Queensland election: Annastacia Palaszczuk won’t rule out her ministers taking part in further cash for access fundraising events
Annastacia Palaszczuk won’t rule out her ministers taking part in further cash for access events before they become illegal in two years.
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk won’t rule out her ministers taking part in further cash for access fundraising events before they become illegal in two years time.
As she hit the hustings in the electorate of Rockhampton on day nine of the campaign, Ms Palaszczuk claimed every party would continue holding the events before new laws begin in 2022.
It comes after The Australian revealed Queensland Labor sold access to state Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath to gambling giant Tabcorp and government-favoured consultant KPMG less than a year after she had introduced legislation to outlaw cash-for-access fundraisers.
Asked today why her ministers won’t stop holding them now, Ms Palaszczuk said: “because the laws come in in 2022”.
“We have brought in the strongest electoral reforms in the nations, that has been widely celebrated,” she said.
“That comes into play in two years time, as does the public funding at the next election.
“Until then, parties need to fundraise, but everything must be done in accordance with the law.
“We have to abide by the laws and that’s exactly what we will be doing.”
ASX-listed Tabcorp paid Labor $11,000 on August 4, three days before the fundraiser where it met with Ms D’Ath, who regulates gambling in the state through the Office of Liquor and Gaming.
Only five of Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk’s ministers declared interactions with donors at Labor’s Business Partnership Program event, after Ms Palaszczuk’s office told them they needed only to disclose “formal” meetings about their portfolios, a relaxation of expectations from previous years.
The Australian understands at least two ministers failed to declare in their ministerial diaries contact with donors at the August 7 event, with the government refusing to disclose meetings it considers “casual,” held standing up rather than sitting down, or unrelated to ministers’ portfolios.
Ms Palaszczuk has this week attacked LNP leader Deb Frecklington over property developers attending her political fundraisers, demanding she give a full explanation of whom she met.
Crime and Corruption Commission chair Alan MacSporran has also warned all candidates about the “blurring lines” between government and business, including lobbyists, consultants, influencers and executives.
The Business Partnerships fundraiser — which KPMG shelled out $27,500 to host at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre — also sold access to Environment Minister Leeanne Enoch to oil and gas producer Santos, transport fuel company QER and mining lobby the Queensland Resources Council.
Oil refining company Southern Oil bought access to Housing, Public Works and Sport Minister Mick de Brenni, while Employment and Small Business Minister Shannon Fentiman met with donors from the Taxi Council of Queensland, Cotton Australia and the Pharmacy Guild.
Ms Palaszczuk visited Southern Oil’s Gladstone refinery on Wednesday.
At least three lobbyists — including Evan Moorhead, Ms Palaszczuk’s former chief of government strategy who is now helping to run her election campaign — paid to go to the ALP fundraiser, which featured Ms Palaszczuk, state ministers, and federal Labor MPs and senators.
Most of Ms Palaszczuk’s ministers did not declare a single meeting at the event, even though an entire morning session was set aside for “networking” between her cabinet members and donors.
A spokesman for Ms Palaszczuk said the published diaries reflected the “requirements of the ministerial handbook”.
“Formal meetings were few, given COVID-19 restrictions but formal meetings that did occur were disclosed,” he said. “Any informal conversations that resulted in requests for formal meetings or official correspondence were appropriately actioned and recorded through the appropriate systems.”
In November last year, Ms D’Ath introduced electoral reforms, including caps on donations and campaign expenditure, designed to “reduce the scope for undue influence through private donations”.
Announcing the changes, she said the reforms would remove the incentive to raise money by controversial methods, including cash-for-access meetings. “It doesn’t matter if you’re big business, lobbyists, unions or individuals, you will all be limited by the same donation caps,” she said.
While expenditure caps are in force now, the donation caps — limiting political parties to accepting a maximum of $4000 from a single donor over a four-year parliamentary term — have been pushed back until 2022.
Asked whether it was appropriate for her to go to a cash-for-access party fundraiser given she has legislated to have them banned, Ms D’Ath said she was “very proud of the Palaszczuk government’s nation-leading integrity reforms”.
“In 2022, laws will change and shift away from private donations to public funds, to remove actual or perceived influence of candidates and political parties once and for all,” she said.
The LNP held a corporate observers event at Brisbane’s RNA showgrounds convention centre on September 18, but Ms Frecklington’s diaries from last month have not been published.
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