Is Australian democracy eroding?

Across the world, concern about democratic backsliding – the erosion of democratic institutions and civil liberties – is growing.

It has become a live issue even in established systems, where erosion can often occur through the steady degradation of institutions and processes.

A recent report by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) highlights the role of parliamentary processes in this dynamic.

The core insight of this report is deceptively simple: parliamentary rules are not just procedural technicalities. They are often important institutional guardrails for democracy.

The IDEA report identifies several ways in which these guardrails can be undermined. Governments may compress legislative timelines, limit debate, or curtail committee scrutiny in ways that reduce the capacity of parliaments to perform their core functions. Procedural tools – for example, control over the legislative agenda or the structuring of committees – can be used to entrench executive dominance.

These insights resonate in how democracy in practised in Australia. There is a growing chorus of concern – from academics, research-based organisations such as the Centre for Public Integrity, professional bodies such as the Law Council of Australia, and non-government parliamentarians – that the Australian parliament is being undermined in different ways. As a result, policies and accountability are suffering.

Law-making with little parliamentary oversight

A first area of concern is the heavy reliance on executive law-making with little respect for parliamentary oversight. This was particularly apparent during the COVID pandemic, where governments understandably required flexibility to respond to rapidly evolving circumstances.

The Senate Scrutiny of Delegated Legislation Committee’s inquiry showed how easily significant executive lawmaking was undertaken outside of parliamentary control. In just the first seven months of 2020, 249 legislative instruments were made. Of those, 48 — around 20% — were exempt from parliamentary disallowance (that is, the parliament cannot veto them). Experts queried whether such exemptions were required even in the context of the pandemic.

The committee also found reduced parliamentary sittings meant less oversight. The committee recommended stronger safeguards, including limiting exemptions and ensuring emergency instruments remain subject to scrutiny.

While executive law making is a necessary feature of modern governance, there are serious concerns when it happens without parliamentary scrutiny. The expansion of such powers raise questions about the balance between efficiency and accountability. These concerns were exacerbated within, but extend beyond the pandemic response.

Disrespect for parliament’s constitutional role

A second issue concerns the integrity of primary lawmaking processes. The Centre for Public Integrity’s recent report, Lawmaking with Integrity, documents a pattern of legislative practices that, while not unprecedented, have become increasingly common. These include

• compressed timeframes
• limited or opaque consultation
• the curtailment of parliamentary scrutiny in the name or urgency.

The Law Council of Australia has expressed similar concerns. In 2025, it too released a Best Practice Legislative Development Checklist.

A small selection of case studies illustrate these trends.

The first involves the passage of the 2025 reforms to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act. Concerns were raised about the limited consultation preceding introduction and the “urgent” progression of the bill through parliament before the conclusion of the Senate Committee inquiry – even before public submissions had closed. This required the suspension of the Senate Standing Order that requires committees to report on bills before passage.

The proposed 2025 changes to freedom of information laws provide another stark illustration of how parliamentary processes can be abused. The FOI amendment bill was developed with no public consultation. The government’s approach to the parliamentary scrutiny process did little to restore confidence.

The Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee inquiry was conducted by a government-dominated, government-chaired committee. Notably, it did not call a number of prominent expert submitters to give evidence.

Equally troubling, reporting later suggested that in seeking to secure passage of the bill, the government had offered additional staffing resources to the opposition. If this allegation is true, it raises serious concerns about the use of public resources in negotiating legislative outcomes.

Government dominance of parliamentary committees

A third area of concern, also highlighted in the IDEA report, is the functioning of parliamentary committees. Committees are central to the scrutiny function of parliament. Yet their effectiveness depends on their composition and operation.

Where committees are dominated by government members, or timelines are truncated, their capacity to perform this role can be diminished. This is why the Centre for Public Integrity has called for best-practice models that ensure at least integrity scrutiny committees are not government-dominated (which remains the norm across most Australian jurisdictions).

Government control of information

A further dimension of democratic erosion is the control of information. Parliamentary procedure also determines what information is available to the parliament, and therefore what scrutiny is possible. Parliament requires appropriate access to information to make laws and hold the executive to account. These functions are central to responsible government.

It is in this context that growing concerns about information control in Australia must be understood. There has been an increasing pattern of government resistance to providing documents to parliament when requested.

The Centre for Public Integrity’s 2025 report, Still Shrouded in Secrecy, documented a significant increase in refusals to comply with Senate orders for the production of documents. Governments are more frequently asserting broad public interest immunity claims and, in some cases, failing to provide adequate justification for withholding information. There is no independent procedure to very such claims.

Parliamentary procedure dictates how the parliament can respond to such refusals. To date, this has had limited success.

At the same time, concerns have been raised about the quality of information provided to parliament in the legislative process itself. In a number of cases involving complex and uncertain reforms, governments have declined to release the underlying evidence or legal advice informing legislative proposals. Instead, it has asked parliament, and the public, to accept assurances that appropriate advice has been obtained.

In at least one instance, such assurances have later been called into question.

Resisting backsliding

In Australia, what may be dismissed as procedural trends are actually concerning signals of democratic backsliding. In particular, the Albanese government, armed with commanding parliamentary numbers following the 2025 election, has too often used that position to undermine the constitutional role of the parliament as a legislative and oversight body.

A healthy democracy requires maintaining democratic guardrails. In the current environment, this will require vigilance. Civil society must be willing to call out poor process, and oppositions, minor parties and independents must be prepared to defend parliament’s role. Importantly, those within the governing parties must be willing to uphold the constitutional function of the legislature rather than acquiesce to the demands of leadership.