Here are some more details from Simon Holmes à Court’s grilling at the National Press Club today, when the founder of Climate 200 defended the organisation’s decision not to go it alone in increasing donation transparency.
Mr Holmes à Court said if the major parties reduce the political donation disclosure limit to $1000, Climate 200 will immediately do the same. Currently, donations of up to $14,500 can remain anonymous.
Simon Holmes à Court faced a grilling about campaign donations.Credit:Alex Ellinghausen
“If we reduce the disclosure limit we would soon see who is disclosing here, and we strongly advocate with that,” he said.
But when asked what was stopping Climate 200 from dropping the disclosure limit to $1000 already, Mr Holmes à Court said it was a “David and Goliath fight”.
“Asking David to tie his hands behind his back and put his slingshot down while Goliath is standing there with a bazooka and heavy artillery; sorry, we’re trying to get these candidates in and when they’re on the crossbench they will be able to implement integrity measures,” he said.
“We’re not going to tie our own hands behind our back, we have taken that first step, we have done what no major political party has done and put the names on our website, and we would be very happy to do more when the major parties match us.”
The debate follows revelations independent MP Zali Steggall made a “rookie” administrative error in recording donations totalling $100,000 from the family of coal millionaire John Kinghorn during the 2019 election campaign. Climate 200 strongly backed Ms Steggall this week.