Guide Dogs fundraising boss gave $87,000 to Liberal Party

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EXCLUSIVE

ANTHONY KLAN

Guide Dogs Victoria’s “capital fundraising” boss Paul Wheelton made over $87,000 in donations to the Liberal Party before the Federal Coalition gave millions of dollars of taxpayer funds to his charity.

At least $2.5 million of the taxpayer funds went directly to the charity’s “campus redevelopment” fundraising campaign, for which Wheelton was directly responsible as Guide Dogs Victoria’s Capital Campaign Chair.

Wheelton, a Melbourne businessman who owns one of the nation’s biggest Budget Rent-a-Car franchises, became “Capital Campaign Chair for the $23 million dollar development” in May 2017, his LinkedIn bio states.

Between October 2017 and June 2018 Wheelton made $60,000 of payments to the Liberal Party, Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) disclosures show.

Between October 2018 and June 2019, Wheelton Investments, one of his private companies, made a further $27,617 in “donations” to the Liberal Party. 

They are the only donations made by Wheelton or Wheelton Investments recorded in the AEC’s database.

In June 2018 the Federal Coalition announced a major grant to Guide Dogs Victoria for a new “project” that “aims to reduce social isolation” (its value was not disclosed.)

In April 2020 the Federal Coalition announced a $2.5m grant specifically for the Guide Dogs Victoria “campus redevelopment” that Wheelton was in charge of raising funds for.

The funds were directed to the charity by then Federal Treasurer and Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party Josh Frydenberg.

“The Federal Liberal and National Government has today announced $2.5 million in funding for Guide Dogs Victoria which will see the current facilities upgraded to become the world’s first state-of-the-art sensory campus,” Frydenberg announced in April 2020.

Then CEO Karen Hayes said: “In April 2020 we secured a significant boost from the federal Government for the funding of “the Future is in Sight” project, bringing us ever closer to unveiling the first fully accessible sensory campus in the world.”

Cash Flows:

Oct 2017 to June 2018: Paul Wheelton gives $60,000 to Liberal Party

June 2018 : Coalition announces major grant

Oct 2018 - June 2019: Wheelton Investments gives $27,617 to Liberal Party

Apr 2020: Coalition announces $2.5m grant for Kew redevelopment

Responding to written questions from The Klaxon regarding why he had made the donations, Wheelton said: 

“Because I can. It is my right and their policies aligned with my view being an owner of an SME (small-to-medium-enterprise) for 37 years”.

When asked whether, in return for the payments to the Liberal Party, he had sought to facilitate grants or other funding for Guide Dogs Victoria from the Federal Government, Wheelton wrote: “No I did not”.

“I have had no dealings with any Federal person or body,” Wheelton told The Klaxon.

“This was all in place with the CEO who had the relationship.”

The CEO was Karen Hayes, who was “stood down” and then last month “resigned”, after it emerged in April she had appeared in advertisements spruiking then Federal Treasurer Frydenberg for re-election.

It is illegal for charities to advocate politicians or political parties.

When asked when he “first made the executive of Guide Dogs Victoria aware of the donations to the Liberal Party”, Wheelton said he had never had a “conversation” about it with Hayes.

“I have never had a conversation about this with the CEO,” Wheelton said.

“However anyone who knows me knows I am a supporter of Conservative politics”.

““Anyone who knows me knows I am a supporter of Conservative politics””

AEC filings show Wheelton made eight payments to the Liberal Party between October 2017 and June 2018 totalling $87,617, including two payments of $25,000 each to the Liberal Party’s Victorian branch.

Between October 2018 and June 2019 Wheelton Investment made five payments to the Liberal Party, totalling $27,617. (In all, $65,234 to the Liberal Party and $50,000 to the Liberal Party’s Victorian branch).

Hayes and Frydenberg have both repeatedly declined to respond to questions from The Klaxon.

The Klaxon put a series of written questions to the Guide Dogs Victoria board, including whether it was aware of Wheelton’s $87,617 payments to the Liberal Party (and if so when it had become aware of those payments) given the payments presented a potentially substantial conflict of interest.

The board, including acting chair David Cochrane and long-time director and former chair Charles Thompson, refused to provide a response.

When asked if he had made the Guide Dogs Victoria board aware of his Liberal Party donations, Wheelton replied:

“I did not make the Board aware. 

“It is not their business and I have had no dealings with the Federal Government on any part of the Campaign.

“I was aware the Federal Liberal Party had previously donated to GDV for the kennel redevelopment.”

When asked when, to his knowledge, the board first became aware of his Liberal Party donations, Wheelton replied: “Not aware they knew”.

As previously revealed, the charity, based in inner Melbourne’s Kew, has received millions of dollars in government grants and other taxpayer funding in recent years despite substantially deteriorating performance.

Last financial year it delivered just 35 guide dogs, the same number as a decade earlier.

The total number of hours of “client services” it delivers each year - which includes both its guide dog and “non-dog related” activities - has slumped by over 25 per cent.

The latest revelations come as Frydenberg has come under scrutiny over fake reports in The Australian newspaper.

Earlier this month the paper reported Frydenberg had been “inundated with private sector offers” since losing his seat at last month’s federal election and “was recently approached as a potential replacement for outgoing AFL chief Gillon McLachlan”.

Yesterday Australian Financial Review columnist Joe Aston revealed it was Frydenberg “who approached the AFL Commission expressing his interest in being considered for the CEO position, not the other way around”.

“The whole stunt was unmistakable. It was so Frydenberg and so embarrassing,” writes Aston.

7 News reports on the Guide Dogs Victoria scandal. Source: 7 News

Secret deal

The Klaxon can exclusively reveal that Hayes had an alleged deal with the Federal Coalition Government - whose finances were controlled by Frydenberg - whereby it would match any funds the Victorian Government gave towards the charity’s “campus redevelopment”.

“I was…informed by the CEO that the Feds would match any donation from the State Government, as is the case with many capital projects,” Wheelton told The Klaxon.

“My dealings were with the (Victorian) Premier Daniel Andrews regarding the State funding part of the redevelopment”.

On September 14, 2018, the Andrews Government committed $5m to Guide Dogs Victoria’s The Future is in Sight redevelopment.

When asked whether the Coalition had followed through and similarly paid $5m to The Future is in Sight redevelopment, Wheelton responded: “Yes”.

Yet the Federal Coalition Government has only publicly identified $2.5m in funds towards the campus redevelopment - that’s the $2.5m grant it announced for the project in April 2020.

Frydenberg’s statement announcing the June 2018 grant makes no mention of Guide Dogs Victoria’s The Future is in Sight “campus redevelopment”.

The size of the grant is not stated, only that it was “one of 147 projects receiving $57 million”.

“The Federal Government is funding the project through the Information, Linkages and Capacity Building (ILC) component of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS),” Frydenberg said.

The purpose of the funds is similarly unclear.

The project “aims to reduce social isolation and improve access to information online for people with vision loss”, Frydenberg wrote of his June 5, 2018, visit to the charity’s Kew headquarters.

(Earlier this month the statement was deleted from Frydenberg’s website, so in this article The Klaxon has linked to an archived version).

On April 30, 2019, just over two weeks before the 2019 federal election, Frydenberg posted on social media about the project.

“In 2018, Guide Dogs received an DIS ILC grant that I supported,” he wrote.

The Coalition’s other major announcement regarding grants to Guide Dogs Victoria announcement was the day before the 2013 federal election, when the Liberal Party announced that if elected it would donate $2m, mainly for new dog kennels.

Frydenberg announced the completion of those kennels on a 2016 visit.

”No Political Agenda”

The lack of clarity around how much public money was directed to Guide Dogs Victoria’s “Campus redevelopment” is despite the two biggest funders being the Federal and Victorian governments.

“The current campus redevelopment plans will be funded fully through State and Federal Government and philanthropic funding,” the charity’s 2020-21 accounts state.

Wheelton said his “chief role” as Guide Dogs Victoria’s Capital Campaign Chair was to “work with HNI (high net-worth individual) and the philanthropic community”.

He said “with the exception of (my) personal meeting with the Premier” of Victoria,  the “political arena” was “left with the CEO”.

“With the exception of the personal meeting with the Premier the political arena was left with the CEO as GDV (Guide Dogs Victoria) had a relationship with all levels of Government,” Wheelton said.

“I have personally donated in excess of $1m to the GDV Campaign.

“As Campaign chair, I lead by example,” he said.

Wheelton said he had “donated in excess of $10mil to charitable causes in the last 10 years”.

“I have no political agenda or desire to be involved in politics,” he said.

Donations to local councils are not captured by the AEC.

Wheelton said he had donated “$50,000 to Robert Doyle’s campaign for the City of Melbourne (council)”.

He had provided this money because: “I wanted to see his vision for his next term fulfilled”.

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