Finally! The mainstream meeja looks at an
issue Crikey’s been tracking for a while: “The Greens have demanded more
accountability and transparency from political parties in elections, but this
has not stopped some in their own party using complex and opaque methods to
channel campaign funds,” Louise Dodson writes in The Sydney Morning Herald
today.

The Herald has learnt the Queensland Greens
have had debts of $174,000 forgiven by an incorporated associated entity, the
Queensland Environmental Consumers Organisation. Documents lodged with the
Australian Electoral Office list debts forgiven to the Greens in 1998-99,
2001-02 and 2003-04. The group does not appear on any company register and has
no website.

Mr Richard Nielsen, whose name appears as
the financial controller of the group, said forgiving the debt was a ‘way by
which the effort of individuals could be recognised and billed to the
Australian Electoral Commission.’ Because the money was forgiven debt, it
attracted no tax, he said.

‘The organisation was a group of
individuals who were mostly Greens who worked on the party’s election
campaigns,’ he said.

‘There was always a bit of a risk of a
falling-out between the individuals, and then the Greens would have to pay the
election bills incurred,’ Mr Nielsen said.

The unsuccessful Greens Senate candidate
in the 2004 election, Drew Hutton, said the Queensland Environmental Consumers
Organisation was not used to hide donors but he was ‘not sure why it had a
different name’ from the Queensland Greens.

Minutes of a Queensland Greens meeting on
August 8, 2002, showed Mr Hutton moved that ‘we approve the donations be made
to the Rainforest Information Centre who will re-route the money to the
Queensland Greens’. A leaked email four days later from Mr Nielsen cautioned
against this being recorded in the minutes and they were removed.

The volumes of leaked material flowing from
various factions of the green movement in Queensland earlier
this year would have left anyone swamped. There’s plenty of bad blood there,
with accusations and counter accusations flying. The Herald quotes Greens leader Bob Brown
as telling a parliamentary committee hearing earlier this month “no donation
was laundered through the Rainforest Information Centre.”

Greens sometimes get precious about what
they call the “bought parties.” The internal politics of the Queensland Greens
suggest, though, that mud goes with rainforests.

The full Herald yarn is here.