Second Reading
Danny O’BRIEN (Gippsland South) (12:50): I will begin on the Electoral Further Amendment Bill 2026 by saying that, yes, as the member for Brighton indicated, we will be opposing this legislation. We came to it with good intentions, with an openness to negotiating with the government and to working through the decisions in the High Court. I think, though, that perhaps some of the issues that we have now seen in this bill that is being rushed through the Parliament were highlighted by the member for Preston’s commentary just now that somehow this is all the Liberal Party’s fault. Far be it from me as Leader of the Nationals to defend the Liberal Party, but hello, we are in this situation because of the legislation that your government introduced back before 2018. That is not the Liberal Party or Cormack’s fault, it is because you messed up that legislation. No-one was desperately saying we had to have legislation to fix this situation with donations and elections. It was Daniel Andrews and your government – their government, Acting Speaker – that caused this. For the member for Preston to now say we are in this situation because of the Cormack Foundation and the Liberal Party is pretty rich.
It is also incumbent on me to say we absolutely think there needs to be a fair system. But the principles are pretty clear here: either you say people can make donations to political parties and influence elections to whatever extent that they want, or you say they cannot do it and the public then has to pay for it through taxpayer funds, because elections cost money. I would prefer that taxpayers did not have to bear the burden of it, but I understand – the perception, at least – that if big donations are being made, that may have an influence on decisions being made by governments in the future. It is about getting the balance right, and I think that is what is being attempted here. But I do not believe that we are in fact getting the balance right.
As the member for Preston indicated, this whole legislation, the reform in the last couple of weeks, has come about because of the actions in the High Court and the decision in the High Court on 15 April. I will not reflect on the High Court’s judgement in this respect, but there is a bit of a principle here that is a problem in that the major parties, which some might call the legacy parties – the parties that have been around a long time, the Labor Party for over 100 years, the Nationals for 110 years and I think the Libs for around 80-odd years – not surprisingly have built up some reserves in that time and actually tried to look after their own interests. And effectively we are being penalised for that, because now the funds that those parties have actually saved over time through their fundraising, through whatever activities and investments, are no longer going to be available to us for running campaigns. I think as a principle that is a concern, notwithstanding that is the situation we have got to.
It is a concern to me, I guess, that what this legislation does is potentially only going to open us up to a constitutional challenge. The member for Brighton has a legal background; he has outlined his views. We have just been joined by the member for Malvern, who, I have said before, I am glad I am not following, because he is a former barrister and it would be like – who did I say at the time? – Justin Bieber following Pavarotti if I were to try and give my legal opinion versus that of the member for Malvern. But nonetheless I think there is a very serious risk that the legislation that is before us will be challenged again. In fact it is almost certain, from what I am hearing, and that is about this issue of entrenchment. The additional public funding for administration of the parties, including independents, in this legislation I think will go to that to a degree.
I have not had time to read the second-reading speech, because we only got it an hour ago. We certainly have not heard from anyone on the government side justifying why the public funding for administration needs to be increased. But I think that in itself will be a concern for the High Court in terms of making sure that we have equality of opportunity for all entrants, new or otherwise, when it comes to running elections.
I have said before that when it comes to support from the public – whether it is corporations, whether it is individuals, whether it is workers or whether it is small businesses – they often will support the candidate or the political party that they believe supports them. I remember many years ago an independent – an independent who represented Gippsland East actually – having a crack at the Nationals for supporting the timber industry because we got a donation from the Heyfield mill. I remember pointing out to a journalist at the time that perhaps the Heyfield mill supported us because we support the timber industry. That is actually how it works, and that should be the case in a free and fair democracy where people are entitled to literally put their money where their mouth is.
Members interjecting.
Danny O’BRIEN: I am hearing a little bit of caterwauling starting from over there, but it is exactly the same reason that the Labor unions support the Labor Party. They take their members’ money and make no bones about the fact that they are there to support the Labor Party. They want to see a Labor Party in government, and that is entirely up to them. Where it gets tricky under this legislation and under the arrangements that this government has put together is that we now have a situation where exactly that will happen. Unions will be able to continue to support the ALP through affiliation fees, but we on this side of Parliament will not get that same opportunity. I know members of my party have a view on this. Repeatedly they ask me, ‘Hang on, isn’t it true that the Labor Party can still get affiliation fees from the unions and we can’t get donations above what is now going to be $7500?’ The answer to that is yes. That is not free and fair, so I do not know how in a legal sense that can be allowed to be the case. That is a concern when it comes to it.
It is often suggested that the parties of the right get all the big corporate money. Well, I can say from the Nationals’ perspective that is not the case. Yes, we have supporters, and we have corporate supporters too, but predominantly our elections are run and supported by locals, by local small businesses and by some medium businesses. As I said, they are people who support the ideals of our party, and they should be able to continue to do that. They are considerably constrained in doing that by the laws that were brought in, as I said, by the former Premier after the 2018 election, and those laws were clearly flawed. They were thrown out by the High Court, and my concern is that this legislation will go the same way. It is setting up an unfair situation where the Labor Party gets its dues from the unions, literally, and the rest of us are constrained by these new laws.
There is one aspect that I will give credit to. It is relatively minor, but it has been a considerable issue, and that is the issue that the Liberals and Nationals run joint upper house tickets in three of the regions in Victoria, and on the public funding that comes to the parties from that, we actually had to take the Victorian Electoral Commission to court to get access to our share of it. We had an agreement with the Liberal Party as part of the coalition arrangements, and the VEC said, ‘No, we can only pay it under the act to the Liberal Party.’ Naturally we had an arrangement, and it was agreed. That public funding was delivered to us, but we actually had to go to court to have that upheld. I believe new section 228(4) in this bill does address that, so that if there are joint parties, whoever they might be, running on a joint ticket, they can provide correspondence to the VEC indicating an agreed share of public funding as a share of the vote that is received and that will be delivered to those parties. That is the one good thing in this legislation that the Nationals will certainly be happy to see addressed.
I think the government will be standing here today – and we have already heard it from the member for Preston – talking to us about integrity and telling us this is about ensuring the integrity of elections, when we have seen one of the least ethical governments in our history. With the issues that we have seen in recent years, in particular with the Big Build, where a blind eye has been turned, it is absolutely hypocritical for the government to now be standing here and lecturing us on integrity, particularly in a circumstance where the High Court judgement was on 15 April and we are now on 3 June and this is being rushed through in a day without proper scrutiny and anyone having the opportunity to address this. We will oppose this legislation, and I think the High Court may well do so as well.
Sitting suspended 1:00 pm until 2:02 pm.
Business interrupted under standing orders.