In the latest edition of Your Say, Crikey readers pretty much all agree: political donations set politicians down the path to corruption.
On The Dirty Country and corruption
Don Latter writes: One way of tackling pork-barrelling would be participatory democracy such as practised in Brazil’s city of Porto Alegre. Citizens, chosen by drawing of lots, debate how the city should spend its money. About 15,000 people have taken part in this over the years, and the government has to have very strong reasons for not accepting their decisions.
Apparently this has resulted in huge improvements in education, health, water supply, transport and so on.
This model could be tried at a local level, and, as problems are ironed out, extended to city, state and ultimately federal government.
Apart from letting a lot of light in on how our money is used, it would be a big improvement on our weak form of democracy where rampant corruption, cronyism, revolving doors and sexual abuse are shrugged off and our only recourse is to wait for the next election to kick the bastards out.
Anyone who has been involved in any kind of local group will know what a vast reservoir of untapped expertise and ingenuity there is among the populace. Our democracy as it stands is unfit for purpose and many politicians running our lives are unfit for office. Drastic changes are needed and participatory democracy would be a huge step in the right direction.
Rick Duley writes: Should all political donations be banned? Good heavens no! I would merely set some limits:
- Donations should only to be made at electorate level
- Donors must be paid-up individual members of the party
- Donations should be limited to $20 a week.
I realise, of course, that this would not fund glossy, nationwide TV and print advertising orchestrated by faceless men in smoky rooms in Canberra. I also realise that this would restrict the focus of a political campaign to the candidate who would be forced to gather enough adherents in the electorate to run a campaign, and enough supporters to get voted in. And, of course, this would require the candidate to meet the electors, which would mean exposure to the wants, needs, dreams and hopes of the people eligible to vote. And I also realise, of course, that this would lead to a parliament made up of people who were faithfully representing their electorates.
I can live with that.
Glen Davis writes: Donations corrupt all public policy, from land zoning and development to environmental protection to even foreign policy. Corrupt donations are the cause of the secret trial of Bernard Collaery and Witness K.
There is only one solution: vote for no candidate of a party that accepts donations. If we have a parliament of independents, we will get corruption cleaned up, get freedom of information cleaned up, get the rule of law restored, get favoured oligopolies subjected to market competition and get donations banned.
Political donations in this country are more corrupt than mobster bag money. Both donors and recipients are tainted.
Tim Davis writes: Bernard Keane’s article “Money for influence” on the corruption brought about by political donations highlights the serious flaw in our democratic process.
When government policies are swayed by large donations to political parties, the interests of the community are undermined. In Victoria we have heard multiple reports on the influence of property developers on local councils. At the state level we learnt of Matthew Guy overriding Bass Coast Council’s objections to rezoning Ventnor farmland for housing in 2011 to the benefit of the wife of a property developer who was also a member of the Liberal Party and a family friend of former Liberal planning minister Rob Maclellan. This debacle cost the state millions of dollars in out-of-court settlements when it became public knowledge and Guy’s decision was reversed.
Look at the haphazard growth of suburbs without proper infrastructure planning and the huge loss of open green space around Melbourne that was designed to limit the urban sprawl that we now face … vested interests have too much influence on political decisions at the expense of the community.
The lack of action on climate change at the federal level, despite decades of overwhelming evidence that it is caused by fossil-fuel burning, is another example where vested interests purchase the outcomes they want by donations.
The Greens have been pushing for political donation law reform for many years for precisely the reasons outlined — that it smacks of bribery and leads to poor community outcomes. Sadly the so-called donation reforms in Victoria were designed to allow the Labor and Liberal parties to continue to receive donations laundered through their associated entities or companies with the specific aim of financially penalising the Greens, an outcome I am glad to say was not achieved.
Craig Silver writes: Two comments: political donations present a clear, textbook example of moral hazard, and the unions aren’t getting value for money.
Parliament House would have you believe :
“Members … take part in debate on proposed laws and public policy, representing the views of the people in their electorate.”
http://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Members
Hogwash.. Democracy is now a fiction in Australia, perverted by parties and their donors.
All members of the federal government and opposition are obliged to vote as directed and Party Whips exist to enforce conformity. It is utter fallacy that party members represent the views of their electorate.
How is the Party policy determined? By its donors through its backroom officials.
Morrison has had ample opportunity to ban party donations. As the greatest beneficiary of the corruption, he has a conflict of interest.
Parties are not to be trusted with this task, not its investigation, not its deliberation and not its decision. It must be put wholly in independent hands.
Vote parties out for a term to get reformation done.
“… representing the views of the people in their electorate.” is hogwash for another reason as well. Representative democracy is based on the concept of the electorate selecting a person to be their representative in parliament not to represent their views. The selected person presents their own views, as they might have expressed them prior to the election but not to somehow judge what the electorate’s views might be on any issue. Party control has meant that those individual’s views are straightjacketed into the party’s conformity. Not a trend that has produced better outcomes I am afraid.
April 24, 1986, SMH reporter Marian Theobald reported that “The Police Appeals Tribunal has relieved the Mayor of Waverley, Alderman John Morrison, of his position as chief inspector in the Waverley and Woollahra areas after an appeal by a senior police officer.
Apparently, as this is hearsay, Morrison Senior used to make MP Ernie Page, a previous mayor, mad by never telling him the time of meetings. Morrison JR is doing the same thing to the media with his weekly briefings.
John Morrison appears to have been an ambitious man, willing to twist situations to his own advantage and with questionable racist attitudes. At least that is the impression I have of him from what I have been able to read on the internet. I stand to be corrected.
https://archiearchive.wordpress.com/2013/12/19/the-public-life-of-scott-morrison/
The rot set in from conception.
Donations to parties could be a little cleaner with a better system. First, donations directly to a party or politician need to be illegal and the prohibition enforced. Then an Electoral Donations Commission should be established through which donors can donate to the party or candidate of their choice. The donation, less a charge for administration, would be forwarded anonymously, in several parts to maintain anonymity, to the party or candidate specified. An agreed percentage could be set aside to aid the campaigns of independent candidates. Of course a donor could still claim to have supported the specified candidate but there would be no proof and thus perhaps less leverage.
Zero bribes, please.
Thank you. Bribes they are.
Political donations are not a flaw in our system, they are the CORRUPTION in our system. They are the way the corrupt do business.
Currently we don’t vote for a local member, we vote to support party policies and ideologies, while the member is shielded from direct local accountability, “copping out” from behind the Chinese Wall of the Party room while the Party propagandists and spin doctors confuse us with (at best) half truths and (at worst) outright lies, all financed by their corporate masters. We need to support good independent candidates who’ve had their hands dirtied by proper work, instead of apparatchiks climbing the Party ladders from within, totally out of touch with ordinary working people. It’s long past time for such a change.