LAWS WON’T SLOW UNION CASH FLOW

THERE are several sides to any story, and that applies to the saga surrounding Labor’s local government reforms that have just passed through State Parliament.

If the anti-corruption laws applied on a level playing field, we should all be celebrating. Greater transparency in the election process, including a crackdown on donors and conflicts of interest, can only be a good thing.

With jail terms for some offences under the new laws, the reforms have real teeth at last.

But this isn’t a level playing field. As the LNP Opposition and indeed the Bulletin have pointed out, there has been no attempt by the Palaszczuk Government to include the unions that pour millions into Labor’s war chest at elections, leading to perceptions of undue influence.

As the Bulletin has said previously, this is about more than local government reform.

It is about the political battle for Queensland and it has been fought largely in our back yard where the impact will be felt greatest by council candidates who have relied on developer donations, and by the LNP.

The State Labor Government meanwhile remains firmly embedded with the unions and given its union membership policy that has been imposed across the public service, we have to assume every new appointment is or becomes a union member, adding to the power base of the unions and by extension, the campaign funds of the ALP.

At council level, every decision involving land in the city at the moment is seen by the public through the lens of if not suspicion, then curiosity over what the true motives are.

All these reforms do is remove one source of suspicion, while protecting another.

But back to the plus side. Greater scrutiny of donors and candidates is about transparency – vital in a democracy – and an era of close monitoring of funding should lead to people who seek election getting out on the hustings to meet voters to explain and debate policies.

Back in the old days, incumbents and candidates beat a path to the door of newspapers, eager to put their case. There has been less of this over the past decade or so as funds have been poured into slick spin machines that have built campaigns for some candidates at local government level and have fought elections at state level in presidential style, emphasising the qualities of the leaders, muzzling the rank and file, rubbishing the opposing party –and ignoring grassroots issues.

The Gold Coast surely dreams of the return of genuine candidates who have the interests of the people in their division at heart and want to engage with their communities, or – at state level – want to fight for their city and be vocal about it.

How much better that would be, rather than a choice between the party-engineered avatars trotted out now to nod their heads at the shoulders of their dear leaders.