The state government says it will not be rushed into reforming Tasmania's political donation laws after the Labor party released a draft bill on the issue for public consultation.
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Labor's draft bill would amend the Electoral Act to include a spending cap of $100,000 per candidate for House of Assembly elections, a cap of $1,000,000 per party for House of Assembly elections, and would increase the Legislative Council candidate campaign spending cap from $17,000 to $30,000.
It also would require the disclosure of all political donations to parties, candidates or sitting members over $1000, including cumulative donations exceeding $1000, within 30 days, and it would prohibit anonymous donations of more than $1000.
Labor justice spokeswoman Ella Haddad said the perception money could buy influence in Tasmania was not good enough.
"Tasmania has the weakest political donation laws in the whole country. Labor is going to fix these laws," Ms Haddad said.
"We are interested in hearing what the community has to say on our proposed laws and we will be tabling them in the next session of Parliament."
In other news:
The government initiated a review of Tasmania's Electoral Act and its associated laws after the 2018 state election.
Public consultation on the Electoral Act Review Interim Report closed in April 2019 and a final report was due by the end of last year.
Ms Haddad said she did not think this issue would ever come off the government's back-burner.
"They promised reform on this in their first term and didn't act on it," she said.
But Attorney-General Elise Archer said the government would not be rushed to act on this complex reform.
"We won't be pushed by Labor into a knee-jerk reaction or, as they've done, recycled their own policy," Ms Archer said.
"I'm not committing to supporting Labor's position on this today. We, of course, will look at any private member's bill."
When asked when the government planned to table its own bill reforming the state's political donation laws, Ms Archer said the government's priority was the COVID-19 response.
"What has been our focus is ensuring we have been providing the economic stimulus to maintain and create jobs for Tasmanians," she said.
"Some projects, such as law reform, can be delayed. Rightly, our focus has been on dealing with the COVID-19 emergency."
University of Tasmania Professor Richard Eccleston, who co-authored a report on campaign finance reform in Tasmania in 2019, said Labor's draft bill appeared to adopt many of the report's recommendations made in relation to last year's review of the Electoral Act.
"Adopting a donation disclosure threshold of $1000 will greatly improve transparency in relation to election funding and would bring Tasmania into line with legislation in Victoria, NSW and the ACT," Dr Eccleston said.
"We welcome the introduction of spending limits for House of Assembly elections, as long practiced in the Legislative Council, as means of reducing the influence of donations in Tasmanian politics but believe this threshold should be lower than the $100,000 per candidate proposed in the draft bill."
Dr Eccleston said the government's first priority must be the COVID-19 response and economic recovery, but he still believed campaign finance reforms should be introduced well before the 2022 state election.
"Given last year's review of the electoral act combined with the fact that the vast majority of Tasmanians support these reforms there is now an opportunity to introduce legislation which would enjoy support from all sides of politics," Dr Eccleston said.
Greens leader Cassy O'Connor welcomed Labor's support for the urgent need for donation election but said the bill did not go far enough.
"We are concerned it is silent on the most corrosive aspect of political donations and that's donations from developers, gambling interests and foreign donors," Ms O'Connor said.
"Labor's draft bill also fails to deliver real-time donations disclosure.
"30 days is about your average campaign length. If Labor is serious about making sure voters knew who is giving how much to which political party, they would have drafted legislation with seven to 14 day donation disclosure thresholds."
Ms O'Connor noted the government's "heel-dragging" on bringing forward electoral reform.
"The Gutwein government can't use the COVID-19 recovery as an excuse to avoid dealing with donations reform. It's possible to walk and chew gum at the same time," Ms O'Connor said.