G'day John,

I'm outraged. Honestly, this is one of the dirtiest things I've
seen in my time up here.

The short version is that the two major parties are teaming up to
pass political donation reforms, which will put caps on how much
people and parties can receive. That sounds good right? I thought
so too.

Except that they are exempting most of the ways that they
actually raise donations from being classified as donations! Some
of the methods exempted are membership fees (which can be up to
$110,000 annually), fundraising dinners and other events.

So what their cap is actually designed to do is to protect both
major parties from being challenged, by capping the number of
independents and small parties who can break into politics.

We urgently need to make a stink about this, can you chip in to
help me spread the word?
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Jacqui speaking on this issue
( [link removed] )
Watch my speech on this issue by clicking the image above. Or
you can read the transcript below:

Today I asked the Special Minister of State, Minister Farrell,
about his plans to reform our election funding. On 20 June this
year, Minister Farrell told Michele Grattan:

'The Australian electoral system shouldn't be just open to people
with lots of money.'

I agree with him on that. Tasmanians know that the Jacqui Lambie
Network don't take big donations from big corporates or unions.
Our average donation is 25 bucks. Senator Tyrrell and I do it the
old-fashioned way. We chuck on our jeans and boots and we talk to
Tasmanians. We go and earn it. That's how we do it.

The joint standing committee's report into Australian election
funding made 15 recommendations. Some of them are good—like
reducing the cap on disclosable donations from $15,200 to $1,000.
The minister is trying to pull the wool over the eyes of
Australians. He knows damn well that putting a cap on donations
won't really hurt the major parties.

In the same interview Minister Farrell said that he wants a level
playing field. The minister already knows that it's not a level
playing field and it is doing nothing about the main funnel for
dark money to the major parties. How do they do this? They set up
different entities. Let's call them dark money hubs because
that's exactly what they are. These dark money hubs get cash from
big donors and then funnel that money back to the parties. The
coalition has 68 associated entities or dark money hubs. This is
to their 15 federal and state branches. The coalition can
multiply donations up to the threshold 83 times. A family group
could have given $17.8 million over the three years leading up to
the last federal election and nobody would ever know.

By the way, business membership forums, fundraising dinners and
events are not treated as donations that have to be disclosed to
the Australian public. Wait. It gets worse. The red and blue
teams both have associated business arms that charge large annual
membership fees in exchange for special policy briefings. That's
right; you can buy a meeting with the minister. That's how it
works. Membership fees to the Liberal Australian Business Network
and the Labor Business Forum are split into three groups. You can
get yourself silver membership for $25,000, gold membership for
$55,000 and the whole kit and caboodle, platinum membership, for
$110,000.

Putting a cap on election campaign funding will do nothing to
bring these dark hubs into the light. The minister and this
government will tell you they care about transparency and
electoral reform. It's pretty clear to me that they do not. All
they care about is keeping themselves in power and keeping out
the Independents who will hold them to account. Australians, this
is a really big problem. There will be a lot more of this coming
out. It's absolutely filthy how the major parties work. This is
what we are up against. They will do everything in their power.
In the future they will do everything that they can to get rid of
Independents and micro parties. I say this to you: start praying
in church—because I can assure you that the Australian people are
right on to you, and this situation is not going away. Keep
feeding your own funnel.

--------------------------------

Doesn't that just make your blood boil? It makes mine.

That's what independents and small parties are up against up
here. it makes me look at my upcoming re-election campaign and
wonder if I'll be able to compete.

Can you chip in to help me prepare to fight this disgusting
collusion between the two major parties?
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DONATE →
( [link removed] )Thanks
again for your support mate, we won't make progress without your
help.

Jacqui

You've received this because you've added your name to receive
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Emails are our most powerful tool for communicating with
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people investing in turning ideas into results. Put simply, we
win big fights through small donations. Can you donate $10 now?
( [link removed] )

Authorised by J. Lambie, Jacqui Lambie Network, PO Box 264, Burnie, Tasmania 7320.