Page 2437 - Week 06 - Thursday, 10 May 2012
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speech, as it would arguably be a significant restriction on that free speech.
In addition, the amendments will provide a powerful incentive for a third-party campaigner wishing to spend more than $30,000 to simply put forward one or more candidates for the purpose of becoming entitled to a higher spending cap. Avoiding this arguably artificial inflation of the number of candidates on the ballot papers is one of the reasons that the government chose to apply an across-the-board level of $60,000 per candidate.
Question put:
That Mrs Dunne’s amendments be agreed to.
The Assembly voted—
|
Ayes 4 |
Noes 9 | ||
|
Mr Coe |
Mr Smyth |
Mr Barr |
Ms Hunter |
|
Mr Doszpot |
Dr Bourke |
Ms Le Couteur | |
|
Mrs Dunne |
Ms Bresnan |
Ms Porter | |
|
Ms Burch |
Mr Rattenbury | ||
|
Mr Corbell | |||
Question so resolved in the negative.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for Police and Emergency Services and Minister for the Environment and Sustainable Development) (9.02): Madam Deputy Speaker, after consultation with other members, given that the approaching amendment is extremely complex and it needs a little bit more finessing before we proceed to debate, can I invite you, with the agreement of colleagues, to suspend the sitting for 10 minutes to allow some final work to occur.
Sitting suspended from 9.03 to 9.25 pm.
MS HUNTER (Ginninderra—Parliamentary Leader, ACT Greens) (9.24): I move amendment No 2 circulated in my name [see schedule 9 at page 2478].
The Greens agree with the starting principle that economies of scale do exist in election campaigns and that parties are at an advantage when they pool resources available to multiple candidates. When it comes to the practical nature of some aspects of running an election campaign such as purchasing advertising or printing of communication material, you really do get much better value for money the more you are able to spend. Your electoral impact exponentially grows as your budget grows.
The Greens also believe in providing a more level playing field to the extent where the independent candidates do have a realistic chance of competing with the other parties. For this reason it does make sense that independent candidates are able to have a larger expenditure cap than the parties. The Greens propose a $60,000 cap on candidates from a party and a $90,000 expenditure cap for independents.
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