How much has corporate influence and quid pro quo governance infected the Australian political environment? Hot tip, more than you’d think. 🧵
#auspol #integritymatters
1/
Some background:
The current Commonwealth lobbying regime represents what the Auditor-General calls a "light-touch approach." Regulated parties and activities are unduly limited, and there is no transparency of lobbying activity.
2/
Our analysis reveals that many lobbyists are often lobbying on behalf of entities which donated significantly to their parties and campaigns while in office.
In 2022 the top 10 individual donors contributed $137.5 million to parties and independents, which equates to 76.9% of all donations given in the year.
Campaign spending for the 2022 Federal Election remained at record-high levels, reaching $439.4 million.
This is arguably the highest federal election spend on record, seeing as the 2018-19 financial year also included Victorian and NSW state elections.
2/
“Spending in the last federal election was at a record high. We cannot continue to allow elections to be effectively bought by the highest bidder.”
~ Melbourne Law School Professor and Centre Director Joo Cheong Tham.
3/
Last year we created donation profiles for each political party with data ranging from 1998/99-2019/2020. This thread has some key screenshots and links to each corresponding party.