Helen Clark says the public wants to know 'who is pulling strings'.
Helen Clark says the public wants to know 'who is pulling strings'.
KEY POINTS:
The Government is confident it will win wide parliamentary backing for a clampdown on anonymous political donations and third-party election campaign financing.
Prime Minister Helen Clark yesterday said the Cabinet was still considering options for election financing reform and was discussing these with other parties.
The Government hopedto introduce legislation next year and Helen Clark was confident there would be enough support to pass it.
"I'm absolutely confident of that," she told reporters.
"I think the public wants to know who is funding political parties. They want to know who is pulling strings, if they are pulling strings through funding. [Nicky Hager's book] The Hollow Men really puts the focus back on that issue."
State funding was one option.
"I would think that a lot of people have worked out that if anonymous donations are clamped down on there will be fewer donations. At that point the issue of transparent public funding comes into the picture."
She said officials had been drawing ideas from Australia, Britain and Ireland, which had tighter laws than New Zealand.
Labour was still considering whether it would lay complaints in relation to election spending breaches it believed The Hollow Men had revealed.
