to say, and it is said to have the coalition's support. I will be interested to see every coalition member maybe exercise their free vote and think carefully of their integrity if they are generally going to support this bill. It is highly beneficial to major parties and it smacks of a dirty deal designed to cement their duopoly. Independents and minor party representatives now make up 12 per cent of the House, 27 per cent of the Senate. Yet we have not been consulted on this legislation for months. I first saw a copy of this and was briefed 12.30 yesterday, less than 24 hours ago. Independents, this bill will have such a long consequence to our Australian democracy and yet there is no scrutiny being allowed on this bill. We're being presented with this 215 page bill making significant reform to our electoral process with less than 24 hours and now a proposal that the Labor and the coalition intend to rush it through the House this week without proper inquiry, despite the fact it's not intended to come into effect until 2028. The question is send it off for inquiry, get a report in the new year, unless the intention is we're not going to come back in the new year - so maybe the government can come clean to the Australian people on that. There appears to be a flagrant double standard. Whilst the donation reform will be pushed through with no scrutiny this week, the truth in political advertising is intended to languish. The government has no intention to push that one for debate and to a vote because it wouldn't want to be stopped from lying when it comes to its advertising. So not only do the Australian people are being asked to pay more to political parties, but they actually will also have to pay for the privilege of being lied to as well because there's a constant delay in introducing voter protections. The last time the two major parties got together to agree on an integrity measure was the national anticorruption commission. Look how well it turned out. A body that's not held a single public hearing, failed to deal with some of our biggest sector scandals, like Robodebt, and has adverse findings about its handling of internal conflicts of interest. Worse still, the government is proposing to reach into public coffers now when it comes to donations, to top up the shortfalls major parties will experience as a result of their new fundraising constraints. At a time when cost of living pressures are daily worry for households, they're proposing to give themselves an extra boost to funding. Under the government's proposal, public funding per vote will rise from $3.50 to $5 at a cost that is north of $100 million. They can't find the money to top up payments for people on JobSeeker, or to deal with the rental crisis but apparently, we can afford additional largess to the political class. The hypocrisy is staggering. Asking taxpayers to pay more to fund the major parties while making it harder for new entrants to participate, has the unmistakable feel of rigging the market. The bill proposes restrictions on the size of donations and the total amount that can be given by individuals, but it is a proposed spending caps which in my view are deliberately designed to put a foot on the scales in favour of our major parties. The government has made it sound like the problem is from the billionaires that fund candidates, but the real problem comes from within the parties, with 23 per cent of the major party's donation receipts to the Australian Electoral Commission shows as a non-declared source. The accounts to around $290 million over the past five years going to the major party coffers with no public record of where it came from. Under this proposed bill, major parties will now be able to spend up to $90 million dollars nationally. While a person, that chooses to stand as an Independent will be restricted to spending $800,000 in a particular seat. But sure, the major party MP or candidate will also be subject to that candidate cap in a particular seat. But at the same time, the major party can run a parallel Senate ticket campaign and its political party advertising. It's clear that $90 million cap will not be spent evenly across candidates by the parties and can be put disproportionately in marginal seats to fend off a challenger. The major parties will run national television brand campaigns to reach everyone's living rooms, they can run a centralised campaign office, as well as databases, infrastructure. Whereas an independent taking on a major party must set it up from scratch. And to add insult to injury, the proposal in this bill is that an incumbent party or MP will have access to a $30,000 a year admin cost and a linear increase for the parties but a challenger has nothing. The challenger has the thanks for coming, you can bear the cost, but major party MP gets the public purse to pay for it. It is such a gross imbalance and will be such a weakening of our democracy. It is not a strengthening because the contest to enter into parliament will be less fair. Duopolies stifle competition just like with Coles and Woolworths. If the major parties make it too difficult for new players to enter, Australians will end up with fewer choices and poor policy outcomes. Independents bring smart solutions and positive impacts. That is the difference and that is why the Australian public are turning away from major parties. They see through this. They see through it. Whilst the government delivered this on a Friday afternoon like putting out the trash, no different to the Morrison government when it comes to that tactic, the Australian people will see through this. So what the big call will be in the 2025 election, we need to get as many independents into this parliament as possible because this piece of legislation is stifling competition. It is there to make sure that we, political parties are just here for power, not for actual smart solutions and real legislation. We need to deal with lies in political advertising. The government has put forward its misinformation and disinformation bill and that's been contentious and is concerning many. It's a necessary guardrail but there's concerns. It would be the height of hypocrisy if then the government does not proceed with pushing for the truth in political advertising bill to be debated and voted on with urgency. The public can have one standard, but political class has a different one. It is outrageous. I very strongly support the motion for Curtin's motion this bill should be sent to inquiry. Both Bills should be treated equally. The Australian public deserves a robust democracy. The opportunity to participate fairly. We need a fair and equal playing field. And this bill is just trying to lock in a monopoly by the major parties.