AN investigation into donations made to the Victorian Liberal Party’s “Ditch Dan” fundraising campaign won’t be finalised before next month’s state election.
Mildura candidate Paul Matheson received the highest donations in the state during the August campaign, which raised a total of $600,000.
Mr Matheson received $35,620, according to the “Ditch Dan” website, almost double the donations received by party leader Matthew Guy.
The campaign, which listed more than 2000 donors, prompted the Victorian Electoral Commission to seek further information about donors.
The VEC said it had monitored the activity on the website and compared the information with donations disclosed and had issued written notices to gather further information from “individuals and entities associated with the campaign”.
“These written notices ordinarily require responses within 14 days,” the VEC said.
“However, individuals and entities exercised their lawful right to request reviews of the written notices, which means – even if the notice is affirmed – it may be up to eight weeks before any information is received.”
Political donors or recipients must disclose donations above $1080 within 21 days of those contributions.
Donations are capped at $4320 over four years and anonymous donations above $1080 are not allowed.
Mr Matheson received five anonymous contributions above the $1080 cap totalling about $14,200, according to the “Ditch Dan” website.
Mr Matheson told Sunraysia Daily in September “all donations greater than $1080 are disclosed to the VEC within 21 days” and published on the VEC’s portal.
As of Sunday, the portal was not displaying any donations to the Victorian Liberal Party worth $2100, which was the amount attributed to two of the anonymous donations to Mr Matheson on the “Ditch Dan” website.
The VEC said it would not disclose particular details about who had been issued a written notice and any information requested.
