The federal government and opposition have united to defend political donations as a necessity amid growing calls for reform.
NSW Premier Mike Baird will press for an overhaul of national election funding laws at the next meeting of federal, state and territory leaders later this year.
It comes as the federal government defends its handling of political donations following revelations that Clubs NSW gave tens of thousands of dollars to Liberal Party fundraising bodies while frontbencher Kevin Andrews was crafting poker machine policy before the 2013 election.
Independent MP Andrew Wilkie says the donations to the Victorian-based Menzies 200 Club, which supports Mr Andrews, were "no better than large sums of money changing hands in a brown paper bag in a developing country".
He wants an overhaul of the threshold and timing of declarations of donations.
The government's suggestion that its policy was not influenced by the donations was "patent nonsense", he said.
"The bottom line here is no one hands over very large sums of money without expecting some sort of return," Mr Wilkie told ABC radio.
"It's not necessarily an immediate return on that investment but they do expect, eventually, a good return."
Mr Wilkie says gambling lobby groups donated large amounts of money to all parties ahead of the 2013 election, after which "modest" poker machine reforms of the previous parliament were quickly overturned.
Independent Senator Nick Xenophon and the Greens have also called for reform.
Opposition frontbencher Matt Thistlethwaite said the $13,000 disclosure threshold for donations was too high.
Labor's national conference at the weekend backed an overhaul of the rules around political fundraising, including a cap on campaign spending, a $1000 disclosure threshold and more taxpayer funding.
But Mr Thistlethwaite agreed with government frontbencher Alan Tudge that political donations were a necessity.
Mr Tudge said donations were part of "political expression" and the alternative of publicly funded campaigns would be unpopular.
"I'm not convinced that the Australian public would necessarily support that, because I'm not sure if they want to be providing the public funds to political parties to run political ads and to put mail in their letterboxes," he told Sky News.
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