Peter Andren (Calare, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I second the motion. I hope the opposition’s change of heart on allowances survives the next election. Incumbents will now be able to spend up to 20 per cent more on printed material, thanks to this increase in the printing entitlement, which could see MPs storing a war chest of up to $217,500, taxpayer funded, in time for next year’s election. Under the arrangement, MPs can now spend $150,000 a year, up from $125,000. As the member for Wills has just said, that $125,000—which I found absolutely amazing at the time, for its largesse—was brought in in 2001 after the former MP Mr Horne was caught out. Embarrassingly, it seemed that an individual had spent so much more than his entitlement. Of course, it was later revealed, as the member for Wills just pointed out, that 13 other members of the parliament at the time had spent way in excess of that amount. The double standards and the hypocrisy of that process were obvious to all and particularly the electorate, I must say.

Sitting MPs are able to have postal vote applications and how-to-vote cards printed under the entitlement, which basically means they have a couple of hundred thousand dollars advantage over other candidates, especially independents and minor party candidates. While I was listening to the start of this debate, I was completing a speech for an independent association conference in Canberra tomorrow, in which I was pointing out some of the important roles that non major party members of parliament can and should play in the system. But it is getting very hard for anybody to step up to the plate when there is $40 million worth of public funding. In addition, there are many millions, now, of undisclosed dollars and many millions of dollars of taxpayer provided allowances. They are called entitlements; I suggest they should be called privileges and we would then have this whole thing in the right sort of perspective. The barrier to anybody taking on this formidable process and having a go in our parliamentary system is beyond the means of ordinary people to overcome.

The printing entitlement is supposed to provide for the production of things such as newsletters, stationery and other items such as calendars for MPs to communicate their work to their electorates, not the production of party propaganda or election material. There are no enforceable regulations to ensure that the printing entitlement is not abused. There is only a convention that says that newsletters, for example, must deal with parliamentary or electorate business and not party business; but it cannot be enforced.

As an independent MP, I have no party business. The only thing I need to communicate to my constituents is the work I do in representing them. In the last financial year I spent about $45,000. Add to that $5,000 for letterheads, envelopes and calendars, and I am spending around $50,000 to $60,000 each year. What do party MPs do with the extra $100,000? They produce total party propaganda designed to blitz electorates, including areas with newly redrawn boundaries, where no sitting MP should be allowed to campaign before the dissolution of parliament and the abolition of the current boundaries.

The Labor Party, while opposing this regulation, is not so pure. There have been deals such as the allowance to print how-to-vote cards prior to the last election, which was part of a nudge-wink deal between the major parties that slipped out. I was alerted to the fact that it was happening. I had no indication that it was going to be available—and nor should it in any sense be available for the production of material that should be the responsibility of the parties, which now have many millions of undisclosed dollars; the limit is now $10,000 before a declaration of where the money comes from must be made.

And here we have the use of the lurks and perks of office to further try to cement and shore up the incumbency of the major parties. It comes with the use of staff during elections to help the members and senators up for election. It again highlights the need for a cap on the spend in campaigns, and for the spend of every individual candidate to be fully audited, so that the playing field can, marginally, be levelled to give people an opportunity to run for parliament without the massive advantage that endorsement by the party system provides.

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