One-seat Clive Palmer emerges as $2m election winner

Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party has received nearly $2m in taxpayer dollars through the Australian Electoral Commission – more than three times the amount it was paid at the last election.

Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party only picked up one Senate seat at the May election. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Nicki Connolly

Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party has received nearly $2m in taxpayer dollars through the Australian Electoral Commission – more than three times the amount it was paid at the last election – despite winning just one Senate seat in May.

The AEC on Wednesday released its final funding payments for political parties and candidates following the May 21 election, and confirmed $75m in public funds had been paid.

Parties and candidates who received 4 per cent or more of the first preference vote are automatically paid $10,656. The AEC then reimburses those parties and candidates for additional electoral expenditure.

Of the $75,876,944 paid out, more than $73m went to political parties and about $1.8m to independents.

The UAP was paid $1,925,262, more than three times the $650,382 payout it received after the 2019 federal election.

It follows Mr Palmer vowing to spend about $70m on advertising for his 2022 campaign, with figures from YouTube showing the mining magnate spent more than $10m on the video platform between February and May.

Mr Palmer also paid for hour-long advertisements on numerous television channels in the lead-up to election day and accused the AEC of tampering with ballot papers as one of the possible reasons for him not picking up any seats.

The AEC categorically refuted the claim, for which Mr Palmer had no evidence, and said it accounted for every ballot paper in the election, with “a documented chain of custody and rigorous ballot storage and transport arrangements in place”.

Labor received $27,104,944 from the AEC, up from the $24,684,039 it was paid in 2019, after narrowly clinching majority government with a historically low primary vote.

 

The party poured more than $2m into social media campaigns, according to data from Meta, compared to just $1m spent by the Liberals on the same platforms.

The Coalition election loss is reaffirmed in the AEC’s payments, with the Liberals one of the few parties that received less money from the public purse in 2022 than what they were handed in 2019.

The Liberal Party was reimbursed $26,550,112 this year, down from $27,569,610 at the last election.

Others that received less money included the Country Liberal Party, which was reimbursed $182,154 – about $30,000 less than in 2019 – and Katter’s Australian Party, which received $175,981 in 2019 but $162,784 following the 2022 election.

The Greens were paid the third-largest sum of all parties, at $10,760,539, following the party’s best-ever election result in May.

Greens leader Adam Bandt hailed the securing of four lower house and 12 upper house seats as a “Green slide”.

Warringah independent Zali Steggall, first elected in 2019, was paid the most of any lower house independent, receiving almost $122,000.

Fellow re-elected independents Helen Haines and Andrew Wilkie received more than $120,400 and $87,400 respectively.

Of the incoming teals, Kooyong MP Monique Ryan received the largest sum of more than $120,300, followed by Mackellar’s Sophie Scamps who received about $109,000.

Zoe Daniel, Allegra Spender and Kate Chaney all received between $90,000 and $98,000, while Kylea Tink was given more than $71,000.

In total, taxpayers forked out more than $580,000 for the six teals.

ACT senator David Pocock was paid out more than $176,000, while the Jacqui Lambie Network – which picked up its second Senate spot in May – received $160,000.

Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party, which has just two sitting senators, received more than $3m, which was up from the $2.8m paid out to the Hanson party after the 2019 election.

Of those independents who did not pick up a seat, Climate 200-backed Cowper candidate Carolyn Heise was paid out the most, receiving more than $85,000.

The 13 other failed independents received between $10,600 and $71,000, and cost the taxpayer more than $820,000 in total.