Interesting to see that the AEC is in the hunt and on the prowl to drag the left-wing ginger group GetUp into the net to have it listed as, what they call an “associated entity”
Most people would say, not before time. It’s been quite apparent that GetUp bats for one side on the Australian political landscape and it’s about time they were brought to heel.
For far too long GetUp have been getting away with flying below the radar as a front and pretending they’re independent of any political party or grouping.
The way things are for GetUp at the moment they are in the true sense of the phrase a shadowy outfit in the literal sense, as they stand in the shadows whilst supporting both Labor and the Greens and all manner of left wing causes.
GetUp! refused to meet a deadline of Friday last to submit full financial accounts as requested by the AEC, and faces possible penalties. What’s their problem? Nothing to hide then just lay it all out there.
Suffice to say GetUp are fighting back and have foreshadowed legal action against the AEC because they are desperate to avoid “associated entity” status as that would force them to lodge ¬financial disclosure returns with much stricter conditions. We would all be able to see just whose sock puppet GetUp actually is.
More on that in a second.
Not only that but it would mean that source donors to GetUp would also be required to lodge returns to the AEC. That is, groups, perhaps corporate or unions that don’t want to be seen to donating to Labor or the Greens for whatever reason, would also be subject to the disinfectant of sunlight.
Losing independent status could also effect GetUp’s branding, potentially undermining its broader support base if it was ¬officially regarded as an arm of Labor or the Greens, or both.`
So just how hand in glove is Labor and the unions with GetUp?
Well, pull up a seat.
Apart from the fact that Bill Shorten was an original board member at the establishment of GetUp in 2006, GetUp has recently added to its board Daniel Stone, Labor’s former digital ¬director who worked on last year’s federal election campaign, and Stephen Monk, an IT executive with social-media links to many prominent ALP identities.
GetUp!’s chairman is Phil Ireland, an active Labor Party member and NSW convenor of the party’s environmental action network.
Then there’s Sam McLean, formerly GetUp!’s national director and now an adviser to Bill Shorten and Lachlan Harris, a onetime GetUp! staff member who later became Kevin Rudd’s media adviser.
On top of all of that, it was reported in The Australian only last week, that The Registered Organisations Commission has confirmed it has started an investigation into both the state and Federal branches of the AWU over whether donations made to GetUp! Back in 2006 were approved under the AWU’s rules.
And who was the boss of the AWU at that time???
That’d be Bill Shorten.
How much seed money was donated by the AWU at Bill Shortens direction back in 2006? $100,000 and possibly more.
Funny how that name keeps popping up as his dodgy history keeps coming back to haunt him.
And even if they were approved under the AWU rules, so what. That just confirms the link as the unions themselves are the industrial wing of the ALP..
That donation by the way also bought Bill Shorten a seat on the original board of GetUp so I think by any measure, in the court of public opinion it could be said that GetUp is indeed wholly owned subsidiary of the ALP and the unions.
In other words an “associated entity”
Several sources recalled “donations” made from the union’s national ¬office, while others said it was possible other funds could have ended up with GetUp from AWU “operating expenses”.
Interesting to note also that at last year’s election GetUp issued how to vote cards that were all directed against the coalition.
They had hundreds of people on the ground doorknocking targeting (successfully the Liberal member for Bass Andrew Nikolic. They ran advertisements, using their online campaigning set-up, making telephone calls and conducting community forums to target undecided voters. They worked with nurses and teachers, and the unions, to focus voter attention on spending cuts to hospitals and schools.
State issues mind you.
And I’m just getting wound up here.
A moment ago I used the word, shadowy to describe GetUp. I think we can add to that characterisation the word sinister.
To understand what we’re dealing with when it comes to GetUp we need to look further afield to the US, to the GetUp equivalent. An outfit called Avaaz and the seriously shadowy and seriously sinister George Soros.
To do this I need to refer to a column in Spectator from October 2016 by Eric Abetz
Abetz wrote:
Back in August September, a trove of hacked documents detailed the international web of organizations nurtured by George Soros via his Open Society Foundations (OSF).
(Soros as most would know, is a United States-based hedge fund operator, currency speculator, convicted insider trader and prolific supporter of left wing causes – worth $25 billion.
The documents illuminate Soros’ extensive support of groups promoting open borders, climate action, Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) against Israel and a range of other left wing issues.
Here’s where it gets interesting.
Back in April 2005, Soros met likeminded multi-millionaires and billionaires in Scottsdale, Arizona to examine why George Bush won the US election. At least 80 wealthy individuals pledged $1m or more apiece to fund a network of left wing advocacy groups.
The same month Purpose Campaigns – founded by Jeremy Heimans and David Madden – posted an ad on the Harvard Institute of Politics website, which described itself as a new progressive political campaigning organization. Also the same month Purpose Campaigns Pty Ltd was registered in Australia by Heimans and Madden, as was GetUp two days later.
GetUp thus became Soros’ local Australian franchise, operated as a joint venture for the Greens, Labor and the unions, whose proxies populate its board.
Heimans and Madden later co-founded a global platform called Avaaz – facilitated by seed funding channeled by another group which received $850,000 from Soros’ Open Society Institute (OSI) specifically earmarked for Avaaz.
A hacked 2010 memo to Soros discusses facilitating the Global Campaign for Climate Action with grants to Avaaz, which it describes as ‘already an OSI grantee and close collaborator’.
The pattern of Soros backed activist organisations nurturing others has spread to Australia, with Avaaz giving GetUp a total of $195,618. GetUp also recently received $42,961 from its German equivalent, Campact, and $39,060 from Purpose – a total of over $275,000 from overseas-based organisations in two years –
Now here’s the thing.
Note all those foreign donations to GetUp, and understand that this very same outfit is at the vanguard of calling for a ban on foreign donations to political parties.
So as a political left wing ginger group preaching from the high moral ground, they get $275,000 from overseas based organizations to use for their own political purposes whilst calling for a ban on foreign donations to political parties.
How’s that for double standards?
In other words as political players they don’t want the rules they’re advocating for others to apply to themselves.
If any organisation illustrates the sinister aspects of foreign donations and interests influencing Australian politics, it’s GetUp.
So next time GetUp members are ‘consulted’ on priorities or receive GetUp’s glib takes on topical issues, they should realize just whose agenda is really being pushed.