Michael Ronaldson (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Special Minister of State and Scrutiny of Government Waste) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the report.

In relation to that report honourable senators will be aware of my comments earlier in the week about the influence of the trade union movement on the ALP. The figures released by the commission on Monday showed that a staggering $4.65 million was paid by unions directly to ALP coffers. On top of that massive $4.65 million there was a further $6.1 million spent on direct political campaigning by the unions on behalf of the Labor government.

I have done a bit of work in relation to this and I have been asking myself for some time, ‘What’s the relationship between the Labor members and senators and their particular unions?’

Honourable Senators:

Honourable senators interjecting—

Michael Ronaldson (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Special Minister of State and Scrutiny of Government Waste) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was actually $5.1 million directed to the ALP. I looked at where the greatest union representation was in these chambers and where the dollars from the unions came from. The only one, interestingly, that seems to be getting a pretty fair deal is the TWU; the TWU is getting a lot of representation for not many dollars. But if you look at the graph it is quite remarkable; you can see the similarity between the graph showing the donations and the graph showing the membership of the trade unions. If you have a look at it you will see the shoppies, the TWU, the miscos, the AWU, the AMWU and the ASU and you will see that the two graphs are almost identical. So what this is telling us is that the influence of the union movement is directly related to the membership of the unions in this place. As I said, it seems that the TWU, for some particular reason—I am not entirely sure why!—is getting a fairly free run.

I want to talk about media reports on the influence of the trade union movement in relation to campaign finance reform. Just before I get onto that, the research that I did showed that the unions which have the largest number of affiliated senators in this place are the ones making the biggest donations.

I want to talk about the influence of the trade union movement on the Australian Labor Party, particularly in reference to the matters shown in that AEC report and in a general sense. Everyone, in this place and outside, knows that the Australian Labor Party owes—o-w-e-s—the trade union movement. And everyone knows that the Trade union movement owns—o-w-n-s—the Australian Labor Party. They are a wholly owned subsidiary of the Australian Labor Party. And the line that is run—that historically the corporate sector were bigger donors to the conservative side of politics, and that that was squared up by the donations of the unions—is now simply not true. If honourable senators want to look at the report they will see that it shows a consistent trend over recent times that the corporate dollars are flowing almost equally to the conservative side of politics as they are to the Labor Party.

During January it was reported, quite clearly, that something is going on in relation to campaign finance reform. Someone is trying to stop this occurring. There is a lot of media speculation—not driven by me but certainly supported by me—that the union movement had stepped in to ensure that campaign finance reform was put on the backblock because the union movement is not prepared to see its influence diminished by campaign finance reform.

I just want to quote from Eric Roozendaal, who was then the New South Wales Labor Treasurer. He said:

Severing financial ties would be a prelude to severing institutional ties between the Labor Party and unions. Unions and the Labor Party were forged together and we will stand together—no matter what.

He went on to say:

I understand the need to reform political fundraising and deal with the challenge of corporate donations ... but I’m concerned that when you start tampering with the relationship between the union movement and the Labor Party—

Michael Forshaw (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senator Ronaldson, your time has expired. I was trying to understand your earlier joke so I let the time run on a little bit. I am sorry. There are a lot of documents on the Notice Paper, and I understand there may be other senators wishing to speak. You can seek leave to continue your remarks, which keeps it on the Notice Paper.

Michael Ronaldson (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Special Minister of State and Scrutiny of Government Waste) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek leave to continue my remarks for a period of no longer than one minute.

Leave granted.

Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President, and I thank those opposite. It is the first week, and I think it is a marvellous gesture. I want to finish on this basis—and I will requote Mr Roozendaal:

I understand the need to reform political fundraising and deal with the challenge of corporate donations, but I am concerned that when you start tampering with the relationship between the union movement and the Labor party it becomes a precursor to eventually dismantling that relationship.

These, as well as my earlier quote about the severing of the financial ties, are the key words. The trade union movement is not prepared to sever these ties. Mr Roozendaal is happy to attack corporate donations but is not prepared to attack union donations. This is dangerous. We are now seeing campaign finance reform potentially being put on the backburner because the trade union—(Time expired)

Question agreed to.