Teals furious as Coalition to wave through tough laws cutting campaign donations

The Coalition will wave Labor’s contentious bill to strip big money out of politics through the House of Representatives, ignoring the fears of independents that the proposed election laws would make it harder for them to take on the major parties.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton told a lively party room meeting, attended by Liberal Party federal director Andrew Hirst, that the Coalition wanted to move amendments to the bill in the Senate, which will play out next week as Labor tries to secure a final deal and pass the laws before parliament rises for the year.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, independent MP Monique Ryan and Opposition Leader Peter Dutton.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

The opposition wants to amend the bill to increase the size of the caps on donations, which limit a person to giving $20,000 to a candidate in a year. It also has concerns about small businesses being forced to declare any donation over $1000, which they fear could attract vandals or union activists to their shops.

But the briefing to MPs at a party room meeting in Canberra, confirmed by four sources unable to speak publicly about the private talks, proved the Coalition’s intent to get a deal done swiftly.

A slew of opposition MPs asked Dutton, Hirst and frontbencher Jane Hume whether the rules would benefit Labor and trade unions, highlighting the big implications of the electoral overhaul.

MPs raised concerns about targeting mum-and-dad donors under the proposal to lower the disclosure threshold to $1000, as well as worries about how the party would fund itself without the same level of private donations. The rules for the Liberal Party’s biggest donor, the Cormack Foundation, were also discussed.

Hume made the point that the Coalition was better off doing a deal with Labor than pushing the government to work with the Greens.

Hirst, according to two MPs, said the legislation on caps was better than the government’s truth-in-advertising laws, which the Coalition does not support and Labor does not believe will pass the parliament.

A Labor spokesman said the government was open to amendments from the opposition.

More than 10 crossbenchers united on Monday in parliament to condemn Labor’s handling of the reforms, arguing the government’s short timeline allowed little scrutiny on a major overhaul of Australia’s election system. They have called it a major party stitch-up.

Four organisations – The Australia Institute, the Centre for Public Integrity, Australian Democracy Network and Transparency International Australia – issued a joint statement on Tuesday arguing the bill should not proceed in its current form.

“The bill would ... entrench major party and incumbency advantage, and further
disadvantage independent and challenger candidates in elections,” the statement said.

Labor’s plan would cap the amount a candidate could receive from a donor at $20,000 and the total a candidate could spend in a seat at $800,000. The changes are designed to stop wealthy individuals such as Clive Palmer from bankrolling election campaigns with outlays of millions of dollars, as he did in the past two elections.

Palmer has flagged a High Court challenge to the laws, as first reported by this masthead in March.

Climate 200, the funding vehicle that backed teal independents at the 2022 federal election, is concerned that the changes would make it much harder for new independents to compete. Crossbenchers flagged they could use a possible balance-of-power position at the next election to reverse changes.

Under the proposed laws, incumbents would receive more money per vote won at elections as well as $30,000 in new administrative funding to help them comply with the rules – but it could not be used for campaigning.

Independent MP Kate Chaney said Labor was trying to rush the bill “to get away with the only path they’ve got left to arrest the trend of declining support for the sclerotic leadership of the two parties”.

The rules in the new bill would apply to all parties and unions and Labor has accused the teals of hypocrisy in calling out the integrity of other parties while opposing a law to take money out of politics.

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