Sebastian Long

In March 2022, the Labor Party defeated the Liberal government in the South Australian election. Amongst the promises campaigned on by the victorious new Premier, the Hon Peter Malinauskas MP, was a commitment to ban political donations. It would be over two years before any such plan was announced, with the Attorney-General, the Hon Kyam Maher MLC, remarking in August 2022 that ‘[t]here are constitutional issues we need to look at when we do the drafting to make sure we overcome’. But on 12 June 2024, the Premier released a draft of the Electoral (Accountability and Integrity) Amendment Bill 2024 (Draft Bill or DB), with his government’s intention clear: ‘We want money out of politics’. At the time of writing, public consultation on the Bill has ended and we await its results.

Graeme Orr

It is 40 years since the Hawke government begat the regime that still essentially governs the funding of campaigns for Commonwealth elections.  That regime remains at rest on twin pillars. Public funding, for parties or candidates that attract above 4% of the vote, in return for some disclosure requirements – whose lack of timeliness is redolent of the paper-and-pen era in which they were hatched.  Whether in an absolute sense, or relative to our usual democratic comparators, the electoral funding and disclosure rules in the Commonwealth Electoral Act remain lax. This state of affairs may align with liberal philosophy in the abstract. But it is not merely passé in terms of developments in the field in the last 40 years; it is corrosive of faith in integrity and political equality in Australian elections.

With a Labor government ostensibly driven by social democratic norms, and an expansive cross-bench of Greens and independents committed in principle to more fairness in electoral participation, what are the prospects for renewal? To discuss this, we need to consider the main dishes on the regulatory menu: disclosure, donation caps, expenditure limits. Then, finally, to ask if reform is imminent after all these years.