The Queensland Parliament has passed a series of legislative reforms that will require the real-time, online disclosure of electoral donations during council elections.
The new reforms will also prevent incorporated associations from receiving or holding electoral campaign funds which are intended for a member’s benefit.
The reforms outline that a candidate’s dedicated account can only be used for gifts or loans and electoral expenditures, a measure that is hoped to make it easier to trace campaign expenses. Any unspent campaign donations in a candidate’s dedicated account must remain in the account for a subsequent election, paid to a registered charity or to a political party.
Deputy Premier and Minister for Infrastructure and Planning Jackie Trad said she believed the new reforms would make significant headway into improving transparency and accountability in local government.
“The passage of this legislation ensures full disclosure of campaign donations during local government elections so Queenslanders know who they’re voting for when they go to the polls,” Ms Trad said.
The LGAQ is supportive of the new reforms but believe the same transparency should be applied to nominating candidates through the implementation of a register of interest for new candidates.
LGAQ Advocate General Manager Sarah Buckler wrote to the then Minister for Local Government Jackie Trad earlier this year expressing LGAQ's desire for increased transparency and accountability around local government elections to ensure the community knows exactly who they are voting for.
"I know the Palaszczuk Government shares the LGAQ's desire to have the local government sector as open and transparent as possible...our joint efforts to increase transparency and accountability would be reinforced by making it mandatory for anyone seeking to nominate as a candidate for local government election to submit their register of interest at the time of nominating," Ms Buckler said.
Minister for Local Government and Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Partnerships Mark Furner said the changes to the Local Government Electoral Act 2011 were a direct response to recommendations made by the Crime and Corruption Commission’s (CCC) report in 2015 on transparency and accountability in local government.
“The focus of the CCC’s report was on local government election donations, not registers of interest,” Mr Furner said.
“The new requirements for dedicated candidate campaign accounts were a key recommendation of the CCC to make it easier to track campaign expenditure and were backed by the independent Review Panel which reviewed the CCC’s report.
“Independent candidates have the option of retaining any unspent money in their dedicated account for future campaigns or donating the surplus funds to a registered charity of their choice.
“Fully self-funded independent candidates are able to deposit money into their dedicated campaign account as required, and therefore are unlikely to have any unspent funds in their dedicated account after polling day,” Mr Furner said.