The centre’s submission,released exclusively toThe Age,welcomed Labor’s “improvements” including a donation cap of $4000 (now $4320) over four years. But it said campaign spending caps were needed to “encourage elected members to represent their constituencies’ interests … rather than focus on raising campaign funds”.
Victoria’s dollar-per-vote public funding system is meant to reduce the risk of corruption. But the centre’s research director,Catherine Williams,said that without electoral expenditure caps,public funding would not dampen demand for private money to fund increasingly expensive campaigns.
“Appropriately designed expenditure caps will ensure that dollars cannot speak louder than ideas in Victoria,and our political aspirants are truly competing on a level playing field,” she said. Victoria and Western Australia are now the only states without electoral spending caps.
Analysis by the Centre for Public Integrity shows that when the other states introduced caps – including NSW in 2010 and Queensland in 2011 – there was a notable decline in campaign spending.
Other experts including University of Sydney constitutional law professor Anne Twomey also support spending caps and warn that without them,politicians are tempted to do deals to raise funds.
“If donation caps reduce the size of donations,but expenditure is unlimited,it creates an environment that encourages corruption and the avoidance of legal constraints to maintain high levels of expenditure,” Twomey said in her submission to the donations review.