Ever wondered why politicians didn’t get hot under the collar over the cash for comment scandal? You know, the one where Alan Jones and John Laws got caught red-handed selling their “opinions” to the highest bidder.

Two reasons. The big two shock jocks are powerful and the pollies won’t take on power, in whatever form it takes. They’d prefer to kowtow to it. Underlying this, however, is the fact that the major parties sell access for cash, and, in many cases, are mere salesmen for the interests which fund them. Big companies sponsor their annual conferences these days, and in return get private hearings with the salesmen who’ll represent their interests to the detriment, if necessary, of the public interest. They also sell access at fundraisers.

Here’s a sample of the evidence at the Independent Commission against Corruption hearing into the ‘Oasis” development yesterday. Gary McIntyre, the Bulldogs bloke who was having trouble getting State government help to make his venture super-profitable – ie more pokies and a transfer of Crown land – gave evidence of a conversation he had with one Arthur Coorey, a bloke with, they all say “impeccable Labor connections”.

“I had heard rightfully or wrongfully that donations had been made by the hotel industry prior to the last election…and they had been going alright.”

“He (Arthur) said to me: ‘Well, if you give a million dollars to the party you’ll probably also get what you want at Liverpool.”

The Herald’s CBD business column revealed a corker of cash-for-access abuse last week, an abuse so prevalent that the pollies don’t even make a secret of it any more. Andrew Refshauge is the NSW deputy premier and the planning minister, the one who’s been falling over himself to win back public support for Labor since Cunningham. He announced recently that he’d “call in” all sensitive coastal development to ensure our coastline got the protection it deserved. And we know from Alvin Stone’s piece in Rage in the suburbs that Refshauge as planning minister can and does declare many projects of “state significance” thus overriding local councils and local communities to get them happening, whatever the cost to the community.

So he’d want to appear independent so the public could confidently trust that his judgment would be made on the merits after taking into account all relevant facts, wouldn’t he? Not on your life.

CBD, last Friday

That well-known leftie, Deputy Premier Andrew Refshauge, is getting back to basics for his latest fundraiser next week.

The event is being held at that well known Bolshevik hang-out, Aria, at a very proletarian $1250 a head.

That other well-known eastern suburbs socialist (when he’s not a socialite flirting with the property market), Dr Robert Hampshire, is organising the do, along with the help of the former secretary of the NSW Labour Council, Michael Easson.

Left-wing location, left-wing price and left-wing organiser. How very convenient. Refshauge is also in charge of planning in NSW, which is why it makes sense to have a property developer plan the do.”

So what do you do? Kick out the Labor Government and put in John Brogden’s Liberals to clean up NSW and deal the public back into the game?

You’ll get more of the same if you do. On Wednesday the Herald blew the lid off the carefully constructed good-guy image of Liberal leader John Brogden, showing he’s just as much part of the disintegration of trust in the political system as everyone else.

The people vote in politicians and they pay them well. Brogden, as an elected representative, let alone a major party frontbencher, now leader, is supposed to represent them full time, carefully weighing competing interests to produce a result on the merits. It is imperative that he not be paid by anyone else. So what does Brogden do?

At a time when he was in the most sensitive portfolio possible, that of planning, he signs up with Price Waterhouse, earning $25,000 a year – $110,000- between 1997 and 2001 – for what? Something “very minor”, says Brogden, “just general public affairs advice”. Money for nothing, John? Spare us. It sounds to me like Price Waterhouse bought the Brogden name cheap to parade him at cocktail parties to enhance the power and influence of the Price Waterhouse brand.

The conflict-of-interest perception problems are legion. I’m not saying Brogden was corrupt in any way, but he’s bound to get caught out on perception. The Herald reported that as planning spokesman he asked two parliamentary questions about a development with which Price Waterhouse was involved.

If that’s not bad enough, John Brogden, front-man for an Opposition looking to win government by exploiting the failings of a pro-developer ALP and convincing voters he’ll do the right thing by them, didn’t tell the truth in his pecuniary interest register.

The regulations for declaring pecuniary interests state that MPs must declare income with a “description sufficient to identify the person from whom, or the circumstances in which, the income was, or is reasonably expected to be, received”.

Pretty simple really – make your disclosure transparent so any potential conflicts of interest are fully revealed. Brogden’s response? He declares “dividends from shares” from his family company Northmist. Price Waterhouse paid Brogden through Northmist. Brogden’s ‘disclosure’ was meaningless.

Then, after a journalist started nosing around last year, Brogden changed his declaration to read “consultancy income from Price Waterhouse Legal through Northmist”. He revealed yesterday that straight after becoming leader in a coup, he sought advice from a top barrister on whether he was obeying the disclosure rules. Why not tell the whole truth, John? You afraid of something? The last refuge of a bloke with something on his conscience is to bring in the lawyers and argue technicalities.

So, the alternative premier of NSW supplements his income with an ill-defined consultancy ripe with conflict of interest problems then avoids his ethical obligation to disclose it to the people who voted for him.Do you trust this man?

The Brogden scandal comes hot on the heels of Labor protecting one of its ministers, Eddie Obeid, from any consequences for multiple, serial failures to fully disclose his company interests for several years. First Carr scuttles a full investigation by an upper house committee, then he accepts Obeid’s latest apology. This is the same Eddie Obeid accused before the Independent Commission gainst Corruption of offering to fix problems with the Oasis development in return for a $1 million donation to the ALP. He denies it, but Carr has not even seen fit to stand him down until the inquiry reports. To top it all off, the bloke who Carr chose to lead the charge against Brogden in Parliament yesterday was none other than Andrew Refshauge!

The contempt with which Bob Carr treats the people of NSW is breathtaking, but is Brogden a viable alternative?

Liberal voter Noel Hadjimichael calls for urgent action by both parties: “The reports about John Brogden’s consultancy fees require a quick and clear answer. The reports about Labor’s Mr Obeid’s family business dealings require some additional thoughts. If the Liberals want to be fair dinkum about transparency and governance they need to look at this issue as a priority. If Labor want to clear the decks before March 2002 they need to act now, before further ICAC time elapses. The major parties dominate only when voters are broadly accepting of their fitness to govern and their preparedness to take tough decisions.”

What can we do? All I can think of to lodge a massive protest vote. If a big slab of us vote for a community candidate we can look in the eye on the street and trust, or a Green who similarly passes the eyeball test, maybe we can frighten the majors into taking their responsibilities seriously. You’ve got a choice after that – to just vote one, or to preference either of the majors. I reckon the maximum impact play is to preference the party which DOES NOT hold your seat. We’d see a massive turnover of MPs, and the realisation by the majors that no seat is safe, that the right to represent people has to be EARNED.

Voters don’t ask for representatives who parrot their views. They want honest, untainted representation. As independent Peter Andren showed in his conservative federal seat of Orange, a minority view, sincerely held, is respected by the electorate, not punished. Peter opposed the post-Tampa refugee policy of Howard. He was returned with an increased majority in last year’s federal election. Peter is honest, intelligent, a strong local representative and a crusader against politicians’ rorts. He’s passed voters’ trust test, and he’s in for as long as he wants.

Is it possible to break through our malfunctioning – perhaps non-functioning “democracy” or do we give up? Webdiarist Jozef Imrich is a librarian who’s been interested in democracy and how to clean it up for a long time. He advises that a few people who care about this unfashionable topic have set up a website called www.opendemocracy.net as a forum for issues pertaining to campaign funding, electoral law and parliamentary and congressional ethics.

“Susan Richards, the editor-at-large is like you a fearless woman … (smile). Democracy, after all, is like woman’s work it is never done … as I am typing my wife is still pottering around and it is rather late …,” Jozef wrote.

The media must play a big part in trying to shame the bastards in charge of our political process into at least trying to restore trust. We’ve got to highlight all their excesses, all their institutionalised conflicts of interest, their capitulation to the interests of big business with big money. We’ve got to stop doing what we’ve been doing for a while – accept that this is the way the game is played and not write the stories any more, or the comment pieces, because it’s not NEW any more.

For a start, where do the majors get off banning cigarette advertising and sponsorship for everyone but themselves? Both parties take cash from Phillip Morris to sponsor their conferences and fundraising events. The Canberra Press Gallery should be writing yarns exposing the scandal of big companies “sponsoring” political parties, and editors should be campaigning on the topic. We’ve also got to get stuck into governments on their secrecy – the insidious practice of refusing to reveal information because it’s “commercial in confidence”.