Editorial: Books must be opened

Tasmania needs reform to bring our state in line with the rest of the country in terms of political donations disclosure.

IT’S often said in journalism that readers are our best researchers.

While this in no way diminishes the often excellent investigate work in newsrooms across Australia and the globe, it is an important and stark reminder of the following indisputable fact: Without public disclosure there can be no accountability.

This statement runs particularly true in relation to the laws that govern political donations in Tasmania.

As our story today notes, it is often pointed out that our state has the weakest electoral funding laws in the nation.

Tasmanians will never know the source of a great number of donations made to our political leaders because our disclosure laws state if someone gives less than $13,500 their identity does not need to be made public.

Labor is accusing the Liberal Party of dragging its feet on reform but notably the party is also refusing to proactively make public the source of its below-threshold donations.

In private conversations, a great many politicians of all persuasions will disclose a growing sense of unease between the increasing need to attract political donors and their actual work of furthering the public good.

The average person often has a less nuanced view and simply believes this money is given in lieu of favours — a quid pro quo arrangement which is in reality an overly simplistic take on our system of government.

Either way one thing is true — if a large number of donations are made anonymously, journalists and the public at large are unable to weigh up whether or not our politicians acted in the public interest or in the interests of those who gave them a tidy wad of cash.

And while $13,500 may be a relatively small sum of money for business elites, it’s a large sum for the average person and certainly buys a solid block of political advertising.

The high threshold also raises other obvious corruption risk — for instance how are we to know whether powerful interests have made multiple donations under the threshold via a number of separate entities?

Are we to trust the parties themselves? Ultimately at present there is very little likelihood the sources of this round of donations will ever be made public and the reputation of our political system is substantially worse off for this.

Leaving the threshold where it is, is politically untenable.

Tasmania needs reform to bring our state in line with the rest of the country in terms of donations disclosure. The threshold needs to be lowered and the declarations should be filed more promptly.

Regardless of party politics, the public has a right to know this information.

If simple common sense ethics won’t motivate change, we urge our political leaders to think of the public perception of them and their work and see that changing these laws will only improve their standing in the community.