Bryce Edwards: Wouldn’t it be great if political parties opened their books

An unusual thing happened on Friday, when the National Party proactively released public information about financial donations it had just received. The party declared that its former deputy leader Paula Bennett had just raised $1.8 million dollars in donations from a handful of wealthy supporters. And she had raised the money in just three weeks. One donation of $250,000 was from New Zealand’s wealthiest man, Graeme Hart.

The unusual part was that the party was releasing the details of the large donations publicly and early, instead of just leaving it to be silently added to the register at a later date on the Electoral Commission website, which would be picked up by the media later down the track.

Normally parties are keen to downplay large donations from the rich. With public suspicions that political parties are beholden to and even corrupted by large donations, there is a reluctance to allow this information to be publicised.