David Pocock (ACT, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I stand to speak in support of the Electoral Legislation Amendment (Fair and Transparent Elections) Bill 2024 (No. 2), which is co-sponsored by Senators Waters, Lambie and Thorpe. Beyond these co-sponsors, this bill has broad support from much of the crossbench. Along with an identical bill introduced in the other place, this bill has the support of no fewer than 29 MPs and senators. I want to give particular mention to Kate Chaney, the member for Curtin. Ms Chaney has worked tirelessly on drafting this bill and on pushing the government to undertake critical electoral reform. The 29 of us are just the most recent parliamentarians in a rich history of crossbenchers pushing for electoral reform, recognising that we have an incredible democracy in this country and that we can and must improve it.

For decades now, the crossbench has recognised the deep and significant flaws in our electoral laws and the need for reform. Following years of advocacy, the government has indicated that a package of reforms is finally coming, and I am grateful to Minister Farrell for his engagement on this issue and for the Labor Party's agreement that the territories are underrepresented in the Senate. I look forward to working constructively with the government on electoral reform.

This is a bill that seeks to restore trust in our democracy. At its core are four fundamental principles: transparency, truth, minimising financial influence and ensuring a level playing field. Building from these principles, the bill delivers on what Australians want to see in their democracy. Voters deserve to know who is funding their candidates before they vote. Voters should be protected from outright lies in political advertising. No individual should be able to influence the outcome of an election. Voters deserve a competitive choice in candidates, and new challengers should have a fighting chance to get their message to voters so our democracy can continue to evolve.

I know and acknowledge that the government accepts many, if not all, of these propositions. Again, I would like to thank the Special Minister of State for his work on electoral reform. I think I can speak on behalf of the crossbench in saying that we stand ready to work constructively and in good faith to deliver electoral reforms that strengthen our democracy.

One of the concerns of the crossbench is to ensure that electoral reform maintains a level playing field and does not entrench incumbency. We have a competition problem in this country; this has been well canvassed in the Senate. From supermarkets to banks to airlines and many other markets, we're dominated by large players that freeze out challengers, and the result is higher prices, less choice and ultimately a broken market. In many ways, our democracy is no different. Until recently, the dominance of the two major parties was near absolute. But Australians want change. They want challengers with bold ideas and the energy and dynamism to pursue them. For the major parties, a more diverse parliament presents an opportunity to prove to Australians why they should stick with the majors. They should welcome the additional competition and use it to strengthen our democracy and our democratic institutions.

But I'm concerned that increased democratic competition is not being seen as an opportunity by all. I'm concerned that it is being seen as a threat. In embarking on electoral reform, I urge the major parties to put the health of our democracy ahead of self-interest. Electoral reform must not benefit incumbents and major parties at the expense of challengers, small parties and Independents. Overdue reforms to things like fundraising and spending at elections must not be shaped to the advantage of big party machines in order to disadvantage dynamic new players.

Our communities want to see a reduction in the power of big money in our political system; that much is clear. No-one thinks it's good for our democracy when someone spends tens of millions of dollars to influence an election. That's why the bill introduces a major donor cap, preventing anyone from donating more than two per cent of the total public funding from the last election. What I hear from members of the community I represent is that they want big money out of politics in Australia, but they also want more transparency around who is spending money to fund political parties.

Transparency in political donations at the federal level is currently a joke. Some $259 million have poured into political parties in the last financial year, yet we know very little about the sources of much of the funding. In fact, the source of 27 per cent of Labor's income is unknown. That's roughly $23 million worth of dark money fuelling their political machinery. The coalition, not to be outdone when it comes to raising cash, received some $27.5 million in dark money. Even if we just look at the roughly $160 million in declared funding to the major parties, it's impossible to distinguish between political fundraising and other sources of income. Business forum memberships and fundraising dinners mean that Australians don't know who is buying access to their politicians. I argue that they have a right to know.

Over the last 20 years, 21 per cent of all private funding to the major parties came from undisclosed sources. When it is disclosed, the time lag before voters know who paid for election spending is as much as 18 months. This isn't good enough, and it is way out of line with community expectations. At a time when bank transfers are instantly visible for just about every Australian, an 18-month delay makes no sense. This bill fixes disclosure requirements so voters know who is funding political candidates in time for it to inform their decision at the ballot box. I'm hopeful that this sort of transparency will be adopted by the government in any upcoming reform.

But voters deserve more than just transparency; they deserve truth. Elections in Western democracies are becoming increasingly vulnerable to the influence of bad actors telling outright lies. In the last election I was subject to a malicious campaign from the group Advance Australia, who manipulated a photo of me to make it look like I was part of a political party. The photo was then plastered all around Canberra in an attempt to discredit me. These kinds of lies are just the tip of the iceberg. AI is opening up a whole new range of possibilities for the creation of deepfakes and for other uses of generative AI models to mislead and deceive voters. To address this, the bill adopts a model of truth in political advertising used at the state level in South Australia. It's a model brought to federal parliament by the member for Warringah, Zali Steggall, in her Commonwealth Electoral Amendment (Stop the Lies) Bill 2022.

The government must act quickly to address the increasingly brazen lies told by those with little respect for our democracy, and this bill proposes a model that we know works. While the bill does not specifically address the use of artificial intelligence to create deepfakes and voice clones, I urge the government and the Senate to deal with this issue as a matter of urgency and rule out the use of deepfakes and voice clones in elections. Our democracy is too precious to allow this level of deception, as has been seen in elections around the world.

I want to end by speaking to a section of the bill particular to the ACT and the Northern Territory. At our national birth in 1901, part II of the Constitution set out that each state was to be provided an equal number of senators. A significant reason for this was the need to safeguard smaller jurisdictions against being dominated by a democratic majority. This is why there are as many senators for Tasmania in this place as there are senators for New South Wales, despite Tasmania having about seven per cent of the New South Wales population. This was a wise decision from the authors of our national birth certificate. It means that, despite representatives of smaller states being vastly outnumbered in the other place, the Senate offers protection to these smaller states from decisions that threaten their interests.

But territories are not afforded the same protection. In 1975 a deal was struck to grant two senators to each territory. It was a political deal based on a calculation that each major party would get two more representatives, but the calculation did not address the core question of what baseline level of democratic representation is appropriate for the territories in the Senate. It overlooked a deeper consideration of the appropriate balance between federalism and representative democracy. As a result, territorians are denied protection and our legislatures suffer from interventions from the federal government.

The historic violations of territory rights are a stain on our democracy. Here in the ACT, we suffered 25 years of discrimination that prevented territorians from accessing voluntary assisted dying. Someone who lives in Tuggeranong should have the same say about their community and life as someone who lives across the border in Queanbeyan, but, until just recently, this was not the case, and I thank senators on all sides of this chamber for their support in legislating the Restoring Territory Rights Bill in late 2022. But attempts from this chamber to reach into territory issues continue. Less than a year ago, we had the Australian Capital Territory Dangerous Drugs Bill 2023 before the Senate. That bill was yet another attempt to prevent the ACT government from making laws that impact ACT residents only.

This federal overreach has to stop, and part of the solution is providing territories fair representation right here in this chamber. This bill would provide territories with half the number of senators of the states. In doing so, it strikes the right balance between federalism and representative democracy and would finally provide territorians the safeguard we deserve. Any electoral reform package from the government must include improved territory representation.

Our electoral laws underpin every decision made in this chamber. They determine who makes these decisions and who can influence the decision-makers. We know that trust in our democratic system has been declining not just here in Australia but globally. To rebuild this trust, we must ensure that voters believe their representatives are making decisions in the public interest, in their interest. This bill seeks to inform the conversation that I hope will take place between the government, the coalition and the crossbench on how to achieve this. With the support of dozens of crossbench members and senators, the bill represents a model that we hope can be built on. But, in doing so, I again urge the government to be mindful that Australians want to see more diversity and competition in our democracy. This is a very good thing that we should embrace. Electoral reform that seeks to entrench the incumbency advantage and lock out new entrants is not in line with community expectations. Australians want our democracy to flourish with additional competition and more diversity, greater transparency, and protection against lies. Again, I thank the crossbench for their work on this bill and acknowledge crossbenchers who have come before us and have pushed this for decades. I commend this bill to the Senate.