Strengthening the ICAC & NSW Integrity

1.1. A watchdog funded by the people it watches

For most of its life, the ICAC's budget has been set through the ordinary annual budget process — controlled by the executive government of the day, the very institution the Commission exists to scrutinise. The funding-pressure critique is well documented:

· In 2020 the NSW Auditor-General found the funding arrangements for the state's integrity agencies presented risks to their independence[i]

· The same year the ICAC itself reported specially to Parliament, arguing that executive-controlled appropriations were inconsistent with its independence[ii]

· Parliamentary committee reviews have pressed the same point; recent budgets have improved matters, but the safeguard still does not sit fully in legislation[iii]

A corruption watchdog should never have to ask the government it is investigating for its next meal.

1.2. Reports that arrive after the moment has passed

High-profile investigations have taken years between public hearings and published findings:

· Delay blunts accountability, because findings land after the political moment has passed

· Delay is also unfair to those under investigation, who live under a cloud without resolution

· Delay is usually a resourcing and process problem — which makes it fixable

Justice delayed is accountability denied — and fairness denied, in both directions.

1.3. Influence in the shadows

The ICAC's own Operation Eclipse report examined the regulation of lobbying, access and influence in New South Wales and found the framework wanting[iv]:

· The lobbyist register captures third-party lobbyists but leaves most in-house lobbying invisible

· Ministerial diaries are published only quarterly, in summary form, months after the meetings

· Sanctions for breaching the lobbying rules are weak and rarely felt

Influence that cannot be seen cannot be scrutinised.

1.4. The revolving door

Ministers, staffers and senior officials continue to move — sometimes within months — into lobbying roles and industries they recently regulated. New South Wales already restricts former ministers from lobbying for eighteen months, but the rule is narrow, covers only some of the players, and is lightly policed.

Public office is a trust, not a training placement for the industries it oversees.

1.5. Grants as party favours

The Stronger Communities Fund controversy showed how discretionary grant schemes can be bent to political ends: the Auditor-General found serious failures of process and record-keeping, an upper house inquiry reached scathing conclusions, and pork-barrelling was famously defended in public life on the basis that it was not illegal[v][vi]. The ICAC has since reported to Parliament that pork-barrelling can amount to corrupt conduct[vii].

· Guidelines existed, but were not binding when it mattered

· Decisions diverged from official advice without documented reasons

· The money flowed disproportionately to favoured electorates

"Not illegal" is the lowest bar in public life. New South Wales deserves better than the lowest bar.

1.6. Whistleblowers still carry the risk

The Public Interest Disclosures Act 2022 modernised NSW whistleblower protection from late 2023[viii] — a genuine step forward. But a scheme is only as strong as its practice: reprisal is hard to prove, careers are quietly ended, and agencies mark their own homework.

The pattern is consistent: our integrity rules are strongest where they matter least, and weakest where they matter most.

2.1. Defend the institution — because it works

The ICAC was established in 1988 under the Independent Commission Against Corruption Act 1988. Its functions are to investigate and expose corrupt conduct in and affecting the NSW public sector — state agencies, local government and members of Parliament — to prevent corruption, and to educate[ix]. Its findings are findings of corrupt conduct, not criminal convictions; prosecutions are a matter for the Director of Public Prosecutions. Across three decades it has exposed serious corruption on all sides of politics. Our first commitment is the simplest: keep it strong.

2.2. Funding set by Parliament, not the Premier

We would legislate an independent funding model:

· A multi-year funding envelope set by Parliament on the recommendation of a parliamentary committee, not determined by the executive

· A guaranteed statutory baseline that cannot be cut mid-term without a parliamentary vote

· A standing, independently assessed mechanism for supplementary funding for major investigations

An independent watchdog needs an independent chequebook.

2.3. Jurisdiction protected, reports on time

We would oppose any narrowing of the Commission's jurisdiction — over MPs, ministers, local government or public functions exercised by private contractors. We would also support published timeliness standards for investigations and reports, resourced to be met, with a published explanation whenever they are exceeded.

2.4. Procedural fairness without defanging

Critics of the ICAC raise real concerns, and the honest response is to address them without gutting the institution. Public inquiries should continue to require a genuine public-interest justification, as the Act already demands. People drawn into investigations deserve timely notice, a fair opportunity to respond, and prompt communication of outcomes — especially those against whom no finding is made. What we will not support is "reform" that converts fairness into a shield for the powerful: gagging public hearings, shrinking jurisdiction, or routine political second-guessing of the Commission.

Fair process and a fearless commission are not alternatives. New South Wales must insist on both.

2.5. A lobbying register with teeth

Consistent with the Commission's own Operation Eclipse recommendations[iv], we would:

· Extend the lobbying register to in-house and peak-body lobbyists, not just third-party firms

· Publish ministerial diaries monthly, with meaningful detail on who met whom and about what

· Attach real sanctions to breaches, including suspension and removal from the register

2.6. Close the revolving door

We would broaden post-separation employment rules to cover ministers, senior staffers and senior officials moving into roles that trade on their former office — with meaningful cooling-off periods, independent enforcement, and published rulings so the boundaries are clear.

2.7. Take the pork out of the barrel

Recent reforms made the state's grants administration guide mandatory — a start. We would put the substance in statute:

· Published eligibility and assessment criteria before any grant round opens

· Merit assessment by officials, with any ministerial departure from that advice documented and published within thirty days

· A standing Auditor-General audit program over discretionary grant schemes

Public money is not campaign money. The rules should make the difference impossible to blur.

2.8. Back the whistleblowers

We would fund agencies to implement the Public Interest Disclosures Act 2022 properly, support independent oversight of how disclosures are actually handled, and back practical protection — because every serious corruption scandal in this state was known to somebody long before it was known to everybody.

Integrity is not a left–right issue. It is the precondition for everything else government does — and the Australian Democrats exist to keep the bastards honest.

The claims on this page draw on the public record, cited below so you can check our work — the same standard we ask of government.

[i] Audit Office of New South Wales: The effectiveness of the financial arrangements and management practices in four integrity agencies — performance audit report (2020)

[ii] ICAC: special report to the NSW Parliament on the need for a new, independent funding model for the Commission (2020)

[iii] NSW Parliament, Committee on the Independent Commission Against Corruption: reviews of the Commission's annual reports and funding arrangements (various years)

[iv] ICAC: Operation Eclipse report on the regulation of lobbying, access and influence in NSW (2021)

[v] Audit Office of New South Wales: Integrity of grant program administration — performance audit report (2022)

[vi] NSW Legislative Council, Public Accountability Committee: inquiry into the integrity, efficacy and value for money of NSW Government grant programs (reports, 2021–2022), with contemporaneous Sydney Morning Herald reporting on the Stronger Communities Fund (2020–2021)

[vii] ICAC: report to Parliament on pork-barrelling and the discretionary allocation of public grants (2022)

[viii] Public Interest Disclosures Act 2022 (NSW); NSW Ombudsman guidance on the new public interest disclosures scheme (2023)

[ix] Independent Commission Against Corruption Act 1988 (NSW); ICAC, "The ICAC's role", icac.nsw.gov.au