Political lobbyists with unfettered access to Australia’s parliament to be publicly named

Political lobbyists with unfettered access to the halls of Parliament House – and the MPs who sponsor their passes – will soon be publicly identified in an online register, under a major shake-up of the pass system. Under the new rules, two MPs will need to sign for a lobbyist to register for a pass, with the primary sponsor responsible for their behaviour. It will also introduce fees for lobbyist and commercial passes. A letter, seen by Guardian Australia, will be distributed to federal parliamentarians on Thursday morning detailing the new rules. The changes drastically increase the transparency of the pass system, under which the public currently has no knowledge of who has sponsored a lobbyist pass, or how many passes an MP has sponsored. There were more than 2,050 sponsored passes for access to Parliament House as of mid-2024. It’s unknown how many of those were held by paid lobbyists. Sign up for the Breaking News Australia email The review of the policies governing access to the building’s private areas was conducted by the House speaker, Milton Dick and Senate president, Sue Lines. The prime minister wrote to them in March ahead of the review and suggested greater “transparency and rigour” of sponsored pass holders. …