Rpg,
It would be very naïve to believe that the only donations to Labour came from the Unions. Check the state of play in Tassie where the big two corporations have run things by donating to both parties. My first post called for a TOTAL ban on donations from Big Business and individuals and that of course would include unions.
When I say that the parties are owned by the corporate world that is because they have more money to throw around than the unions or individuals.
I do not see that if any organization wants to spend money on advertising their point of view that it can be stopped, you do not want to take away the right of free speech.
That said it should not be called a donation.
Perhaps the Left leaning bias in the ABC and Uni’s is because they are looking at the Right and not liking what they see. OK the ABC should be “middle of the road” but it is staffed by humans.
If the Right had such a good agenda to offer then maybe more would be leaning their way.
As for a straight two party system, no thanks. That’s what we have had in Tassie forever and mostly also in the federal sphere. It has led to to parties that are the same in all but name. In Tassie they are known as the LibLabs.
It is only when there is a third (or more) party in the wings that there is any form of a genuine opposition as in “keep the bastards honest”.
I totally agree with David F about initiative, referendum and recall.
I just am not going to hold my breath on that one. The pollies will never give up power to any other system. I think it would take a revolution to change that.

"I do not see that if any organization wants to spend money on advertising their point of view that it can be stopped, you do not want to take away the right of free speech.
That said it should not be called a donation."

So what's the difference then?

If I give money to a friend it is also not called a donation, why should it matter how it is called?

What is the difference between me advertising my ideas in person with my own money (after tax of course), or giving the same money to a body that organises and coordinates the advertising of the same ideas?

Yuyutsu,
If you give money to a friend, it is called a donation.
The obvious thing is to make it a requirement for any political party or politician to make their accounts open to scrutiny by an independent body. Any money or other assets showing up would have to be accounted for.
The Wiki definition of a donation is below.

A donation is a gift given by physical or legal persons, typically for charitable purposes and/or to benefit a cause. A donation may take various forms, including cash, services, new or used goods including clothing, toys, food, and vehicles. It also may consist of emergency, relief or humanitarian aid items, development aid support, and can also relate to medical care needs as i.e. blood or organs for transplant. Charitable gifts of goods or services are also called gifts in kind.
Donations are gifts given without return consideration. This lack of return consideration means that, in common law, an agreement to make a donation is an "imperfect contract void for want of consideration."[1] Only when the donation is actually made does it acquire legal status as a transfer or property. In civil law jurisdictions, on the contrary, donations are valid contracts, though they may require some extra formalities, such as being done in writing.

Fine, Sarnian,

So if I understand you correctly, then it is not right to call monies that one gives to a political party a "donation", because you get something in return - the propagation of your ideas.

So nothing that you give away is really a donation if you expect something in return, for example, a chance for winning a seat in heaven.

One advantage of single-member constituencies is that they have some responsibility to their electors, ie, it's more difficult for the parties to put in someone too awful.

So this suggests a system like that of Germany or New Zealand, where there are members elected per constituency, and also a PR component in the membership of the whole parliament.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_member_proportional_representation for the details

As a former memeber of the Labor Party, I agree with Klass that there is no democracy within the Labor Party. The aristocrats in the executive take as much notice of the wishes of the lumpen proletariate members, as Marie Antoinette took of cake distribution in France.

But to have proportional representation elections, you must have a society where there is fundamental agreement as to what constitutes the correct cultural values of a country. That is no longer possible in a culturally divided country like Australia.

One of the reasons why both the Labor and Liberal Parties supported Multiculturalism, was to divide the electorate into ethnic voting blocks which they could play off against each other. Divide and Rule. Of course, the chickens would come home to roost with proportional representation.

Proportional representation is going to result in a Shiite Party and a Sunni Party, who will happilly attack each other when they are not both attacking the Jewish Party. A Serbian Party and a Croation Party will be similarly inclined to squabble, when they are not both attacking the Bosnian party. Same for the Armenian Party and the Turkish Party. The mind boggles.

Of course, we could see some interesting developmemnts. The Turkish Party and the Macedonian Party could unite against the Greek Party. The Greek Party could then ally themselves with the Armenian Party to give the Turks and the Macedonians a bit of stick.

One wonders if these ethnic political parties will then be forced to change their names to non ethnic names (like the soccor clubs of Sydney), to prevent every political meeting turning into a race riot.

One presumes that we will end up living in interesting times with an election every six months.