“Godfather” tied to AEC mass censorship

EXCLUSIVE

ANTHONY KLAN

INVESTIGATION

Last year’s mass censorship of political “donations” data by the Australian Electoral Commission followed action by the office of Special Minister of State Don Farrell — the architect of the Albanese Government’s electoral reforms.

The Klaxon can exclusively reveal it was Farrell’s office that last year “alerted” the AEC to an historic “data breach” the AEC is using to justify the biggest censorship of donations data in the nation’s history.

A phone call to the AEC about the breach — which occurred in 2019 — was made by either Farrell himself, or someone else in his office, at the time Farrell was writing the proposed new laws.

In 2019 an AEC error saw postal address details for 17 electoral candidates “publicly viewed”, despite them being “silent” from the electoral roll.

That incident, from over five years ago, is being used by the AEC — which reports to Farrell — to “justify” undertaking the biggest censorship of political donations data in the nation’s history.

It is also being used by Farrell to “justify” enshrining that mass censorship into law, through his Electoral Reform Bill, currently before the Senate.

The moves by the AEC and Farrell are despite the AEC error occurring in 2019, it involving just 17 people, it resulting in no “personal safety incidents” — and that the incident didn’t even rise to the level of being a “notifiable breach”.

The Australian Federal Police has said it is “not aware of any personal safety incidents as a result of the data breach”.

“The AEC error occurred in 2019, involved just 17 people, resulted in no “personal safety incidents” — didn’t even rise to the level of being a ‘notifiable breach'”

As well as being Special Minister of State, Farrell — who has been nicknamed Labor’s “Godfather” — is also the minister for trade and tourism and the government’s deputy leader in the Senate.

In May last year the AEC pulled its entire disclosure register, including the tens of thousands of disclosure documents, saying it had become aware of an error from 2019.

It made the register accessible again two months later, on July 23, but all disclosure forms had been removed.

That’s despite the AEC being required by law to make the disclosure returns public.

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The proposed Bill has drawn heavy criticism from some Senators. Source: The Klaxon

The documents are essential for determining the identity of many “donors” – particularly those seeking to mask payments via shell companies and obscure post office box addresses.

The AEC is providing the returns manually on request, in a process often taking it weeks — but only after it has blacked out all “address” details provided.

That information was essential in determining the true bankrollers of the “No” campaign against the Indigenous Voice.

As previously revealed, Farrell is now trying to overturn Commonwealth Electoral Act of 1918, to make it law that all return documents — which have been publicly available for decades — are hidden from the public for good.

“Farrell is trying to overturn Commonwealth Electoral Act of 1918 to hide the documents for good”

That’s despite the AEC error only pertaining to one type of return — “candidate returns” — and even then, only a tiny subset of information on those candidate returns.

The now hidden electoral donations data was vital in establishing the true donors behind the Voice “No” campaign. Source: The Klaxon

On May 15 last year the AEC issued a statement that it had “became aware” of an error.

Shortly afterwards, Farrell’s AEC commissioned an “external review” into the matter.

That little-known “review” then made some extreme “recommendations”— which Farrell then inserted deep inside the Electoral Reform Bill.

The ALP rushed the highly-complex, 227-page bill through the lower house late last year, just 48 hours after making it public.

The ALP and Coalition voted down calls to have the bill reviewed by a parliamentary committee, which is standard practice.

The “Godfather” – Don Farrell’s office called the AEC, then Farrell inserted extreme “recommendations” into the Electoral Reform Bill. Source: ABC News/Matt Roberts

The review — in its first sentence — falsely states that it was the AEC that “discovered” the data breach.

“On 15 May 2024 the AEC discovered an inadvertent data breach on its Transparency Register,” it states.

In fact, far deeper in the document — on page 26 — it is revealed the AEC was contacted about the matter in a phone call from either Farrell himself or someone in his office.

It states on page 26:

“The AEC became aware there was an apparent data breach at 0900 hours on 15 May 2024 through a call from the office of the Special Minister of State, the Hon Don Farrell MP”.

The AEC was told “that a parliamentarian had notified the office that their residential address was displayed on the Register”.

“The AEC became aware there was an apparent data breach…through a call from the office of the Special Minister of State, the Hon Don Farrell MP” — “External Review”, p26

The author of the review is identified in the document only as “external reviewer Tony Sheehan”.

Part of the now heavily redacted donor return for  anti-Voice group “Advance”. The return (previously unredacted) would be hidden under Farrell’s Bill. Source: AEC (2024)

The review made a series of recommendations, including that the AEC “audit those of its systems which do not automatically suppress silent elector addresses” so that it is “positioned to identify, and where necessary suppress, any silent elector addresses present”.

But it also contained some extreme recommendations, which it has provided no evidence to support — which were subsequently inserted on page 157 of Farrell’s Electoral Reform Bill.

The “external review” recommended an “amendment to the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918” to reverse the legal requirement that disclosure returns be published.

Instead, it recommended only “returns information” be required to be published — that is, a sub-set of the data scraped by the AEC from the actual returns.

It also recommended the AEC be given wide-ranging powers to “redact, remove or amend information” on the AEC Transparency Register, “including past returns” — and that the laws be made retrospective.

DONATIONS STITCH-UP – more from The Klaxon:

Feb 6 – “Snouts in the Trough” – Senators oppose “Electoral Reforms” Bill

Feb 4 – PM in secretive push for mass “donations” censorship

Feb 2 – Vast censorship of political “donations” data

Jan 30 – Labor Party rigs “donations” laws

Sheehan’s “Recommendation 5” states:

“That the AEC recommends to government and the Department of Finance an amendment to the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918, which requires publication of returns information rather than publication of returns.

“The amendment should also give AEC the power to redact, remove or amend information on the Transparency Register including past returns and information provided prior to the amendment coming into effect.”

“The ‘review’ recommended the AEC be given the power to ‘redact, remove or amend’ information on the register”

The recommendations of the “review”. Source: AEC “review”

Under Farrell’s Electoral Returns Bill – detailed on page 157 of the document – all references to “returns” would be stripped from the Commonwealth legislation and replaced with the term “return information”.

The Government would only be required to disclose a subset of information, which the AEC would scrape from the actual returns and publish on its Transparency Portal, which the AEC can change at any time.

Vital data — including “address” information — would be hidden.

Also on page 157, it states the Electoral Commissioner — who is appointed by the government of the day and runs the AEC — would be given wide powers to “redact or remove personal information” despite that information being “required to be published”, even under the new law.

“Farrell’s bill would give the AEC the power to ‘redact or remove personal information’ from donations disclosures”

“Despite subsection (1), the Electoral Commissioner may…redact or remove personal information (within the meaning of the Privacy Act 1998) required to be published in item 4 or 5 of the table in subsection (1) from the register,” Farrell’s bill states.

Proposed changes to the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918, hiding all returns from the public. Source: Page 157, Electoral Reform Bill

The New York Times has described Australia as potentially “the world’s most secretive democracy”.

Between 2012 and 2022 no other OECD country fell faster towards corruption than Australia, according to Transparency International.

The Electoral Reforms bill is scheduled to be debated in the Senate Thursday, in what is expected to be its final sitting before the federal election.

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Anthony Klan

Editor, The Klaxon