Last-minute declaration reveals $50,000 donation to Liberals

The Liberal Party failed to declare a $50,000 donation from the Tasmanian Hospitality Association – made two weeks before the last state election.

THE Liberal Party failed to declare a $50,000 donation from the Tasmanian Hospitality Association made two weeks before the last state election.

Liberal Party state president Rod Scurrah said the party lodged an amended 2017-18 return today — the day before the final Australian Electoral Commission deadline — to clear up “administrative anomalies”.

The disclosure of the donation came 675 days after it was received.

It was uncovered by the Australian Electoral Commission’s regular programme of compliance reviews, Mr Scurrah said.

Those “anomalies” included the $50,000 THA donation and reclassifying $123,673 in tax credits received from the Australian Taxation Office.

“This receipt from the THA had already been publicly disclosed by the THA on their electoral return, and as a result the amount publicly disclosed as being donated by the THA to the Liberal Party in 2017-18 is unchanged as a result of this amendment,” Mr Scurrah said.

He said the disclosure “demonstrates clearly that the existing triple-check system of donor disclosure-recipient disclosure-compliance review is working.”

Love Your Local chairman Michael Best with Tasmanian Hospitality Association chief Steve Old outside an election billboard during the 2018 state election campaign. Picture: LUKE BOWDEN

In its original return, the Liberal Party declared $160,000 from the THA.

The THA declared $269,750 in political donations in 2017-18.

All of that money was paid to the Tasmanian branch of the Liberal Party — in 14 amounts ranging between $220 and $60,000.

The missing money appears to have been donated to the Liberals on February 16, 2018 – two weeks before the state election.

It formed part of the party’s war chest for the 2018 state election which saw it returned to power after outspending the Labor party four-to-one.

The THA was a vocal opponent of Labor’s policy of phasing poker machines out of non-casino venues.

Tasmania’s electoral donation disclosure rules remain the weakest in the nation.

Political parties are required to declare only the source of individual donations of $13,800 or more, meaning the sources of the vast majority of donations are never known.

Donations are made public only once a year, in February..

Returns on the Australian Electoral Commission website reveal the THA made five separate donations of $10,000 to the Liberals on March 1 last year, two days before the election, plus additional donations of $5000 and $2000 the same day.

A report on reform to the state’s electoral donation laws is due by the end of the year.

Revealing bad news in the days before major public holidays when it is unlikely to be noticed is a strategy known to media relations advisers as “taking out the trash”.