Big parties should scrap electoral funding scam

Kerryn Smith
May 31, 2013
Issue 
968
News

The deal between Labor and the Liberal-Nationals to add another $2 million to their election campaign funds — at the people's expense — before the September election was an extension of a “deeply undemocratic major party scam to further entrench their parliamentary domination”, said Peter Boyle, Socialist Alliance candidate for Sydney.

“This comes on top of the $45 million in electoral funding these three parties received, between them, for the 2010 election,” said Boyle.

"And it follows the doubling of candidate deposits for the House of Representatives and the Senate — a move that makes it harder for smaller and newer parties as well as for independents," said Boyle, a national co-convener of the Socialist Alliance.

“Electoral funding has been used by the big parties mainly to pay for deceptive and manipulative TV advertising campaigns, which systematically misinformed the public.

“The current electoral system should be scrapped and replaced by a new system under which the Australian Electoral Commission is given the duty to distribute and publicise the policies and profiles of all candidates.”

The major parties are already entrenched by the single-member electorates for the House of Representatives, Boyle said, and this was why the Socialist Alliance supported proportional representation for both houses of Parliament.

Elections
Democracy

Comments

John Robertson replied on

Donations to political parties are bribes. The Money Solution tax can collect all the money needed to operate Parliament. With no bribery we will gain better candidates. Under existing law Editors are lining up to go to jail. All Editors who have published images of Kevin Rudd as a bumbling Nazi have breached Australia's Electoral Act. You can read the words. The 'relevant period' commenced early in August and ends when the last vote is cast on September 7th 2013. For more information Google for Murdoch war Malaysia Sun. The Murdoch editors are obviously caught. What about law abiding editors who broke the stories and reported on the stories of others - by showing the offending images? The image is aimed at the voters who like Page 3 and Sport; the covering words are immaterial. The escape is at (5) (1) but even Rudd's most supportive editor may not be able to explain why their image is not defamatory of Rudd. I suggest they immediately publish their defense with words on a front page - using a miniature image in their explanation. You can also see that this upgraded 1918 law also applies to radio, TV, internet and telephone John Robertson

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