KEY POINTS:
It always makes me cringe a little when journalists start "exposing" payments to political parties from businessmen and implying that the recipients are automatically the kept puppets of the donor.
What then does that make every television or print reporter who takes a free travel trip, reviews a free book, or flies off to Sydney, courtesy of a record company, to do puff pieces on visiting celebrities?
We don't live in a perfect world.
As far as politicians are concerned, there is a simple solution for those of us who fret about their dependency on top-ups from commercial sugar daddies. It's state funding.
I don't recall a clamour in favour of that. But if the media want politicians to be hermetically sealed from outside tainting, yet at the same time have adequate resources to be well informed, and able to get their messages out, what other solution is there?
At the risk of sounding hypocritical, I admit a certain delight at Winston Peters' latest discomfiture.
But that's because he's consistently denied taking the dirty dollar and baubles such as free helicopter rides, when the evidence is there for all to see, that the opposite is true.
The latest revelations have United Future leader Peter Dunne in the gun too for receiving a $5000 donation from a fishing mogul, in 1999, after he voted to oppose some arcane United Nations proposal to restrict international fishing.
Mr Dunne says now there was no connection between the donation and party policy. To an outsider, it seems a very cheap price to pay for one's integrity if it were true.
Of course Mr Dunne, or "Peter Dunhill" as he's mockingly referred to by anti-smoking lobbyists, has been dogged for years for his pro-tobacco industry voting stance.
In October 2003, Green Party leader Jeanette Fitzsimons tried to table a letter from British American Tobacco to Mr Dunne, which said "Paul Adams has asked me to send you the enclosed £100 to help pay for your Awayday. I do hope you will enjoy yourselves."
The letter asked him to "get receipts for your expenses and pass them on to the driver - even large companies have to account for their money. Enjoy your visit to England."
Mr Dunne told Agenda the money was for a very pleasant lunch on an old country pub on a private trip and that "we've never been offered tobacco company money". Asked if he would take it if offered, he replied "If people want to give us funding we accept funding on a no-strings-attached basis."
It's the same message delivered by every party - except, perhaps, the Greens, who are made of sterner stuff than the rest.
Of course if we're concerned about the petty cash that flows into the coffers of the political minnows, how about the millions that have flowed into the Big Two parties over the years, mostly unaccounted for?
The much criticised Electoral Finance Act was aimed at stamping out the laundering of large donations through anonymous trust accounts and "third party" campaigners.
It was a reaction to the $1 million Exclusive Brethren pro-National campaign in 2005, as well as the $1.7 million that was anonymously donated to National through trust funds, and the $300,000 Labour received.
The most recent Electoral Commission summary of donations suggests the EFA has worked, that the $20,000-plus donors have just disappeared into the night. Either that or they've resorted to posting $50 bills anonymously day and night to their chosen party since the law came in.
As of two weeks ago, according to the Elections New Zealand website, National has received just two donations in excess of $20,000 this campaign - $30,000 cheques from both leader John Key and the Road Transport Trust.
Act got $100,000 cheques from new list candidate John Boscawen and from Roger Douglas' old Rogernome mate, Alan Gibbs. Labour has registered no $20,000-plus donations. The Greens have six supporters, including co-leader, Jeanette Fitzsimons who have exceeded the $20,000 trigger point.
So what's happening? The lack of advertising and campaign literature over the past few weeks suggests the simple answer might be the correct one. That the damaging spotlight on big donors has burned them off. Even big companies have backed away.
On Monday, the Greens called for even tougher funding rules as part of its open government policy. They want the source of any donation over $1000 named, and a cap of $35,000 on any one donor or entity.
They want a register of lobbyists and who their clients and lobbying methods are. They also want partial state funding as "insurance against ... parties becoming captured by wealthy vested interests ... "
It's time we took these ideas seriously.
But that's not going to happen while it's easier to take potshots at Winston buzzing about overhead.
