I want to see a party (maybe the Greens) campaign strongly on public funding of political parties, which may go some way to ending political patronage and influence peddling on all sides of politics.
Bring in a rule that you can receive either your publicly funded pension OR continue to work, but you can't have both. Not saying their pension is gone, just that the argument years ago for politicians to be able to get their pension early was that after many years of public "service" they should be supported as they may have trouble getting a new job. If they're happy to continue working then they don't need that tax payer support.
Bring in some form of public record for when someone how previously held an elected position meets with a currently elected person. Should shine the spot light on how much access these people are being given.
Bring in an independent body that is charged with determining job hiring for public companies and overseas positions. I'm too sick of each party putting in an old colleague to lord it in London or New York at taxpayer expense. Bring in some public scrutiny to the process and have an open process to show that whoever is picked has been properly screened and was the best candidate to apply for the position. I'm also sick of jobs for mates as directors in public companies.
bring in a rule to stop members of a union or political party who serve at a high level - say anything higher than the equivalent of a branch leader - and especially anyone involved with fundraising or setting party policy should be banned from being appointed to any government funded position ie public company boards, audits / commissions.
Bring in a rule where a person who has strong views on a issue that is generally publicly known should not be appointed to a role where they receive a publicly funded position to determine policy in that area. How can the public have faith in the findings if it's well know the person leading the review already appears to have made their mind up?
I'm sure there's other ways to try and stem the flow of political patronage. At least shining a light on it and giving the public something to be angry over may make politicians at least rethink some of their actions, but from the feeble excuses we continually get over expense rorts voting them out may be the way way to really get their attention.
The stench of corruption is everywhere within politics these days. It's in the revolving door nature from politics to plum lobbying positions or board directorships. It's in the way each party hires from the corporate world those that align with their views so they can stack reviews to present the outcome they want. In a pluralistic society we should welcome the airing of opposing views as this helps keep tensions from becoming too extreme, and it also helps to avoid the mistakes of being too myopic on an issue.
Maybe we need to look towards the Swiss and their style of Governing where they have quarterly referendums. It's a lot harder to use corruption to your advantage when there's regular votes by the people on important public policy. Imagine if we'd been able to have a referendum on Work Choices, carbon Tax, Refugees policy, sending troops to Iraq II, PPL. WE might be able to stop some of the more extreme political blunders of our "leaders"