Access and Influence in Australian Politics

Who’s in the room? Access and influence in Australian politics Grattan Institute Support Grattan Institute Report No. 2018-12, September 2018 Founding members Endowment Supporters This report was written by Danielle Wood, Kate Griffiths and Carmela The Myer Foundation Chivers. Grattan interns Tim Asimakis, Matthew Bowes, Isabelle National Australia Bank Hughes and Anne Yang provided research assistance and made Susan McKinnon Foundation substantial contributions to the report. We would like to thank the members of Grattan Institute’s Public Policy Affiliate Partners Committee for their helpful comments. We also thank AJ Brown, Ken Medibank Private Coghill, Belinda Edwards, Darren Halpin, Serena Lillywhite, Cameron Susan McKinnon Foundation Murray, Joo-Cheong Tham and Anne Twomey for their suggestions, and staff of the Australian Electoral Commission, NSW Electoral Commission, NSW ICAC and other government and industry bodies for Senior Affiliates their technical input. Google Maddocks The opinions in this report are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of Grattan Institute’s founding PwC members, affiliates, individual board members, committee members or McKinsey & Company reviewers. Any errors or omissions are the responsibility of the authors. The Scanlon Foundation Grattan Institute is an independent think-tank focused on Australian Wesfarmers public policy. Our work is independent, practical and rigorous. We aim Westpac to improve policy outcomes by engaging with both decision-makers and the community. Affiliates For further information on the Institute’s programs, or to join our mailing Ashurst list, please go to: http://www.grattan.edu.au/. Corrs This report may be cited as: Wood, D., Griffiths, K., and Chivers, C. (2018). Who’s in GE ANZ the room? Access and influence in Australian politics. Grattan Institute. Jemena ISBN: 978-0-6483311-3-1 Urbis All material published or otherwise created by Grattan Institute is licensed under a Woodside Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License Grattan Institute 2018 2 Who’s in the room? Access and influence in Australian politics Overview Australians are rightly concerned about the role of special interests in then policy makers will usually follow. Major advertising campaigns are politics. Even a healthy democracy like Australia’s can be vulnerable the preserve of well-resourced groups: unions, industry peak bodies to policy capture. Well-resourced interests – such as big business, and GetUp! were major spenders in the past decade. Some groups unions and not-for-profits – use money, resources and relationships to commission consultants or think tanks to lend credibility to their case. influence policy to serve their interests, at times at the expense of the The media often publish their findings uncritically or fail to ask: ‘who public interest. Even if they are only sometimes successful, it’s not the paid for this research?’ ‘fair go’ Australians expect. Who’s in the room – and who’s in the news – matters for policy Access to decision makers is vital for anyone seeking to influence outcomes. Powerful groups have triumphed over the public interest in policy. But some groups get more access than others. Businesses with some recent debates, from pokies reforms to pharmaceutical prices, to the most at stake in government decisions lobby harder and get more toll roads and superannuation governance. meetings with senior ministers. Some industries – such as gambling and property construction – are hugely over-represented compared to This report shows how to strengthen checks and balances on policy their contribution to the economy. influence. Publishing ministerial diaries and lists of lobbyists with passes to Parliament House could encourage politicians to seek more Money and relationships can boost access: time with ministers and diverse input. More timely and comprehensive data would improve their shadows is explicitly ‘for sale’ at fundraising dinners, and major visibility of the major donors to political parties. Accountability should donors are more likely to get a meeting with a senior minister. And be strengthened through clear standards for MPs’ conduct, enforced by more than one-quarter of politicians go on to post-politics jobs for an independent body. A cap on political advertising expenditure would special interests, where their relationships can help open doors. reduce the donations ‘arms race’ between parties and their reliance The major political parties rely on a handful of big donors: just 5 per on major donors. These reforms won’t cure every ill, but they are likely cent of donors contributed more than half of the big parties’ declared to help. They would improve the incentives to act in the public interest donations at the last election. Donations build relationships and a and have done no obvious harm in jurisdictions where they have been sense of reciprocity. And the fact that industries in the cross-hairs of implemented. policy debate sometimes donate generously and then withdraw once Australians want to drain the billabong: they don’t like the current the debate has moved on suggests they believe, perhaps rightly, that system and they don’t trust it. This report proposes some simple money matters. changes that would improve the quality of policy debate and boost the Special interests also seek influence through the public debate. The public’s confidence that policy is being made for all Australians – not idea is simple: if you can capture the ‘hearts and minds’ of the public just those in the room. Grattan Institute 2018 3 Who’s in the room? Access and influence in Australian politics Recommendations Australian political institutions are generally robust, but there is room for • Independently administer codes of conduct, to build public improvement. This report proposes eight key reforms. confidence that people are complying with them. Appoint a separate ethics adviser to encourage current and former politicians Improve transparency in policy making to seek advice when they are in doubt. • Publish ministerial diaries to enable public scrutiny of who • ministers are meeting – and not meeting – and encourage them Establish a federal integrity or anti-corruption body to investigate to seek out a wider range of views. potential misconduct or corruption, publish findings, and refer any corrupt activity to the Commonwealth Director of Public • Link the lobbyists register to ‘orange passes’ to identify Prosecutions. commercial and in-house lobbyists with privileged behind-the- scenes access to Parliament House, and ensure they comply with Level the playing field the lobbying code of conduct. • Cap political advertising expenditure by political parties and • Improve the visibility of political donations by lowering the third parties during election campaigns to reduce the imbalance donations disclosure threshold to $5,000, requiring political parties between groups with different means to broadcast political views, to aggregate multiple donations from the same donor and requiring and limit the reliance of major political parties on individual donors. more timely release of donations data. • Strengthen accountability of policy makers Boost countervailing voices through more inclusive policy review processes and advocacy for under-represented groups to give • Clarify conflicts of interest for all parliamentarians – particularly politicians and public officials better information with which to around hospitality, gifts and secondary employment – and set adjudicate the public interest. a standard for the public, media and parliament to hold elected officials to. These recommendations are detailed in Chapter 5. Grattan Institute 2018 4 Who’s in the room? Access and influence in Australian politics Table of contents Overview . 3 Recommendations . 4 1 Australia is vulnerable to policy capture . 6 2 The access problem in Australian politics . 16 3 The money problem in Australian politics . 31 4 Winning hearts and minds . 47 5 Proposals for reform . 56 A Case studies of special interest influence . 69 B Associated entities . 75 Grattan Institute 2018 5 Who’s in the room? Access and influence in Australian politics 1 Australia is vulnerable to policy capture This report examines the influence of special interests on policy making some cases they are getting weaker. That’s why many democracies in Australia. It demonstrates how individuals and organisations with have direct checks on the influence of special interest groups – the most to gain or lose from policy changes push their agenda. And particularly around political donations and access. it highlights the cost to other Australians when the voices of special interest groups are given too much weight in policy debates. 1.1.1 The policy-making process has a number of checks This chapter shows why – even in a healthy democracy like Australia’s against undue influence – special interests can sometimes successfully hijack the policy-making Policy making is rarely linear or neat – politicians and other decision- process. Indeed, many of the ‘risk factors’ for policy capture – financial makers draw information, analysis and views from a range of sources: dependence, cosy relationships and lack of transparency in dealings between special interests and parliamentarians – are present in our • Individuals represent their interests by writing to or talking with system. a local member or minister, signing a petition, joining a protest, expressing a view in the media, or donating to or volunteering for a

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