{"id":20016,"date":"2023-02-02T00:28:52","date_gmt":"2023-02-02T00:28:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/?p=20016"},"modified":"2023-02-02T00:28:52","modified_gmt":"2023-02-02T00:28:52","slug":"big-four-reap-big-rewards-from-big-donations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/2023\/02\/02\/big-four-reap-big-rewards-from-big-donations\/","title":{"rendered":"BIG FOUR REAP BIG REWARDS FROM BIG DONATIONS"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>The Big 4 consultancy firms are amongst the biggest corporate donors to the LNP and the Labor Party over the last financial year. Together, PwC, Deloitte, EY and KPMG donated almost $860,000 to the two major parties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>PwC donated more than $246,000 to the major parties in 2021-22 and received Government contracts worth almost $600 million in the same financial year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>PwC was embroiled in a scandal in recent weeks after a senior partner, now no longer with PwC, was deregistered as a Tax Agent after sharing confidential information obtained while being consulted by the Australian Tax Office on changes to the tax system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThese political donations are more than just a case of you scratch my back and I\u2019ll scratch yours,\u201d said Greens Finance Spokesperson, Senator Barbara Pocock. \u201cIt\u2019s more like you scratch my back and I\u2019ll scratch yours and give you a Maserati!\u201d She said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve got to have a close look at the whole regime of outsourcing government work to private consultancy firms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWhat confidence can Australians have in companies who make large donations to political parties and then receive major government contracts?\u201d Senator Pocock asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThere are obvious conflicts of interest when the firms you hire as consultants are also major donors to your political party,\u201d she said. \u201cWe need to regulate political donations so that Australian voters can be confident that there are no conflicts of interest amongst companies taking Government contracts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWithout such action how can Australians be confident that our democracy is not for sale?\u201d Senator Pocock said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last week Senator Pocock called for a review of the Government\u2019s use of consultants and wants Labor held to its promise to reduce spending on external consultants.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Big 4 consultancy firms are amongst the biggest corporate donors to the LNP and the Labor Party over the last financial year. Together, PwC, Deloitte, EY and KPMG donated almost $860,000 to the two major parties. PwC donated more than $246,000 to the major parties in 2021-22 and received Government contracts worth almost $600 &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/2023\/02\/02\/big-four-reap-big-rewards-from-big-donations\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;BIG FOUR REAP BIG REWARDS FROM BIG DONATIONS&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aussie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20016"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20017,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20016\/revisions\/20017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}