The party room might sign off on anti-lobbying legislation as soon as Monday. It was going to consider it this Monday, before the parliamentary session was postponed. It'll be dressed up as a move against foreign influence. Every organisation that gets even some of its income from overseas (GetUp gets 3 per cent of its income from overseas) would be prevented from spending more than a certain amount on political advocacy during the lead-up to elections. It echoes the Transparency in Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Act introduced by Britain's Conservative prime minister David Cameron. That act bans spending above a threshold during the 12 months before polling day on activities that could be "perceived as intended to influence how people vote". Registered organisations have to keep records and face audits. The United Nations Special Rapporteur has described its effect as "chilling", saying many organisations opt for silence. Few people know exactly what's in Australia's draft bill prepared by Special Minister of State Scott Ryan, although the word is its provisions have been made extensive in the expectation the Senate will cut them back.

Australian charities are already (appropriately) limited in what they can do during elections. They are not allowed to promote or oppose a political party or candidate, but they are allowed to advance public debate, including "promoting or opposing a change in the law". They can put out scorecards, helping us work out how to vote, which is what some in the Coalition don't like. One minister is said to have been incensed at a mobile billboard that paraded around his electorate comparing his record of voting on the environment to the stance of the candidates that opposed him. Pew Charitable Trusts is an international philanthropic organisation, but in Australia is a registered charity that promotes Australia's Indigenous Ranger program. The government program creates jobs for locals to protect natural and cultural values of their lands. It's backed by both the government and the opposition. But if Pew was to go public during the next campaign about which side backed it most, it could fall foul of the proposed law. Or not. David Crosbie whose Community Council for Australia is running the Hands Off Our Charities campaign, says the proposed law's real power would lie in what it made uncertain. "Our concern isn't so much that it would mean Pew wouldn't be able to do its work, although it would be bizarre to stop people advocating for Aboriginal rangers," he says. "It's that every charity would be asked those questions about what it did, and would be inclined to pull back. That's the chilling impact. If we don't want to be audited and don't want to be asked those questions, during the next 12 months or so we are going to have to shut up about housing or animal welfare or whatever it is we exist for. It would have an impact on all of us."

Which might be the idea. Quietly, with just as little publicity, the government has been moving against 'political' charities on another front. In April last year, a government-backed inquiry into the register of environmental organisations (there is such a register) recommended that environmental charities be stripped of tax-deductible status unless they spent more than 25 per cent of their income on "environmental remediation work". Organisations like the Australian Conservation Foundation would be allowed tax deductibility only if they cleaned up oil spills or collected rubbish in addition to doing what's most effective: lobbying to prevent the environment being damaged in the first place. Leading the push for the limit was the Minerals Council of Australia, whose members include coal miners and doesn't mind the odd bit of lobbying itself. If the government wanted to, it could do it now. It doesn't need legislation. And although it hasn't said what it will do, it might have started. This year, the 600 environmental organisations on the register were asked two new questions when they completed their statistical return. The first was how much of their income was spent outside of the country. The second wanted their spending divided by categories, among them "campaign/advocacy" and "on-ground environmental remediation". Loading

Because many don't keep those sort of records, many didn't answer. But down the track they might be made to, under the threat of having their charitable status stripped from them. That's if the government doesn't back down, which given its political problems it might well do. But it's instructive to look at what some of its members would like to do if they could. They would like to narrow the number of voices out there at election time, to make it harder for us to choose.