The power to provoke, stir, enlighten, amuse or simply provide a different perspective in a single picture is unique to cartoonists, who have a range of weapons photographers do not.

But the editor of a collection of the top Australian political cartoons for 2014 has warned the art form's influence is facing an inevitable decline.

"The editorial cartoon appeared as a newspaper phenomena, it's a creation of newspapers so I guess as newspapers decline this particular form of political satire will decline," Best Australian Political Cartoons editor Russ Radcliffe said.

"I can't see any way around that."

Radcliffe said it was an open question as to whether political cartoons generally have a huge impact anymore.

"George Orwell said every joke or every cartoon is a minor revolution, that might have been true in a more deferential age," he said.

"I don't think it's true these days, I mean the fact that you show Tony Abbott in budgie smugglers isn't really a great political statement.

"It would've incensed people to show Churchill that way in the 1930s or 40s."

When deciding which cartoons made the cut, Radcliffe said he looked for cartoons that packed a punch.

"Lazy cartoons will show the big bums, the big noses and will go for the cheap laugh," he said.

"I think a great political cartoonist may well use that kind of caricature but there will be a much more powerful message or ethical message in there as well.

"And those are the cartoons I most like to include."

He said while the internet had opened new opportunities for some, artists were finding it harder to make a living.

"I don't think newspapers are as committed to them as they used to be, I don't think they realise the value of them as much as they used to," he said.

"Cartoons are always at their best when they're next to serious reporting.

"They really complement that serious, rigorous, analytical journalism."

Budget, asylum seekers and ISIS dominate 2014

Jon Kudelka's satirical take on gender equity in the current administration. ( Jon Kudelka )

In a news sense, federal budgets come and go but this year has been different for several reasons.

As well as being the Abbott Government's first, it failed to get the required support in the Senate.

It has consequently become one of the biggest subjects in this year's collection of Best Australian Political Cartoons, drawn from newspapers, websites and magazines.

"If the budget gets more than half a dozen, or a dozen at the most cartoons, it's been a big year," Radcliffe said.

"This year of course, the budget's been such a huge part of the year and it's been part of the Government's failure, I suppose to sell its message.

"And once again, asylum seeker issues, it's an issue cartoonists always come back to."

The collection does not start from January 1, but from when the Liberals/Nationals took power, telling the narrative of the "political year".

Radcliffe said it was always hard to pick a favourite, but this year he settled on David Pope's Pinocchio cartoon published in The Canberra Times.

"He's one of my favourite cartoonists really, he's a much more cerebral cartoonist than a lot of other ones," Radcliffe said.

"His cartoons are always superficially funny and light but they always pack quite a punch.

"My favourite's on page 174, Tony Abbott went to New York and had dinner with Rupert Murdoch and Pope's done a take on the Pinocchio story.

"In some ways Pinocchio and the long nose is an old cartooning cliche that politicians lie and their nose gets longer, it's a tired old cliche but he tells the whole story.

"He's got Rupert Murdoch as the puppetmaster Geppetto, and Tony Abbott as Pinocchio.

"It's a beautifully drawn cartoon."

A close second was Bill Leak's depiction of Clive Palmer, who has cut a controversial figure in Australian politics since his election.

"Bill Leak in The Australian particularly has got stuck into Clive Palmer," Radcliffe said.

"There was this extraordinary moment when Clive Palmer shared a platform with Al Gore, and he shows the hypocrisy of Clive Palmer's newly-discovered environmental concerns, it's a very nicely drawn cartoon I think."

Radcliffe said child abuse also became more of a political issue because of the establishment of the Royal Commission, which has held hearings over the past 12 months.

Artist draws fire for Israel-Palestine conflict cartoon

The West Australian's cartoonist Dean Alston's take on ISIS in Iraq. ( Dean Alston )

Cartoons depicting ISIS were selected, but none concerning the conflict in Gaza.

The cartoon which itself generated news in Australia in 2014 — Glen Le Lievre's comment on the Gaza conflict published in The Sydney Morning Herald — is not included.

The journalist whose story ran alongside the cartoon, Mike Carlton, ultimately resigned.

"Most years there is something on Israel-Palestine, this year not," Radcliffe said.

"It's a very touchy subject, I think cartoonists have to be quite careful when they're drawing on it.

"The thing is Glen Le Lievre withdrew it from his website and it was withdrawn from a lot of places, that was the main reason I didn't use it."

But Radcliffe said he did not think the cartoon itself was "wrong" or misguided.

"I personally think it was a pretty reasonable take on the situation, it was a pretty good cartoon actually," he said.

"But the problem is whenever you're drawing anything to do with Israel, cartoonists have to be extra careful because they're stepping into a whole history of Jews and the way they've been represented, so every representation echoes one that may have been used last century.

"The main problem was probably the Star of David there rather than the Israeli flag, for me that might've been the only thing I would've been concerned about, in that it seems to tar all Jews with what happened in Gaza."