Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is not my first speech. I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Finance and the Public Service (Senator Cormann) to a question without notice asked by Senator Waters today relating to the Lobbying Code of Conduct.

I asked about the revolving door of lobbyists and politicians. It has been a very well used revolving door, and there has been a litany of examples. I asked the minister why, despite the fact that there have been at least 11 breaches that have been identified by the Auditor-General in a report done earlier this year, is the Lobbying Code of Conduct still not enforced? Why is it so toothless? Why is it being ignored by the Prime Minister?

Unfortunately, I didn't get an answer to that, except to say that the minister thinks it is being well-enforced. He said he didn't know about the examples and, really, without knowing about the examples how could he do anything about it? I would suggest that the minister and his representative go and read the Auditor-General's report. It's not that long; I've just had a great flip through it myself. In fact, it says that the Prime Minister and Cabinet's 'delivery of a low level of compliance activity' is one of the key points. So here we have a damning report from the Auditor-General saying that the Lobbyist Code of Conduct is deliberately only enforced with a low level of compliance. The minister thinks that's not a problem, and apparently the Prime Minister's not going to do anything about it.

The whole reason for us being concerned about this revolving door of lobbyists and politicians in this place is the wholesale takeover by big business of our democracy. We have a litany of examples of it. We have the donations that are flowing regularly and generously to both sides of politics from all sorts of industries with vested interests: mining, gambling, property development, alcohol—you name it. We have no federal anti-corruption body, no ICAC, so there is no enforcement of any sort of rules or codes of conduct that apply to us. We have codes of conduct for ministers and lobbyists that are weak and not enforced so it's pretty clear that big business has simply hijacked our democracy. In fact, I have a motion coming up for debate later today which urges some tightening up of those codes of conduct and some motions coming up tomorrow. Unfortunately, I'm not holding my breath that we'll get any support because it's a very cosy and convenient relationship for both the government and the opposition to have this revolving door of lobbyists in and out of their doors and then in and out of cushy roles post politics.

I next asked the minister why some National Party executives, the key decision makers, are being paid simultaneously as lobbyists to influence this government's policy and why didn't anyone have a problem with that? And why can't this government see that is contributing to the lack of confidence that Australians have in their government? Is it any wonder the community feels their views are not being represented in this place? They're not being heard; their voices don't matter. Their interests are not the first concern of government. It is really clear that people think these vested interests are running the show. And the reason they think that is because it's true. We have these pathetically weak rules which allow big business to run the show and we have sadly both sides of politics very happy for that charade to continue. The minister's response to 'How can we trust the government when it is being run by big business?' was he didn't accept the premise of the question and, sadly, he didn't engage further or really give anyone confidence that isn't the case.

The last part of my question related to the fact that the banks are obviously now being investigated by a royal commission and yet we still have banking lobbyists walking these halls, having access to government ministers, cosying up, lobbying for goodness knows what—lighter treatment of the royal commission findings. The government are still writing their response to this royal commission. It is still effectively on foot and yet you have these lobbyists continuing to ply their wares with direct access to ministers. It is completely wrong. It is an abomination of democracy. We had one of the banking execs make a very bad joke at the mid-winter ball about his lawyers having cleared him to be there. This is just emblematic of the sickness at the heart of our democracy, when it has been taken over by these interests, when lobbyists can walk these halls with very little regulation and virtually no enforcement of what weak regulation does exist.

The minister's response to that was very distressing. According to him, lobbying is legitimate; it operates with transparency and integrity. I am afraid the Auditor-General would beg to differ and most Australians I speak to would beg to differ. They can see that our democracy is being sold out to corporate interests. They want their democracy back. They deserve to be represented in this place and they deserve to have the interests of themselves and their families and the environment that sustains them put ahead of the corporate interests of the donors and lobbyists that are in the hip pocket of this government.

Question agreed to.