Matt Kean shoulders load on NSW Liberals’ fundraising

NSW Treasurer Matt Kean has contributed $363,000 to the Liberal Party’s election war chest, more than a quarter of all MPs fundraising.

NSW Treasurer Matt Kean has contributed $363,000 to the Liberal Party’s election war chest, more than a quarter of all MPs fundraising. Picture: NCA NewsWire/David Swift

NSW Treasurer Matt Kean has contributed more than $360,000 to the Liberal Party’s election war chest, more than a quarter of all MPs’ fundraising, while the seats of retiring ministers are failing to hit benchmarks ahead of the pivotal March poll.

Sensitive internal Liberal Party data obtained by The Weekend Australian reveals the state electoral conference’s fundraising target of retiring cabinet ministers – Rob Stokes, Brad Hazzard, Victor Dominello, David Elliott and Geoff Lee – have fallen short of party-defined targets.

Each state seat conference is given a benchmark amount paid to the party and used in the election campaign to help defend their own seat, sandbag vulnerable assets or lay siege to Labor-held electorates.

While MPs are not solely responsible for fundraising in their seat, an onus of responsibility falls on their shoulders given they are the party’s face in the electorate. Candidates replacing retiring MPs take responsibility once they are preselected for the seats, Liberal insiders said. The figures are the aggregate of donations since the 2019 election.

Mr Kean has soared well in excess of the Hornsby SEC’s $80,000 benchmark, with his $363,000 representing well over a quarter of the total amount raised by the party.

The seat of Vaucluse, vacated by the retiring Gabrielle Upton and replaced by Kellie Sloane at the March election, has accumulated the second-most with $138,997, passing the SEC’s $80,000 target with another $58,997.

So has Trade Minister Alister Henskens, with the Ku-ring-gai SEC raising $115,416, over $35,000 above his target, along with Multiculturalism Minister Mark Coure, with the Oatley conference surpassing the $50,000 target by $4700.

“For all the complaining about Matt Kean, he is the only one who can raise any money,” one Liberal Party HQ source said.

 

According to the internal data, the Pittwater seat of Mr Stokes, who holds the infrastructure portfolio, has reached $52,000 of the $80,000 target set by the party. The neighbouring seat of Wakehurst, vacated by the retiring Mr Hazzard, is more than $15,000 short of the same target.

Mr Stokes rejected any suggestion he was not pulling his weight, pointing to a fundraiser he held in his own home last year, and noted he had announced his retirement in late September.

“I’ll concede we didn’t get all the way there. I was retiring and I made that known six months ago,” he said, noting the additional amounts held by individual branches could bump the figure up to $80,000.

One Liberal source said MPs had been “read the riot act” by NSW Liberal Party HQ last year about the lack of fundraising.

“Party room was given a pep talk about fundraising in the middle of last year by state director Chris Stone and former NSW president Philip Ruddock,” the source said.

“Popular MPs need to transfer personal votes over to new MPs. They can make up for their lack of fundraising by working hard to hand over their popularity on to the candidates.”

But other retiring ministers said responsibility for fundraising should not fall on their shoulders.

Retiring MP Geoff Lee. Picture: Toby Zerna

Liberal party candidate for Parramatta Katie Mullens.

Despite new Parramatta Liberal candidate Katie Mullens only being preselected in late January, just two months before the election, Mr Lee, the Corrections Minister who announced his retirement in August, rejected the suggestion retiring MPs or ministers had to meet fundraising targets.

“Candidates are responsible for raising money for their own campaigns. The Liberal Party, like every other party, is responsible for the timing and announcement of candidates – retiring members do not control this process,” he said.

In Mr Elliott’s abolished seat of Baulkham Hills, the SEC has only raised $13,396, just over one one-eight of the target, while Mr Dominello’s seat of Ryde – with Labor targeting the electorate and new Liberal candidate Jordan Lane – had only raised $29,195 of a $50,000 target.