A new report from the Grattan Institute has highlighted that Tasmania, once again, has some of the weakest mechanisms in place to ensure public money is not being misused.
The report found Tasmania had such poor rules around governments spending on political advertising that it could not even compare Tasmania with other states around the country.
Last year the Liberals spent $43 million of public money on advertising, which is $25 million more than was spent in 2014.
While not all this spending is illegitimate, there have been clear cases here in Tasmania of the Liberals using public money for political advertising.
Jeremy Rockliff and his Government must commit to a complete and thorough overhaul of the rules and oversight for Government advertising. These measures could be an annual auditor-general review, an independent reviewer, a 6-monthly report to the Parliament, and legislative reform, to name just a few.
Jeremy Rockliff must act now to ensure public trust can be restored in the State Government, because so far that trust is just being eroded further.
Failure to do will raise further question marks about Premier Rockliff’s promise he would lead a government with integrity.
Ella Haddad MP
Shadow Attorney General
