God Dolly. The parliament is only just sitting now, but we have already lived three lifetimes this morning.

There are also reports a deal has been done on Labor’s electoral reforms, between the government and the opposition (no surprises there, because it largely disadvantages independents and minority parties) so we will bring you more on that very soon.

For a refresh on why these changes (to call them reforms would imply they are good) are not great for democracy, here are some of the concerns with the bill as it was presented:

Among the concerns with the bill are:

  • The extreme haste shown by the government in introducing and trying to pass the bill. Four in five Australians (81%) agree that major changes to electoral law should be reviewed by a multi-party committee, which has not happened.
  • The caps on political donations are per “party” (or per independent candidate) but what Australians think of as political parties – like the Liberal, Labor, Greens and National parties – are actually groups of parties, each party in the group being able to receive donations up to the cap. This would limit the ability of independent candidates, new political parties, and political campaigners to fundraise, while leaving established parties much less constrained.
  • The nominated entity exception to donation caps intended for the major parties may in practice allow a billionaire-funded minor party to escape spending limits.
  • In exchange for having their fundraising limited, established parties and incumbent MPs would receive tens of millions of dollars more in public funding; in some cases, far more than the political donations that they are missing out on. Independent candidates, new parties, their candidates and political campaigners would receive nothing to compensate them for lost revenue.
  • The bill would also limit spending on election campaigns. In practice, independent candidates will be far more limited in their spending than party candidates.