Who are Parakeelia?
Parakeelia Pty Ltd was established in 1989 by then Liberal Party treasurer, Ron Walker. Its address is the federal Liberal Party headquarters in Canberra. The company directors are federal Liberal Party director Tony Nutt and party president Richard Alston.
Parakeelia produces only one product, a software program called Feedback, which compiles data on constituents and allows MPs to profile and target undecided voters, while ignoring the decided ones. The program is sold exclusively to Liberal MPs. The ALP uses a similar program called Campaign Central.
Parakeelia also provide training and support sessions to MPs run by their Training and Operations director, Sallyann Innes, who is simultaneously employed by the taxpayer as a government media advisor. While similar software programs can be purchased for under $500, Feedback is sold for $2,500 per MP, per year. This cost is covered by the MP’s taxpayer-funded expense account.
Despite grossly overcharging the taxpayer, Parakeelia is listed as a non-profit organisation. How? By donating all its profits to the Liberal party. Over the last three years the company has donated around $1,100,000 to the Liberal Party, making Parakeelia (or more accurately the taxpayers they bill) the party’s second biggest donor.
Now before anyone jumps to the conclusion that this is some sort of scam to funnel taxpayer’s money to the Liberal Party using a process not dissimilar to money laundering, I would like to point out that there is one important difference. Money laundering is a crime, while this is all, you know, legally a bit of a grey area.