Steph Hodgins-May (Victoria, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the Lobbying (Improving Government Honesty and Trust) Bill 2025 and commend Senator David Pocock for bringing it before us today. When each of us enters public office, we do so to represent the communities, our constituents and the concerns of Australians, who entrust us to act with integrity, accountability and transparency in this place. We have no mandate to serve the corporate interests of Woodside, Santos, Sportsbet, Pfizer or Lockheed Martin, yet the current lobbying regime gives precisely those interests disproportionate access to decision-making through a weak code of conduct, with minimal to no consequences for poor behaviour, undisclosed ministerial meetings, minimal oversight of sponsored parliamentary passes and a revolving door between government and industry spinning unrecorded and unchecked.

I heard the government quote Transparency International. I'm also going to quote some of their figures. Transparency International Australia's recent analysis shows the Commonwealth ranks near the bottom amongst Australian jurisdictions on transparency, enforcement and anticorruption measures, scoring just 17 out of 100. There is no independent federal regulator to enforce lobbying rules. Over 700 registered lobbyists, more than triple the number of elected MPs, operate with minimal scrutiny. The Centre for Public Integrity has shown just how deep the link between lobbying and donations runs in this country. Political donations from lobbyists have risen more than 500 per cent since the late 1990s, spiking into the millions during election years. Most of this money flows unchecked through donations and backroom access.

Speaking of backroom access, the revolving door between this place and cushy jobs is bipartisan and systemic. Both Labor and Liberal former ministers regularly transition from regulating industry to working with it, raising legitimate concerns about conflicts of interest. Simon Birmingham, finance minister until 2022, is now the CEO of the Australian Banking Association, just three years after overseeing the very industry he now represents. Ian Macfarlane, industry minister until 2015, joined Woodside almost immediately after leaving office, following nearly every former resources minister into the fossil fuel sector. Josh Frydenberg, Treasurer until 2022, is now chairman of Goldman Sachs Australia and New Zealand. And, just recently, the Australian Financial Review reported that ADNOC, the United Arab Emirates state owned oil company, hired Prime Minister Albanese's former chief of staff to advise on its Santos takeover bid, while Peter Dutton's former chief of staff joined lobbying firm TG Public Affairs. These aren't isolated cases. How do you think this instils confidence in the public that we are in here representing their public interests?

These cases form a pattern. Ministers and senior advisers are moving straight from regulating industries to profiting from them, while the public is left in the dark. Yet, despite all this capital, we have a weak lobbying code with virtually no enforcement. Since 2013 there have been at least 14 confirmed breaches of the federal lobbying code, yet not a single sanction issued. Breaches have been handled informally, with no penalties beyond a slap on the wrist.

That is why the Greens acknowledge the measures proposed in Senator David Pocock's bill. We must strengthen lobbying rules by expanding the register to include in-house lobbyists. We must improve transparency, restrict gifts and conflicts of interest, and extend cooling-off periods to close the revolving door between politics and industry. These steps are long overdue and would bring Australia a step closer towards international best practice. Countries like Ireland, Canada and Scotland already adopt many of these standards. The proposed measures in this bill would move the dial considerably on honesty and trust, but of course much more is needed to truly shift the balance of power in our democracy towards genuinely representing the public interest. Transparency and accountability matter—of course they do—but transparency without structural change still leaves corporations with outsized power to shape laws and policies.

We must take on the fossil fuel giants and gambling companies that are holding entrenched influence over both major parties here in this parliament because, frankly, what we are facing is state capture. Nowhere is this clearer than the fossil fuel industry's capture of successive governments in this country. In the Australian Democracy Network's report Confronting state capture, they write:

The fossil fuel lobby has been an aggressive and ubiquitous presence within Australian politics for as long as these industries have existed. Its present form has been shaped in opposition to the growing urgency of the climate threat since the late 1980s, with the coal industry joined in recent decades by the rapid growth of the export gas industry.

Within this report, a fossil fuel lobbyist themselves is quoted as saying:

We know more about energy policy than the government does. We know more about industry policy than the government does. We know where every skeleton in the closet is—most of them, we buried.

This capture permeates law, policy, media and culture from all angles: laws cracking down on climate activists who dare to speak the truth about these industry giants, fossil fuel companies sponsoring community infrastructure to brand themselves as good corporate citizens, and media outlets captured and funded to run favourable stories. Over the past decade, tens of millions of dollars have flowed from the oil and gas industry to politics in donations, sponsorships and membership fees, targeting both major parties to block climate action, to weaken environmental laws and to delay meaningful reform.

How can we write strong and bold climate policies when Labor alone received almost $800,000 from fossil fuel companies in the last reporting period, when former ministers walk into fossil fuel board rooms, and when corporations are handed the pen to draft policies that don't just ignore the climate crisis; they actively accelerate it? And, I might add, we are still waiting for Labor to disclose their latest political donation figures. How much has the Albanese government taken from fossil fuel companies this time, just as they prepare to decide on critical policies like our 2035 emissions targets? The Albanese government must open its books.

To confront this deep and entrenched state capture, we must not only rein in lobbyists but also level the playing field, making space for grassroots voices, community advocates and scientific experts, who too often get crowded out or just simply ignored. I meet daily both here and back in Victoria with tireless community representatives. Just yesterday I met with the AYCC, the Australian Youth Climate Coalition, and Seed Mob, a group of ferocious young activists pushing this government towards bolder action. I hear from healthcare and consumer groups, multicultural communities, researchers and lived experience advocates. Their voices are vital, yet too often they are ignored, encounter closed doors or are pushed aside by corporate interests.

Meanwhile, well-resourced corporate actors book out calendars, set agendas and secure influence—whether it be through an expensive lunch or a ticket to a box at the footy. This isn't democracy. It's corporate dominance at the expense of the voices of people who have the solutions to the problems that we face and, frankly, deserve to have a seat at the table and to be listened to. We can and should do so much more. We can require full disclosure of all legislative consultation, including who is being consulted, when and where the gaps lie. We can prioritise and properly resource community advocates. We can listen to and adhere to science and expertise by establishing a parliamentary office of science and technology. We can support participatory forums such as citizens juries, public assemblies and community panels. We can consider restrictions on success fees and industry rent-seeking. These reforms shouldn't just be viewed as nice to haves; they are essential to a well-functioning democracy.

If we're to have a fighting chance against the might of the fossil fuel, gambling, weapons and pharmaceutical industries, we must enact structural changes that shift the scales in favour of the broader public interest. Transparency alone is important but won't be enough. Real reform must create space for community voices and grassroots advocacy to have genuine access to decision-makers so that public policy reflects the interests of Australians, not just the balance sheets of corporations. These steps would begin to restore balance in our democracy and give the public a fighting chance to have their voices heard and acted upon.

I must say, we're off to an appalling start in this term of parliament. The Albanese government is now seeking to charge for freedom of information requests and is refusing more Senate orders for documents than the Morrison government. It has already become an administration of secrecy. But we can turn this around. We can make the 48th Parliament one of openness and fairness, and the Greens stand ready to work with the government to strengthen our democracy and transparency measures, as we do with the crossbench who have brought this on today.

We can build a democracy that works for Australians and not corporations. We can create a parliament where laws and policies reflect the voices of communities, not the balances of fossil fuel corporations, gambling giants or other entrenched corporate interests. That is the democracy Australians deserve and that is the democracy the Greens are committed to building.