Cashed-up election armies swell as war cry looms

Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton’s path to election victory will be determined by cashed-up campaigns waged by Advance and Climate 200-backed independents across more than 40 electorates, as the outfits draw from up to 500,000 supporters.

Labor and Liberal strategists are finalising campaign plans and headquarters in the lead-up to the federal election. Artwork: Frank Ling

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Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton’s path to election victory will be determined by cashed-up campaigns waged by Advance and Climate 200-backed independents across more than 40 electorates, as the ideologically opposed outfits draw funding and volunteer armies from up to 500,000 supporters.

Campaigns waged by political parties, unions, activists and ­industry groups are expected to push into the hundreds of millions of dollars, amid expectations of a hung parliament and the rise of king-making independents benefiting from sharp declines in ALP and Coalition primary votes.

As Labor and Liberal strategists finalise campaign plans and headquarters, The Australian can reveal Advance, which led the successful No campaign for the Indigenous voice referendum, will launch a multimillion-dollar election blitz to unseat Greens MPs Adam Bandt, Elizabeth Watson-Brown, Stephen Bates and Max Chandler-Mather.

The conservative activist group, which boasts almost 400,000 supporters and spent $2m attacking the Greens in six federal electorates over summer, is also planning campaigns in ­ALP heartland areas, including the Hunter and Illawarra regions of NSW where the government faces backlash over offshore wind farms and the renewables rollout.

Advance played a central role in the Victorian Liberals winning back the Greens-held seat of Prahran last weekend, funding a grassroots campaign against the minor party and manning booths across the electorate. By-election tactics will be replicated in federal seats, with Advance preparing to use trucks, billboards, social media, mass advertising campaigns and letter box drops to ­attack the Greens.

Advance spokeswoman Sandra Bourke said the group’s sole focus was to “drive the Greens brand into political irrelevancy”. The Greens are expected to lose Brisbane to the Coalition or Labor, with the LNP firming to reclaim Ryan and Labor hopeful of winning back Kevin Rudd’s former seat of Griffith.

Anthony Albanese, with former Greens official and his endorsed candidate for the Illawarra-based seat of Whitlam, Carol Berry, was heckled by anti-wind farm protesters on Friday. Picture: PMO

The Simon Holmes a Court-backed Climate 200 – whose 2022 election funding helped win six previously Liberal blue-ribbon metropolitan seats and an ACT Senate spot for David Pocock and boosted four existing independents – is also expanding support for candidates across the country.

Climate 200 is expected to provide funding support for more than 30 independents, almost ­exclusively in current and former Liberal and Nationals seats. In addition to retaining gains won at the last election, Climate 200 will pour resources into previously safe Coalition-held seats including Wannon, Bradfield, Cowper and Calare. Funding for candidates, which can range to up to 50 per cent of donations, is typically valued at about one-third of a campaign.

The self-described community crowd-funded initiative, which supports candidates committed to “climate change, integrity in politics and gender equality”, is also backing candidates in the Perth and Victorian electorates of Moore and Monash, where former Liberal MPs Ian Goodenough and Russell Broadbent are running as independents.

As Advance and Climate 200 line up their campaigns, the Prime Minister was heckled on Friday by protesters during a press conference in Lake Illawarra where he announced former senior Greens official and candidate Carol Berry as Labor’s pick in the seat of Whitlam. The Prime Minister, who Labor MPs believe will call an election in coming weeks and abandon plans for a March 25 budget, was called out by three locals campaigning against the government’s offshore wind farm plan.

Senior Labor sources also questioned Mr Albanese’s Judgement in endorsing a former Greens candidate after spending the past few months attacking Mr Bandt’s party.

With Liberal strategists increasingly confident of winning Paterson, held by Labor’s Meryl Swanson on a 2.6 per cent margin, former prime minister John Howard travelled to the Hunter region electorate on Friday. Mr Howard, who met voters alongside Liberal candidate Laurence Antcliff, seized on anger in Maitland and Port Stephens over Labor’s proposed offshore wind farm and renewables revolution.

Declaring offshore wind zones should be scrapped, Mr Howard attacked Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen for having a “stupid bigoted attitude” towards zero-emissions nuclear power.

Advance, established to counter left-wing activist groups such as GetUp, has enjoyed a groundswell of support from ­donors following its prominent role leading the No voice campaign. The Australian can reveal Advance received 3500 individual donations in January, more than 30 per cent higher than the same period ahead of Mr Albanese’s failed 2023 referendum.

After launching its Greens Truth campaign last June, ­Advance is focusing resources in the four Greens seats – Melbourne, Brisbane, Ryan and Griffith – as well as Labor-held Greens targets Macnamara and Wills in Melbourne.

Ms Bourke said Advance’s election campaign, which would deploy hundreds of volunteers, would press home to voters that the Greens “are not who they used to be and the Australian public know it”.

“We will take every lesson we have learned from the referendum and the recent by-­elections to achieve the maximum impact on key voters in the seats,” Ms Bourke said.

“Combined with this, we will continue to drive awareness of the impact of the Labor renewable push into the regions. Mainstream Australians are rising up. They have had enough of the weakness, enough of the wokeness, and enough of paying for it.

“Advance continues to experience fantastic growth, closing in on 400,000 supporters across the country, with tens of thousand grassroots donors.”

With Advance focused on Greens and vulnerable Labor seats, Coalition headquarters will lead efforts to sandbag seats under threat from Climate 200-backed independents via its “Teals Revealed” campaign.

Curtin teal MP Kate Chaney will come under maximum pressure from the Liberals in her Perth seat, which she won by 2657 votes. The Liberals are also targeting Goldstein, Kooyong, Wentworth and Mackellar, held by Zoe Daniel, Monique Ryan, Allegra Spender and Sophie Scamps. Zali Steggall is likely safe in Warringah. Senator Pocock is unlikely to require Climate 200 funding in his re-election bid.

With nearly one in three voters supporting an independent or minor party in 2022, Climate 200 expects more than 30,000 volunteers will actively support independents, along with 60,000 people being engaged in the wider movement.

Climate 200’s election hit list includes Mr Dutton’s outer-­Brisbane seat of Dickson, McPherson, Fisher, Fairfax and Groom in southeast Queensland, Berowra, Lyne and Farrer in NSW, Casey and Flinders in Victoria, Sturt in South Australia and Forrest in Western Australia. At this stage, Climate 200 is funding candidates in two Labor electorates: the southern Tasmanian seat of Franklin, held by cabinet minister Julie Collins, and the southern ACT electorate of Bean, held by backbencher David Smith.