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The Forum > Article Comments > Democracy for sale > Comments

Democracy for sale : Comments

By Joo-Cheong Tham, published 16/3/2007

There is a dangerous mix of money and politics that has given rise to systemic problems - beyond the activities of Burke and Grill.

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This is an important article that should be read and widely discussed.

Joo-Cheong Tha is, however, naive to believe that Senator Andrew Murray's Electoral (Greater Fairness of Electoral Processes) Amendment Bill 2007 (Cth) will 'inject much-needed transparency into funding of political parties...[and] will go some way to restoring the integrity of Australia’s democratic system...'

Andrew Murray is one of small minority of politicians with integrity and with a sense of the ethical principles needed for protecting the public good. In short, his Bill will die for lack of oxygen.

Joo-Cheong Tha is, unfortunately, right to claim that, 'Transparency of [political] funding has considerably worsened after amendments made last year that allow many political donations to be shrouded in secrecy.' These cynical changes were designed in the context of 'a debased political morality' and a conscious 'lax regulation of political funding'. Secrecy suits the major parties and they have no intention of giving Andrew Murray's reforms any attention.
Posted by FrankGol, Friday, 16 March 2007 10:14:57 AM
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Yes the comments should be taken seriously and rightly we have expectation that our elected representatives will behave honestly.
Unfortunately with a PM who does not believe in involvement of the electorate in other than home issues and limit’s the amount of information stemming from Parliament, preferring talk back radio to the questioning by the media, tightly controlling the public service and finding not knowing or seeing, hearing, a workable ploy, how does one know what happens.
As well as the media seemingly preferring trivia and opinion as news much escapes the public. Competition on a commercial scale is the end point.
Friel and Falk in The Record of the Paper (the N.Y. Times) find deliberate avoidance of issues that perhaps should, in a healthy democracy, be public knowledge. They refer in particular to the way in which this paper, and it is not alone, fails to mention international law in its postings, an absence meaning a lesser challenge to wars by the Government.
No analysis has I think been done here except concerning the reporting of Muslims discussed by Peter Manning in Us and Them 2006, indeed reading Hamilton and Maddox Silencing Dissent, one might doubt funding would be made available for such a research project.
Thus in addition to the role of players and money generally beyond the electorate ‘s ken and unacknowledged contributions from those seeking favour there are indications that the electorate is deprived of the knowledge necessary for a functioning democracy.
There seems to be, but this might be my inability to find the data, no requirement for the media to report accurately facts, all facts, not a selection. Sure they like all of us including politicians are subject to the general law but this is negative the positive of will behave in a given way is lacking. Penalty as in parliament seems at the whim of the powerful, ministerial guidelines and parliamentary elections, as it were.
Posted by untutored mind, Friday, 16 March 2007 12:39:32 PM
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This is a most important topic, and many of the points Tham make are good. However, I think he pays too much attention to Andrew Murray's bill. There is no chance it could ever pass until the public cries out for change. And the Democrats haven't always been the best when it comes to political donations. Until they shot themselves in the foot during Meg Lees' leadership and companies stopped donating, they certainly have taken some donations that a respectable party would refuse - tens of thousands of dollars from the Australian Casino Association, Distilled Spirits Industry Council of Australia and others.
Posted by Darloguy, Friday, 16 March 2007 1:45:58 PM
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Sounds good but let's toughen it up with a well resourced anti corruption commission with standing Royal Commission powers as in WA.

Coupled with a possible loss of parliamentary pensions and protections for our MPs and public servants this would be a reasonable package of anti corruption measures.
Posted by westernred, Friday, 16 March 2007 2:06:22 PM
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Indeed an important issue in a well written and thought provoking article.

What is "Democracy"?

Democracy in it's purest form stems from two Greek words "Demos" (people) and "Kratos" (rule)

The problem we in Australia face - and we are far from being alone - is that our system is merely an oligarchy. Nowhere do the people rule and (obnoxiously) nowhere where the people can rule during the tenure of the incumbent party.

Sure - we are fed ad-nauseum the "D" word, but as Hitler said “A lie, told often enough and loud enough, will become the truth.” Constantly the mantra "Democracy" is thrown up to placate the masses. Other mantras that exploited Hitler's were: "Weapons of Mass Destruction" and "Children Overboard" and "Safer Society" by "Getting guns off the streets". None could and none did bear fruit - which of course means we are fed a continuous stream of lies.

In fact, our system is a Parliamentary Democracy as distinct from a "Democracy" We are forced to elect (for fear of being fined) people who in the main the majority of people already mistrust. These people have no loyalty to the people who were forced to elect them (broad brush approach I know). Their loyalty is to the party dogma.

The end effect is that for some years, we suffer an adverserial system where management issues are manipulated by political party priorities so that never ending crises are created, then 'they' set about arguing and bitching to demolish what they create.

Within that system, misbehaviour and incomptence is common, and is all too often rewarded - not penalised as would we mere mortals.

We then elect them again so we can enjoy being screwed and see the nation mismanaged by short term political agendas.

So then - anybody can bitch, but who can offer a solution. I can!

Just discovered a 350 word limit - more at another time.
There IS a solution.
PC
Posted by Peter Cunningham, Friday, 16 March 2007 2:54:01 PM
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Politicians of democracies the world over are paid too low for the amount of work put in. They should follow in Singapore's foot-steps where ministers are better paid compared to their counterparts.

Estimated yearly salaries (SGD$1.2 =AUS$1)
Prime Minister - between $4 to $6 million (including bonuses)
President (performing ceremonial role) - $3million (including bonuses)
Ministers - $1million to $3 million (including bonuses)
Junior Ministers $1million to $2 million (including bonuses)

In 2005 the top 4 CEOs were paid in US$: Barry Diller $295M; Richard D. Fairbank $249M; Eugene M. Isenberg $203M;Terry S. Semel $183M;

Gone are the days where you'd expect talented people to work for pittance. Appealing to altruism, the self-sacrificial motive will not work in a globalised world. If you want to draw talented people into politics there is a need to pay them sufficiently so as to avoid petty corruption. What the amount is, is best left to market forces.

The top three democracies of the world, USA, UK and Australia only had mediocre men to lead them. The motive of the three lowly paid leaders Bush, Blair and Howard for going to war in IRAQ is questionable. It was illegal and unprovoked. No weapons of mass destruction was found and the world is much more dangerous place.
Posted by Philip Tang, Friday, 16 March 2007 3:33:22 PM
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Phillip - while I agree politicians need to be paid a reasonable amount, I think you're wrong to assume that more money will automatically attract a better calibre of leader.

Money is one thing, but power is another. There is also the issue of what is the right reason to get into politics. It should always be to represent your electorate.

Increasing the wages of politicians won't really do anything to address the problems that the author has highlighted.

Something really has to be done about campaign financing - I'm not sure precisely what it is yet, but private donations are not the way to go. It is downright naive to assume that fund contributions are given simply as a gesture of goodwill - they expect something in return.
Posted by TurnRightThenLeft, Friday, 16 March 2007 3:38:59 PM
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I suppose all the political mud-slinging has one unintended benefit for the public. With the mud, occasionally the worst of the corrupt politicians get flushed out into the street.

Senator Santoro has just resigned - the heat from blowtorch of truth finally became unbearable. You'll remember that, after being appointed to his health-related portfolio in 2006, Santoro failed to immediately sell off stocks in a biotechnology company about which he made official decisions - without declaring an interest.

Prime Minister Howard earlier this week refused to sack the Senator, saying he had alerted him as soon as the error was realised, and that he had donated the profit from the shares to a 'charity'. Unfortunately for the Howard Government, that charity has now been revealed to be not a charity but a conservative values group, Family Council of Queensland. The hypocrisy is stunning.

Its president, Alan Baxter, was the person who 'sold' the shares to Senator Santoro in the first place.

We desperately need Senator Murray's Bill to be enacted; but even after this scandal - perhaps because of it - the Bill has Buckley's chance of finding the support it needs from the Big Boys.
Posted by FrankGol, Friday, 16 March 2007 3:42:39 PM
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People get the governments they deserve. Clearly, if people didn't want corrupt politicians, they wouldn't keep voting for a (major) party machine. Yet most people do, so what does that say about the populace? It's too easy to make excuses for the populace and say they've been lied to, or the information hasn't been provided. Some information is available, but people are too lazy to go and get it. Some information isn't available, but people are too lazy to demand it or threaten to vote for someone else or stop financially supporting the media. So, why should anyone expect politicians or the media to treat people as anything but lazy, stupid fools only too willing to be taken for a ride? I'm not absolving politicians or the media here, but if you put your left hand into a wolf's mouth and had it bitten off, would you put your right hand in next? Evidently, if you're an Australian voter, the answer is a resounding "YES"!
Posted by shorbe, Friday, 16 March 2007 4:02:40 PM
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The investigations into WA Inc. cost the taxpayers some $30 million. The recent revelations from the Corruption and Crime Commission will cost us more than that and unbelievably, the same players, Burke and Grill still up to their mischief, 20 years hence.

These lobbyists' tentacles have invaded every conceivable industry in WA and beyond, to the detriment of the constituents.

When you have heads of the EPA and the Departments of Environment colluding with lobbyists of ill-repute, then one realises that nothing is sacred. How can ethical bureaucrats be lobbied on environmental assessments?

However, the EPA's assessments which were made to curb carbon emissions were ignored by Ministers on two large coal projects last year and given approval to proceed without the EPA's recommended environmental restrictions.

The plight of communities, force-fed vile chemicals from the shabby hazardous waste industry was ignored. Same lobbyists, same outcome.

WA is terminally ill and the collusive business community, devoid of integrity, is also culpable and should hang their heads in shame.

New strategies will be implemented to override transparency in bribes and donations. The impotent few who do protest will again be ridiculed and the thugs will continue on the gravy train, under the guise of "economic progress" - well for the "privileged" few anyway!
Posted by dickie, Friday, 16 March 2007 11:23:15 PM
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This sinister mix between money and politics has been the undoing of democracy around the world.

It runs far deeper than just issues with donations to political parties - to the very connection between the rich, powerful, profit-motive-above-all-else people and the decision-makers in government. It means that governments don’t make independent decisions. It skittles the fundamental purpose of governments.

It is basically the reason why we are told that we have to keep on growing with no end in sight, and with scant thought of the finite and stressed nature of the systems that are supposed to support this ever-bigger extent of humanity.

Because we are so powerfully told this lie – that we’ve gotta have growth or else we’ll all be rooned – the majority of the community goes along with it…..while in the backs of their minds they really know that a stable level of human activity well within the natural support mechanisms is essential for a healthy future, and that when basic resources become obviously stressed, such as water in many cities and regions, it is obviously time to stop bloody well expanding the population and thus the overall level of demand!

But governments are so totally tied in to appeasing big business and the ever-increasing markets and profits paradigm that they won’t even consider this absolutely basic premise. This cannot be more obvious than in southeast Queensland, where the water situation is grave and has clearly been worsening for a long time, but where population growth remains rapid, with the full support of the state government!

This sinister connection between the vested-interest profit-chasers and those who are supposed to be protecting our society from its negative aspects, is so great that it is literally leading us rapidly to ruin.

We are on such an enormously antisustainable path, facilitated by governments, when the fundamental role of governments is to direct us towards sustainability and protect our future wellbeing.

Dickie says that WA is terminally ill. Well, Australia and indeed all democracies are terminally ill
Posted by Ludwig, Saturday, 17 March 2007 8:41:52 AM
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How will this stop the liberal and labour parties setting up dummy "Trust Fund " type organizations as they do now?
Donations are made to the fund which in turn makes donations to the part and no-one is the wiser about where the money really came from.

the US seems, strangely to have a slightly more transparent system.
look up who bankrolled Ernie Schwarzenegger in California for example.
Posted by michael2, Saturday, 17 March 2007 9:46:16 PM
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Shorbe, the most extraordinary part of this business is indeed the lack of interest in the general community. If the community gave half a hoot, governments wouldn’t get away with this blatant duplicity, or even with underhanded and surreptitious duplicity.

While I have been pleased to find support for my concerns over things like this on this forum, I am at the same time dismayed that even amongst the good conscientious OLO contributors, few actually seriously care about our appalling state of governance and its absolutely terrible consequences, most significantly the overall momentum of our society so strongly and blatantly away from sustainability.

It is a huge quandary that I just can’t get my head around.
Posted by Ludwig, Sunday, 18 March 2007 9:39:13 AM
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Good'ay Ludwig, see you're still on the right track as usual. But what can we do with our PM flitting around still trying to run the war in Iraq backed by his persistent 'I' rather than 'us' or 'we'. It is so incredulous that with all the increasing mess in Iraq, with killer chemicals now being used by the insurgents, and the next thing a tiny life and mind destroying nuclear device, Georgie Boy Bush and his Anglophilic offsiders will still be sure they know what the're doing.

Personally, having lost my wife, am getting too old and lonely to care. Certainly praying won't help because the Good Lord we used to rely on seems now to vouchsafe all that is going on. Going by Bush, Blair, Howard and chief prayer-man Abbot, anyhow.

Possibly the best thing we can pray for these days, is just plain commonsense and fair play.

Cheers, George C - WA
Posted by bushbred, Sunday, 18 March 2007 12:39:28 PM
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LUDWIG - Well said.
Sadly though, 'people power' under the current system is insufficient to effect change.
The only time when real change is effected is during times of war or invasion, in between, we sacrifice our liberty and place our wellbeing in the hands of bureaucracies and government.

We are continually faced with a situation far removed from democracy, where we are forced to elect those whom we inherently mistrust.
There is no alternative, therefore, short of civil insurrection, things will not change.
The holy grail is supposed to exist at the end of oblivion, so onwards we march like lemmings where the almighty dollar and individual gain are the gods.

Discussion and concern means zilch unless coordinated into force which will address our concerns.

I urge people to have a peek at the Liberal Democratic Party (ldp.org.au) and see what we stand for.
PC
Posted by Peter Cunningham, Monday, 19 March 2007 8:56:39 AM
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Can I suggest that the alleged relaxation of political donation disclosure law is seen by all significant political parties, in the present climate of public opinion, to be an unavoidable necessity?

If it was not relaxed, what would we see? Would we see a steady decline in the number of separate donors? Of the donors left in the field, increasingly would they be being seen to be donating to several significant (and notionally opposing) players at the same time? An ever contracting group of corporate and private interests propping up not merely a particular party, but an traditional political party structure, a structure from which the rest of the community is steadily withdrawing both participatory and financial support?

The alternative to corporate and private funding of political parties is presented as being public funding. What do you think the public response would be to any proposal by any party in government today to increase public funding to political parties? Round condemnation, perhaps?

How is it that nobody proposes immediately totally cutting public funding? Such might force the unrepresentativeness and unresponsiveness of party organisational structure and operation right into the limelight. One good reason for not proposing it is that the whole show, across the board, is largely operating under a massive long-term system of electoral deception that has been working quite well for those administering it.

Operating exclusively with public funding would, of course, represent the ultimate in such hijacking of political expression. The organisation proposed by a naive few to administer it, the Australian Electoral Commission, has a dismal record of performance with respect to operating within the requirements of its own Act. Hard to forget the dog-in-a-manger attitude of both the AEC and the Queensland Premier when a minor party took "their" public funding from a major player. Hard to forget the ingratitude when private contribution totally re-imbursed the Queensland taxpayers money that would have otherwise been lost to major political parties. Not a word of thanks. Par for the course.
Posted by Forrest Gumpp, Monday, 19 March 2007 9:48:23 AM
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There is an incremental approach that will improve matters. This is to allow us all a say in how we spend taxes. Impossible you say? Well no it isn't and we have an example of what can be done with our compulsory superannuation surcharge. Another way of looking at the superannuation surcharge is to see it as giving control of taxes for old age social security to the consumers. The "normal" way has been to collect taxes then distribute to people when they need it as old age pensions. The super surcharge approach is to leave the taxes with the people BUT require them to spend it on their old age.

We can do the same with education, health, roads, water, broadband, etc. Anywhere where a government now spends money on public goods we can give the taxes back to the people for them to spend. We have to have ways of controlling and monitoring the expenditures but we leave that in the hands of elected boards that control the expenditures. That is, we disburse democracy so that we can vote for people who are helping us look after our own taxes.

For example everyone in Australia could get 8 cents a day to spend on public broadcasting. The boards of the organisations to whom we give the money are elected by the donors. This would get rid of the nonsense of the PM theoretically being able to appoint everyone to every public board and bring diversity and more accountability to the spending of funds on public goods.

Do this and the opportunities for corruption of the system diminish plus we will get much better value for our taxes because it will be us spending our own money on ourselves rather than some bureaucrat spending our money on someone else.
Posted by Fickle Pickle, Monday, 19 March 2007 10:33:46 AM
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