What is influencing our politicians? Uncover vested interests instantly.
There is no democracy without transparency.
Powerful corporations and lobbyists too often shape political decisions behind closed doors.
Alcohol and gambling companies shower political leaders with gifts. The same leaders tasked with creating laws that regulate those harmful industries.
Courtside seats. Grand final tickets. A seat at the table.
With greater transparency, we can begin to unpick exactly who influences our leaders.
That’s where Influence Engine comes in.
Influence Engine is a search engine. It automatically scans the Federal Parliamentary Registers of Interest every 24 hours and makes the data instantly searchable.
The Registers of Interest is where all federal politicians are required to declare gifts, hospitality and financial holdings that may be a conflict of interest.
Without Influence Engine, manually searching for this information would take hours.
The influence of billion-dollar corporations and their lobbyists casts a shadow over political decision-making. Influence Engine exposes this corporate lobbying to strengthen public debate.
Alcohol and gambling companies shower political leaders with gifts, treating them to exclusive seats at the AFL and NRL grand finals, Australian Open and Melbourne Cup.
These are the same leaders tasked with creating laws that regulate those harmful industries.
When we create greater accountability for our decision makers and transparency with the community, we build a stronger democracy.
Influence Engine makes sense of thousands of documents in the overflowing digital filing cabinet where politicians are required to declare gifts and conflicts of interest.
But, that doesn’t even capture the closed-door meetings, the lobbyists wandering the halls of Parliament House and the gifts that aren’t required to be made public.
Right now, the system favours industries with vested interests and big budgets to secure the time of our decision makers.
A strong democracy is one where every single voter is given the information to make an informed choice. Influence Engine makes that a little bit easier.
Have a question, issue or idea? Get in touch at [email protected]
Influence Engine was developed by FARE, in partnership with the Alliance for Gambling Reform with support from Mannifera.
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