Special interests have a huge amount of influence on politicians through campaign donations. This in turn can lead to policies that favour those interests rather than national priorities. Full public funding may allow elected officials to spend more time addressing issues, focusing more on policies rather than fund raising. It may also level the playing field for candidates - giving all citizens regardless of wealth a fair shot to be heard and to participate in the democratic process. Whether this will actually work in practice however - is another matter. It may just be an unrealistic pipe-dream.
However, one can live and hope.

The Greens, to their credit, have opposed political donations and espoused public funding"

Literally so!

Their account was credited, my tax-payer account was debited.Posted by Yuyutsu, Thursday, 17 March 2011 8:13:23 AM

Full marks, Yuyutsu, for a correct analysis of my statement!!

(quote)
Editorial:

The Australian 12 January 2011

Senator Brown has been busy justifying the gift from Graeme Wood, which bankrolled a major advertising campaign ahead of the August election. Mr Wood is a very rich man and this is a personal donation, but Senator Brown's rhetoric is simply ludicrous when set alongside his attacks on corporate donations and his bid to replace them with public funding of elections. The Greens leader has made a moral crusade out of banning corporate money, ratcheting up his language over the years. In 2009, for example, he suggested that "democracy is being eroded by money" and warned that those who could not afford to donate were increasingly powerless in our political system.
(continued)

(read on)

A gift with questions attache

$1.6 MILLION donation sits strangely with Greens rhetoric.

Bob Brown is a smart politician and he just might convince some that the $1.6 million donation from Wotif.com founder Graeme Wood is different from the corporate donations the Greens leader has criticised in the past. Senator Brown has been busy justifying the gift, which bankrolled a major advertising campaign ahead of the August election. Mr Wood is a very rich man and this is a personal donation, but Senator Brown's rhetoric is simply ludicrous when set alongside his attacks on corporate donations and his bid to replace them with public funding of elections. The Greens leader has made a moral crusade out of banning corporate money, ratcheting up his language over the years. In 2009, for example, he suggested that "democracy is being eroded by money" and warned that those who could not afford to donate were increasingly powerless in our political system.

Mr Wood's gift is the largest single political donation in the nation's history,........ The Australian has absolutely no problem with either gift, nor with corporate donations in general, as long as shareholders are satisfied. The only reason the Wotif.com money has become an issue is because Senator Brown has made it so. With stunning disregard for his own words, the Greens leader has absorbed this money into the party's political operations, arguing that it is within the existing rules. It is an accommodation that reeks of opportunism rather than the high principles espoused by the senator. It seems donations are bad when they support your rivals but fine when they come your way. The Greens' gains at the last election cemented them as the third party. That means increased scrutiny of their operations and the gaps between rhetoric and action. Senator Brown needs to do better if he is to avoid the charge of hypocrisy.
(unquote)

Greens' supporters please justify this historic hypocracy, if you can.

I'm not sure you can call it hypocrisy, Is Mise. And I'm not a Green.

>>Greens' supporters please justify this historic hypocracy, if you can.<<

Mr Brown is simply operating under the same rules as everyone else. Until those rules are changed, he is perfectly entitled - indeed, obliged - to accept the donation.

I might decide that all Australians should be allowed unfettered access to top-quality health care, and campaign vigorously for the necessary laws to be passed, taxes to be raised, and the private health funds abolished. In the meantime, though, I will continue with my health insurance, because the infrastructure isn't there yet.

I am equally comfortable to campaign for the public education system to be improved to be as good as my son's private school, on the basis that it would be a really great thing for the country to achieve. In the meantime, though, I'll continue to pay the fees.

It is not hypocrisy. If I were a Green, and were told that Mr Brown had knocked back a perfectly legal and legitimate donation "on principle", I'd question his sanity.

There is of course a line. If it were drug money, for example. But this one isn't even from a "property developer".

Pericles,
The money Bob Brown accepted was from a special interested person in buying the Greens agenda, which is what the Greens are against in other Parties donations from their special interested persons or groups. This is not a consistent act on principle just accepting the same buying of support for their agenda. Obviously a double standard which the public will not accept as integrity of one's word.