This little piggy bank likes donations
The Redlands has experienced rapid development over the past few decades. We are currently going through the process of preparing a new City planning scheme known as City Plan 2015. Discussion about the amount and type of future residential development is hotting up. There is some concern about the transparency of planning decisions at the state and local level in Queensland.
Can we learn from NSW?
In NSW it is illegal for property developers to make political donations. These laws were introduced in 2009 to reduce the risk and perception that developers could get favorable decisions by donating money to politicians. Former NSW Premier Nathen Rees explained why he introduced these laws in the Sydney Morning Herald where he said that the people of his state were:
entitled to a planning and governance system free of innuendo and corruption. Nothing corrodes public confidence more than a belief that favourable decisions can be bought. It is the definition of corruption.
Investigations by the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) have resulted in some members resigning from the NSW parliament after admitting to receiving illegal donations – in brown paper bags.
What about political donations in Queensland?
Is there any reason to believe that the property development industry in Queensland is different to the industry in NSW? Are there fundamental differences between politicians north and south of the Tweed?
Queensland has no laws which ban developers from making donations to state or local politicians. Should we follow the lead of NSW and ban developers from making political donations?
Have your say in our poll.
[yop_poll id=”2″]
We think it important to note that polls of this nature only reflect the views of people who choose to participate. In this respect they are different to statistically valid polls which use random sampling.
Poll Results
The poll was open for 13 days and during this time 154 people voted on the question:
Should Queensland ban developers from making political donations?
| Votes | % | |
| Yes | 143 | 93 |
| No | 11 | 7 |
| Total | 154 | 100 |
The results show that a resounding majority of people who responded support the idea of Queensland following the lead of NSW and banning developers from making political donations.Redlands2030 will be making our state parliamentarians aware of the community’s wishes.
Please note: Offensive or off-topic comments will be deleted. If offended by any published comment please email thereporter@redlands2030.net
Should political donations from developers be banned ? is the pope catholic? am I good lookin’? well… two out of three isn’t bad
PS I’m not good lookin’ (I gave that up for Lent, last year. well maybe a little longer).
My view is one person one vote…all votes are equal. PS many developers don’t live in the Redlands. And, what’s more No businesses are on the electoral roll….. could that be to ensue equal say? 😐
It seems to me that we could tackle the problem of vested interests trumping the interests of citizens by changing the voting system. Ted Mack gave a fantastic talk on Radio National Big Ideas. The talk is available on audio called “Ted Mack: Time for major reform of the way we do government”. It can be downloaded at http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/bigideas/time-for-major-reform-of-the-way-we-do-government/5064518. It is quite long so make sure that you have plenty of time to listen to the whole talk.
No they should be enabled but all political donations from any person group or company should be made to a treasury trust and a single anonymous cheque combining all donations made over a period from there to the party nominated. There should be no trace back to the individual making it.
Ian ,
I guess it all depend on how you view the principles of democracy.
Again one man one vote all are equal is key.
The mathematics laws that under pin such a principle is that with total participation the decision will be determined at a minimum of the average + ONE. Logically this results in the middle and that it serves the majority of people or at least the majority can live with. i.e. the extremes cancel each other out.
What democracy isn’t or shouldn’t be is a profit or power centre, both these favour minorities and as such are UN( non)democratic for the whole populous by definition.
Clearly the much hysterically cried ” the tyranny of the mob” is utter nonsense.
Tyranny can only exist in the absence of true democracy.
One of the tools of tyranny is mass misinformation (emotional spin…fear) pick any political communication (?). Anyone who is an objective observer would note that elections are built on mass negativity and fear… or meaningless motherhood clichés. Ergo the more money the easier/greater the deception. As a consequence the less accountable the local member becomes and the more beholden to the party . And in turn the party to undemocratic interests via funding and access to the media.
e.g. who amongst us really wants a religious ideologue ‘stick in the mud’ who’s more interested in telling other levels of government how they should run than influencing the party at his level for us.
In reality he has no say in other levels and apparently little in his.
Likewise why should we tolerate a serial philanderer who if he betrays his family how much concern do you think he has for people he doesn’t know if their interests get in the way of his ‘career’.
Objective thinking dictates that in the absence of centralised ‘special interests’ ( read undemocratic) funding the funding from the equal man and therefore reliance… accountability would be.
And who wouldn’t want their representative to be more accountable to us than a machine party power or special interest?
Hence All donations should be limed to that which the average man can afford. But most importantly they should come from a ‘ personal verified account‘ to your anonymous treasury account et al.
PS The same logic applies to ANY and ALL parties and interest groups including unions, party biased (stink um ) think tanks, foundations etc.
I look forward to being proven wrong 😐
oops it should read all donations should be limited……….
It could certainly help the Redlands, but it must be open and above board and no behinnd closed doors decisions
All donations should be made public whether from property developers , unions or interest groups and even individuals. We as the voting public should know who is supporting our politicians . And not just published on the back pages of some unread document but openly declared by the politician and political group.