Page 5348 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 16 November 2011
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Accordingly, the bill provides separate limits on political gifts. I might point out here that gifts to candidates from family or friends in their private capacity are by no means caught by this provision.
Where a party, an MLA or a candidate receives a gift exceeding $7,000 in a single financial year, the receiver commits an offence. I should reinforce that: where a party or a candidate receives a gift from a single source exceeding $7,000 in a single financial year, the receiver commits an offence. In addition, direct gifts, which would otherwise be an obvious way around the provisions, are prohibited.
It is also worth noting that there are penalties in this part of the legislation as well but the penalties apply to the receiver of gifts—that is, political parties and their candidates—and not to the giver of gifts. We take the view that it may be possible that a person off the street who wants to donate does not know the provisions of the law, but it is incumbent upon us in the political process to know the provisions of the law. So any penalties go to the receiver of the gift, not the giver of the gift.
Public funding will now be tied to the levels provided in Senate elections, discounted to take account of lower costs in the ACT. Further, a new division makes provision for administrative expenditure, subject to acquittal and audit, for expenses incurred by parliamentary parties and non-party MLAs, to a limit of $20,000 per MLA per year.
Disclosure provisions have been strengthened in this bill. Annual electoral returns as such have provided accountability, but often too late to provide information which is useful to the electorate, particularly in relation to election periods. Accordingly, large gifts must, under this bill, be disclosed to the Electoral Commissioner within 30 days, or seven days during the election period, rather than waiting until many weeks after the election, as is now the case. This provision applies whether the gift was received as a single sum or over several smaller amounts over the course of the financial year. The commissioner is required to publish this information as soon as possible.
Anonymous gifts are a major problem for attempts to create an accountable system. The nature of political fundraising does have implications here and it is not practical to abolish all anonymous gifts without completely reinventing the political process. However, there is clearly scope to use them to avoid accountability altogether. Accordingly, in line with the recommendations of the JACS committee, a limit of $25,000 per MLA or political party has been set for the total amount received in small anonymous gifts.
With this tighter regime, the present requirement for returns by donors is unduly onerous. The requirement entails collecting the necessary information from two sources, which is inefficient and unnecessary. The Electoral Commissioner has dwelt on this on a number of occasions. Of the two potential sources, it is clear that political parties are, or should be, set up to account for donations, and can do so much more efficiently than their donors. Further, there is the opportunity to compare income and expenditure records for political parties. Accordingly, the requirement for donors to provide returns has been removed in this bill.
The penalty provisions that I have touched on in this bill are, I believe, in proportion to the seriousness of offences involving, as they do, attempts to subvert the political
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