Democracy not for sale

REVELATIONS that the Tasmanian Liberals received $30,000 in donations from companies linked to a billionaire Chinese businessman whose Australian permanent residency has been cancelled due to his political ties and “character” are disturbing.

The worrying news came just days after scant details were belatedly released about the gaming industry’s campaign on behalf of the Liberals in last year’s state election.

These two stories raise serious questions about whether democracy is up for sale in Tasmania.

That the Liberals took money from companies chaired by Huang Xiangmo — a year after intelligence agency ASIO warned against political parties accepting donations from the Chinese billionaire — is difficult to swallow.

Mr Huang is now stranded overseas after Australian agencies declared him unfit to hold an Australian passport and cancelled his permanent residency.

The issue of buying influence in Australian politics is not confined to the Liberals.

Mr Huang and his associates have donated at a federal and state level to both major parties, with most going to the ALP —$1.8 million to Labor and $1.1 million to the Libs.

Everyone from former Liberal PM Malcolm Turnbull, ex-foreign minister Julie Bishop and Victorian Labor Premier Daniel Andrews has been photographed socialising with the billionaire.

Former Labor senator Sam Dastyari’s relationship with Mr Huang was among issues that brought about his political downfall in 2017.

Dastyari recently told of an “arms race” in Australian politics, where competing interests — corporate, individual or foreign entities — are upping the ante in their efforts to buy power.

Political parties are more desperate than ever for this funding because hi-tech electoral campaigning has become an industry, and the machinery and expertise in the rapidly advancing science of propaganda is expensive.

The big winners in this arms race are spin doctors, campaign strategists and public relations firms, and the wealthy who bankroll them and surreptitiously get their way.

The losers are Jill and Joe Public, kept in the dark and played like pawns in a power struggle waged from the shadows.

This is not democracy, it is deceit.

That Jill and Joe had to wait almost a year for the Australian Election Commission to publish donations and other income received by the state parties in the 2017-18 financial year is beyond the pale.

That the information eventually provided by the AEC is so meagre that most donations remain secret and unaccounted for is an insult.

The state Liberals and Labor failed to declare the source of more than threequarters of their donations. That’s not disclosure, it’s rorting the system.

The Liberals declared more than $4 million — four times Labor and 10 times the Greens — but revealed the source of only $925,159.

“The problem with the AEC data is that it only gives a very partial account of political donations and spending in relation to the last state election,” University of Tasmania Institute for the Study of Social Change director Richard Eccleston explained in Talking Point ( Mercury, February 2).

The Liberals received $936,000 in corporate donations in 2017-18, including $269,500 from the Australian Hotels Association, and $50,000 from Federal Group.

But here is the rub: the AEC figures do not reveal campaign spending by lobby groups.

Whoever bankrolled the statewide “Love your local” campaign that kicked off before last year’s election campaign had officially started and grew to a crescendo in the weeks before the March poll remains a secret.

How much was spent on the campaign is secret too.

Also unexplained is how the “Love your local” message fit so snugly with the Liberals’ official campaign. Was that a lucky coincidence for the Liberals, or was there strategic co-ordination between party and lobby?

Jill and Joe are kept in the dark. Pesky voters, we are treated like mugs.

That’s wrong, damned wrong, unacceptably wrong.

That’s why 90 per cent of respondents to a recent Mercury survey demanded better disclosure of donations.

Too right. We’ve had a gutful.

“The reality is that federal disclosure laws are extremely weak and only provide a limited and very belated summary of the money spent on political campaigning in state or federal elections,” Professor Eccleston said.

“Fortunately, the tide is turning and there is now a broad consensus that we need greater transparency around political donations and campaign spending.”

It is good news Premier Will Hodgman has said he is serious about political reform amid calls from Prof Eccleston and others for stronger disclosure laws.

But there is more here than just a matter of disclosure.

The voting public will be short-changed if this reform concludes with merely more transparency.

Knowing who is behind the smoke and mirrors is but the first step.

In terms of seats, the state Liberals won government by the skin of their teeth. The “Love your local” campaign was a deciding factor in the victory.

Should wealthy individuals, corporations or foreign interests be able to buy this kind of persuasion, influence and power in a democracy?

Me, Jill and Joe do not think so.