Dissenting report—Australian Greens

1.1Public trust in parliament and politicians is at an all-time low, and the community feels less and less confident that their representatives represent them, rather than doing the bidding of their corporate donors.

1.2After trying for years in numerous iterations of private senators' bills to limit the influence of big money in politics, which both big parties failed to support, I thought this minimal option might be acceptable to the big political party duopoly.

1.3Hence I designed this bill to be the lowest common denominator, a bill to stop the same corporations who make political donations from putting their hands out for public money in the form of contracts, tenders, grants and approvals. I am incredulous but perhaps not shocked that the big parties via their representatives on this committee did not agree on the basic principle that decisions regarding the allocation of government resources should be guided by the public interest, rather than the influence and interests of donors.

1.4This bill has a simple objective: to ban donations to the political party in government, including to a coalition partner, for 12 months before and after any contract is sought to be entered into, or any grant tender submission or application for federal approval is made.

1.5This reform is needed because currently money is able to buy political access and political influence. Over the last 10 years the Big 4 consulting firms donated more than $4.3 million to both sides of politics and secured $8 billion in government contracts over that same time period. The obvious expectation from corporations is that donations will return results for their bottom line. This feeds the public perception that decisions in our parliament are made improperly, with self-interest and the interests of donors and mates consistently overriding the public interest.

1.6I disagree with the committee view that the bill's approach to preventing donations to a governing party is overreach. It is clear that our current system is one of legalised bribery. Money shouldn't be able to buy government contracts or development approvals. Yet it does time and again. Adani Australia Pty Ltd and its subsidiaries donated $250,000 to the Coalition in the same financial year as it received final environmental approval for its mega coal mine, including donating $100,000 of that sum in the month after that final approval was given.

1.7I agree with the evidence presented by Dr Catherine Williams and Dr Mark Zirnsak that this level of undue influence is dangerous for our democracy.[1] That's exactly why this bill is needed, to stop those with more money gaining unequal access to government. This bill would achieve that by strengthening the integrity of grants administration, tendering and procurement processes, and the environmental assessment of large projects.

1.8The 2022 election results confirmed that the Australian public want a more transparent and representative government that acts in the public interest.

1.9This bill is one small step towards getting big money out of politics and restoring public confidence in our democracy. This reform, among a suite of others, are sorely needed.

1.10That the Senate should pass the bill.

Senator Larissa Waters

Australian Greens

Footnotes

[1]Dr Catherine Williams, Executive Director, Centre for Public Integrity, Committee Hansard, 5February 2024, p. 18.