Australia has hit a new low when it comes to corruption, according to Transparency International’s annual Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) released this week. It considers both rates of public sector corruption and the presence of systems to prevent corruption.
Corruption is an issue close to our hearts here at Crikey, and Australia’s failure to prioritise fighting corruption is a scourge on our democracy.
To make matters worse, there was a time, not so long ago, when we up there with the best…
2012
The first published CPI had Australia in a healthy position, ranked in seventh place with a score of 85 (Denmark, Finland and New Zealand were ranked No. 1). At this point, Australia and Norway were considered equals in the fight against corruption. Unfortunately this is where the country’s corruption trajectories diverge. The UK and the US held scores of 74 and 73, and ranks of 19 and 17 respectively, placing them at the lower end of developed nations.
2017
By 2017, Australia’s score had slipped dramatically to 77, leaving us with a ranking of 13 (New Zealand was still sitting in first place). Our decline was largely attributed to a failure to continue to develop systems for preventing corruption. While there was some variance in the intervening years, Norway held its score of 85. The US score remained mostly unchanged, but significant efforts by David Cameron’s government to introduce anti-corruption mechanisms saw the UK’s score rise to 82 and its rank to eight.
2021
In the current index Australia has continued to decline, dropping a significant four points to reach its lowest score recorded of 73, and lowest ranking of 18 (Denmark, Finland, and New Zealand are first — well done to our neighbours across the ditch).
Australia is now on the precipice of leaving the top 20. It has failed to make serious strides to prevent corruption, such as introducing an effective federal anti-corruption commission. Alongside the prevalence of various rorts and Gladys Berejiklian’s appearance before the NSW ICAC, the past 12 months have been a low point in Australia’s fight against corruption. Meanwhile Norway holds strong at 85 points, and is ranked fourth.
The US has slipped significantly, with a downturn that began during the Trump administration in 2017, and has continued to its current low point: a score of 67 and a rank of 27. This ranking places them below the United Arab Emirates. Similarly, much of the progress made in the UK has been undone amid Brexit and the Pandora Papers — although it’s still doing better than Australia at 78 points and a rank of 11.
According to Transparency International, 27 countries hit historic lows in their score on the 2021 survey. Nice to know we’re not alone.
