Greens' Larissa Waters wants to 'clean up' politics from the ground up

The party announced its plan on Thursday to create stronger integrity assurances in Parliament House.

Queensland Greens senator Larissa Waters said corruption needed to be punished but a complete overhaul was required to remove the conditions "that allow corruption and poor standards to flourish".

It comes after a number of scandals plagued Parliament's final sitting fortnight this year, including serious allegations of abuse by a senior government minister and a report suggesting a commuter car park grants program was determined by political pork-barrelling.

A 2019 federal election promise by Prime Minister Scott Morrison to establish a federal integrity commission is also becoming increasingly unlikely to be fulfilled as the days before an election are called are limited.

The Greens senator said it was time to clean up the house.

"Community confidence in political leaders is at an all-time low after years of scandals," Senator Waters said.

"Australians no longer trust the government to act in anything other than their own interests and the interests of their dodgy mates."

"Cleaning up politics is a big job and needs to start from the ground up. We need to catch and punish corrupt politicians, but we also need to remove the conditions that allow corruption to fester in the first place."

The plan focuses on tightening up rules during the election period along with lifting parliamentary standards and stamping out corrupt behaviours, including pork barrelling.

Caps on electoral spending, donations and bans on money from dirty industries have also been floated as policy reforms.

READ MORE:

A strong integrity body and proper funding and resourcing for the Australian National Audit Office is also pledged.

The Greens policy will also aspire to place restrictions on ministers working in industries they used to regulate within five years of retiring from Parliament.

Senator Waters passed a bill in the upper house two years earlier to establish an anti-corruption body with teeth but it has yet to be debated or voted on in the House of Representatives.

A separate, but similar, bill by member for Indi Helen Haines has also yet to be debated on after the federal government blocked discussion on a technicality in the final sitting fortnight.

"The Greens' National Integrity Commission is a gold-standard model that will hold politicians and public servants to account, root out corruption where it occurs, and protect those who come forward to report it," Senator Waters said.

"Everyone benefits from a culture of honesty, integrity, transparency, and accountability in politics. It's what people in Australia deserve, and only the Greens have a clear plan to deliver it."

But the Greens' influence in the 47th Parliament's will be hard fought.

Labor has repeatedly dismissed suggestion it would consider a coalition government with the minor party if it could win power over the lower house in its own right.

Both parties have suggested integrity bodies similar to the model used in NSW's ICAC.

Mr Morrison this week has suggested the NSW integrity body was more like a "kangaroo court" while publicly supporting suggestion former state premier Gladys Berejiklian could run for the federal seat of Warringah.

Ms Berejiklian is being investigated by ICAC after failing to disclose her relationship with disgraced former NSW MP Daryl Maguire while she was the state's treasurer.

In publicly-aired phone calls between the two politicians, Ms Berejiklian told Mr Maguire she would "throw money" at his Wagga Wagga electorate.