Page 2675 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 6 June 2012
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
Unfortunately, in the wash-up of all the respective amendments and Assembly support for only part of amendments, we are left with an act that does not quite cover off everything that it needs to. At the moment new section 205I(4) in the amendment act says:
Also, a receiver other than a third-party campaigner must not accept a gift from a person who is not an individual enrolled to vote in the ACT unless the gift is paid into the federal election account.
This provision was supposed to be the second part of an amendment in which the first section set out the details of the federal election account and gave some context for that section to operate in. As the first part of the amendment was not supported by the Assembly, we now have a clause where, although it can probably be implemented, it would certainly be desirable to clarify exactly what it means and how it works. Further, the enforcement provisions for this section are also unclear, and the bill proposes to establish a clear scheme around the prohibition to ensure that there can be no doubt about what is and is not permissible and what action the Electoral Commissioner can take should a breach occur.
The bill provides a revised obligation of depositing the donation in an account kept only for federal election campaigns and a definition of exactly what such an account can be used for. This amendment ensures that not only is it clear exactly what the obligations are but also that the section is not inconsistent with the commonwealth electoral law and that it is within the legislative capacity of the Assembly.
The new sections are modelled on the New South Wales Election Funding, Expenditure and Disclosures Act 1981 and impose the same penalties and enforcement processes as were created by the Assembly in the amendment act passed last sitting in relation to other limitations on donations.
The next part of the bill deals with anonymous donations and addresses a couple of omissions from both the previous bill and amendments made to it during its passage through the Assembly. The previous bill created a new scheme with new definitions; unfortunately, these were not included in the amendments to section 222 of the act. This bill corrects this and ensures that the new definitions do apply and it is clear how the limitation on anonymous gifts applies to all electoral participants. The amendment act passed last sitting also contains an amended reference to anonymous gifts in section 216, and unfortunately the corresponding amendment was not made to section 222. The bill corrects this error and clarifies that the limit on anonymous donations is $250.
These are primarily technical amendments that do not introduce any new policy; they simply clarify how the scheme will work. For example, one section currently refers to incorrect section numbers. The passage of the bill would avoid the very undesirable situation of the Electoral Commission having to promote a scheme and then, two months later and only two months before an election, having to put out further advice to clarify exactly what can and cannot be done by electoral participants.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video