Last week Liberal Party MP Christopher Pyne was warmly congratulated by a his colleagues after delivering his kick in the guts for the Labor Party through the report into the integrity of the electoral roll.
In the long term, though, the Liberals might rue the day.
The setting up of the inquiry by the joint parliamentary committee on electoral matters was from the outset and exercise in embarrassing Labor. The inquiry was spawned by an earlier inquiry by Tom Shepherdson, QC, in Queensland. Shepherdson looked at Labor’s pre-selection rorts. Labor had been caught because it had earlier attempted to clean up branch-stacking by using the Commonwealth electoral roll as a new “clean” verification procedure for people voting in party pre-selection ballots to ensure they lived in the electorate. Alas for Labor, it did not anticipate the determination of rorters who then put outside people on the Commonwealth electoral roll fraudulently so that they could still rig pre-selection ballots. The Shepherdson inquiry exposed them.
This in turn led the federal government to opportunistically set-up of the inquiry that was headed by Mr Pyne. The Pyne inquiry would keep the matter of a Labour Party electoral skulduggery in the public eye for as long as possible. The coalition had not got much mileage out of the Shepherdson inquiry at the time because of the politically astute dealing with it by Queensland Premier Peter Beattie.
It was a Coalition beat up because the Labor Party rorting would have had no effect on any federal or state election as the number of people fraudulently put on the Commonwealth electoral roll was too small. They were only put there to a rig a small pre-selection ballot within that the Labor Party. Twenty people could do that, but would have no effect on any seat at a federal election. That did not deter the Coalition.
Having looked at the electoral roll, the Pyne inquiry sought to further embarrass and upset the Labor Party with a couple of recommendations under the heading “regulating political parties”. One was to suggest that the Australian Electoral Commission conduct internal elections for political parties and at the other, more damning for Labor, said:
“That the Commonwealth electoral Act 1918 be amended to insure that the principle of one vote, one value for internal party ballots be a prerequisite for the registration of political parties.”
The Coalition wants to rush this recommendation into legislation as soon as possible. (And the Democrats will support it because their history has a commendable streak of promoting electoral fariness). The requirements sound innocuous enough, but for Labor it is an unmitigated horror. Labor, alone among the major parties, does not have a principle of one vote, one value for internal party ballots.
To quote the Australian Labor Party constitution: “In all states the state conference shall comprise not less than 50 per cent nor more than 60 per cent union representatives and not less than 40 per cent or more than 50 per cent constituency party representatives. . . . All bona-fide unions shall have at the right to affiliate to the ALP. . . . Each state and territory branch should develop an equitable basis of determining union entitlement for representation at state level party units. . . . This shall not prevent state branches making reasonable special arrangements for the representation of small unions. . . . It shall be a the right of each union it to determine the criteria and procedures for selection of its delegates. . . . No less than one third of the combined base and supplementary component of each state delegation shall consist of the women.”
That does not seem to be one vote, one value. Unions can arrange their own form of election for delegates. Moreover, union affiliates get a guaranteed number of delegates irrespective of how many members of the Labor Party they have as union members. It obviously gives the leadership of affiliated unions far greater power in the Labour Party than ordinary members. Further, the provision of a guaranteed female percentage of delegates and pre-selections is contrary to one vote, one value.
If a Labour keeps this constitutional set-up, it faces the prospect of not being able to register as a political party under the Commonwealth Electoral Act, under the Coalition’s proposed legislation. That would have three dire consequences for Labor.
If a Party is not registered, it cannot receive public funding. Nor can it cannot put its name besides its candidates on the ballot paper. And it cannot nominate all its candidates in bulk. The last is a mere administrative convenience. The first two, on the other hand, were Labor Party babies in the early 1980s. Both helped the Labor vote. Public funding was promoted as a counter to the power of rich corporations which gave to the conservative parties. Public funding has grown like topsy. Last election it came to $1.62 per vote cast. It totalled $34 million. Labor’s share was $14 million. That is a huge incentive for Labor to comply with any new registration provisions.
Indeed, the public funding might well outweigh the contribution of the unions to Labor coffers. More significantly, if Labor tried to impose one vote, one value in internal ballots of its own volition, the unions might well respond with a withdrawal of funds in fit of pique. But if it were done as a result of Coalition arm twisting, unions might well understand and continue with their financial support of Labor.
When one considers the electoral strife that being beholden to the union movement has caused Labor, being rid of the block union the vote might make Labor a better party. The Arthur Calwells, Wayne Berrys and Barrie Unsworths of the Labor Party – – people seen as a heavily connected it to the union movement – – were, for that reason, almost unelectable.
And if Labor is made more electable, it would fit Labor’s history since 1996 – virtually the only things that have made it more appealing to the gernal voter have been various male fide actions of the part of the Howard Government.
It may well be that the Liberals will put into effect the badly needed reform of the Labor Party that Labor was incapable or unwilling to do itself.