Palmer phenomenon must never happen again

Thanks to years of inaction, we have allowed an extraordinarily rich man to influence elections in pursuit of what appears to be little more than political aggrandisement, and all at the cost of Queenslanders, writes Terry Sweetman.

One of the truly pivotal Australian federal elections was in 1949 because it set the nation on a path from which it refused to veer for 23 years.

The Liberal and Country parties under Robert Menzies defeated a well-performed and war-winning Labor Party and made conservatism the natural party of government until 1972.

The issues were many, but University of New South Wales Associate Professor of History David Lee makes a good case that the issue that swung the election was petrol rationing, something the Labor government had clung to in loyalty to Britain and the malnourished sterling bloc.

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Reading the media of the day it is obvious that rationing and a general weariness were huge issues. However, the Government’s troubles really began with its bid to privatise the banks, an issue that went off the boil when the High Court gave it the thumbs down. (Events of recent years suggest that maybe privatisation wasn’t such a bad idea, but that’s an issue for bar room debate.)

But, for the government, the damage was done as the Liberal Party rattled the can in front of its much-alarmed friends here and abroad.

After May 18 there will be a lot of things for us to think about and the Palmer phenomenon is one of them. Picture: AAP/Kelly Barnes

Journalist, historian, PR whiz and political insider Don Whitington wrote in 1961 that of the million pounds raised for the party’s 1949 campaign, 100,000 pounds of it came from English bankers.

The size of Labor’s war chest is unknown because there was no such thing as public disclosure in those days.

It’s all water under the political bridge, but it is generally acknowledged that 1949 was the first of the big-money elections that gave campaigning a whole new sophistication.

So how much did the Liberals spend? The Reserve Bank’s inflation calculator reckons that the million pounds would be worth $56 million today and the London bankers’ mite would be a cool $5.6 million.

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To put it in some kind of perspective the Liberals spent on that election for just eight million Australians about a third of that spent by all parties (on all things) in 2016 when the population was about 24 million.

And that 2016 figure of $156 million (Australian Electoral Commission figures) includes the public funding component.

They are sobering figures and enough to make you wonder about the heart and soul of our political process.

The kind of election figures we’re seeing are sobering and enough to make you wonder about the heart and soul of our political process. Picture: AAP/Kelly Barnes

But this year we have the blowhard Clive Palmer spending something between $30 million (one media estimate), $50 million plus (a Palmer spokesman declaration in January) and $60 million (Senator Brian Burston claim). If you look at his United Australia Party website, that upper figure would represent $15 million per policy.

Extraordinary stuff. Entirely legal but extraordinary.

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Palmer is a man who has stiffed his workers and the Australian taxpayers for even more than he is forking out on the election but he is entitled to spend his money as he wishes.

Remember the huffing and puffing when he spent $5 million on a yacht for his 15-year-old daughter? His money, his decision. However, I worry that a huge bank account (up to $4 billion, according to Palmer’s sometimes elastic estimates) should allow him to buy inordinate

political influence and, perhaps, change the course of my country.

I’d worry if it was Jesus Christ himself buying votes and Palmer ain’t even close.

Thankfully, there aren’t many Palmers around but he has designed the template for the brutal exercise of money for power and we need only look at the United States to see how that has enfeebled and corrupted the democratic process.

There is general acceptance in principle, if not the extent, of the need to disclose and cap donations. Picture: AAP/Kelly Barnes

After May 18 there will be a lot of things for us to think about and the Palmer phenomenon is one of them.

Donations and political funding have exercised the political mind for decades, although each side has generally come to different conclusions.

There is general acceptance in principle, if not the extent, of the need to disclose and cap donations and government attempts to curtail the role of people such as developers have met with High Court approval.

Public funding, I suspect, has been an abject failure, merely adding to the baseline costing of elections and bankrolling also-rans with sometimes repugnant or loopy policy platforms.

Instead of reducing party dependence on donations it has sharpened their appetites.

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A Parliamentary Library paper after the 2016 elections concluded: “Assuming that the cost of elections is not going to decrease substantially, the main policy options in Australia for election finance reform would seem to relate to public funding and donation disclosure.’’

Not even considered — or even suspected — was the need to examine the right and the ability of an extraordinarily rich man to influence elections in pursuit of what appears to be little more than political aggrandisement.

In the meantime, anyone who gives comfort or preferences to a man who is attempting to buy political power is demonstrating a contempt for democracy.

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