Victorian Leader of the United Australia Party, Geoff Shaw, has called for an urgent VEC investigation into the actions of so-called 'preference whisperer' Glenn Druery.
"It has come out publicly what Glenn Druery is doing, that is, getting paid by parties to preference them in the upper house,'' Mr Shaw said.
"The fact that a person can profit from wheeling and dealing with political parties at an election, effectively manipulating the intention of Victorian voters, should be outlawed.
"I want to make it clear that the United Australia Party has not, and will not, engage in this type of practice and is not a client of Glenn Druery.
"Trying to game the electoral system could be viewed as corruption. Trying to unduly influence the outcome of an election or intentionally mislead voters could also be illegal under the Electoral Act 2002.
"The funding and disclosures team of the Victorian Electoral Commission must investigate this immediately. Victorians deserve to know which political parties have paid this 'preference whisperer' in the past and if such payments were disclosed to the VEC as an election expense.
"Setting up fake parties in order to funnel preferences to the Labor Party is the worst kind of voter manipulation,'' he said.
"Victorian taxpayers fund these sham political parties with hundreds and thousands of dollars in administration and policy development funding when that money would be better spent on the broken ambulance system.
"We have a man admitting he gets paid to manipulate preferences so the cross bench will work in Dictator Dan's favour. It's outrageous.
"This is just another example of how due process has been subverted in the state of Victoria to allow the Andrews Government to retain unfettered power. The only way to stop the continued abuse of citizens is to vote Dan Andrews out,'' Mr Shaw said.
