David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Trade and Tourism (Senator Farrell) to a question without notice asked by the Leader of the Australian Greens in the Senate (Senator Waters) today relating to political donations.

We've just seen in the referendum campaign some of the worst abuses of political messaging—active misinformation and active disinformation being driven by the proponents of the 'no' vote in the referendum campaign. It was literally straight out of Donald Trump's playbook, and it was funded by corporate interests and unknown sources that pumped out on social media across the country plain straight lies about the referendum, plain straight lies about the legal impact of the changes and repeated lies about the opinions of First Nations peoples.

We've just seen a little insight into what the next federal election will be like in this country unless we take a step and put in place truth-in-political-advertising laws. Almost nine out of 10 Australians, 87 per cent, support truth-in-political-advertising laws. They do so because they're sick of being lied to. They do so because they want laws that hold the political class to account. When Minister Farrell, representing the Albanese government, was asked what is the government's view on truth in political advertising—does the Labor government align with the nine out of 10 Australians who want truth-in-political-advertising laws, or does the Labor government align with the forces who want to have another mis and disinformation campaign of Trumpian proportions in the next federal election?—the minister squibbed it and said, 'Oh, there's consideration of truth-in-political-advertising laws.'

Why did the minister squib it? Because there is very likely cooking up as we speak a deal between the Labor Party and the coalition to change our political donation laws, to change our broader electoral laws, so that they can continue to receive bucketloads of corporate donations, so that they can continue to hide the sources of the money with loophole after loophole—dark money from cash-for-access events, political front groups and other undisclosed sources—and allow that money to continue to find its way through dark and grubby paths into the bank accounts of the Labor Party, the Liberal Party, and the National Party, and to also come up with a scheme that'll see the Labor Party and the Liberal Party get extra public money and not close any of the loopholes.

Of course, we know what the price for the coalition is for entry into that little deal—it's don't touch truth-in-political-advertising laws and it's don't touch our corporate donations. That's a real threat to democracy right now. It's a threat to the fundamentals of an open democratic system when two players with such an obvious conflict of interest—they're already in receipt of bucketloads of corporate donations and already working the system to get dark money to come into their campaigns—sit down again to cut another deal to shut down the moves that the Australian public want for truth in political advertising and to find new pathways for dark money and corporate donations to fund their campaigns going forward.

There's a real choice for the Labor Party now. Does the Labor Party want to fundamentally reform our laws, to close the disclosure loopholes and to have genuine real-time disclosure in the lead-up to the next federal election? If you do, the Greens are here and I know the progressive crossbench are here to make that law as soon as possible. If the Labor Party want to get rid of the misinformation and disinformation, to have laws that hold politicians to account for lying and to de-Trump our politics, there's a pathway there too with the Greens and the progressive crossbench. Tragically, it looks like the pathway that Labor is choosing now is instead through the coalition—the kings and queens of misinformation and disinformation and their corporate mates. You choose.

Question agreed to.