Thursday, 18 August 2022

Ministers statements: political donations

Mr PEARSON (Essendon—Assistant Treasurer, Minister for Regulatory Reform, Minister for Government Services, Minister for Housing) (14:07): I rise to speak on, you guessed it, Victoria’s donation laws, because pleading ignorance is not an option, even if some members of the house might think it is. As I informed the house yesterday, there are a few simple rules surrounding the disclosure of donations. These rules are so simple that it is safe to say if you were to dodge the rules, it would be obvious that it was a deliberate attempt to rort the system.

You can disclose a donation by heading to the Victorian Electoral Commission website. Once you are on the website you can head to the disclosure page. You can then choose to view donations by financial year. Each disclosure item gives you detailed information about the donation. It gives you, for example, the suburb, the state, the party, the recipient, the date and of course the amount of money. You can find similar information on the Australian Electoral Commission’s website, and if you were to do so, you might stumble across some familiar names when doing such a search on the AEC website. Here is an interesting one—a donation of $100 000 from Jayburn Pty Ltd in 2017 to the Liberal Party. Who was the secretary of Jayburn Pty Ltd in 2017, I wonder? It was Mr Jonathan Munz. Now, $100 000—that number and that name sound very familiar—could it be that this was the same Liberal donor that the Leader of the Opposition tried to enter a dodgy deal with? Let me take you back to the VEC website. In 2021 a donation of $4000 was made from GSA Capital Pty Ltd. Who is the secretary of GSA Capital? Again, Mr Munz. So can the Leader of the Opposition answer this: is there anyone not on these lists that should be?

Members interjecting.

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for South Barwon is warned.