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March 30, 2025
Transcript – Sky News Campaign Confidential
30 March 2025
E&OE
JAMES MORROW:
Now joining me from the Liberal campaign trail is Shadow Home Affairs Minister James Paterson. Thank you for joining me, Senator. I'm glad to have you with me because we've got some breaking news just as we went to air the Australian newspaper has just broken the story that Anthony Albanese Labor allegedly accepted, it's just allegedly at this point thousands of dollars from a senior office holder of a Chinese group described by the Attorney-General as an agent of foreign influence. Now, not only did restaurateur James Chan allegedly pay $2,000 to attend a Labor fundraising dinner with the PM, just this month, but there have been claims that he is linked to something called the Australian Council for the Promotion of Peaceful Reunification of China. Now, he has denied this. This has been reportedly denied, but it's a very interesting story. And I would love your take because I know, Senator, that you follow an awful lot of what China tries to do in terms of influencing our politics. Your reaction to this story?
JAMES PATERSON:
Well, James, it certainly is a very interesting story. And I think the Prime Minister has some serious questions to answer. When he stands up at his press conference tomorrow morning in Perth, he has to explain if it is indeed the case that he and the Labor Party have accepted a donation from someone who is linked to an organisation that's affiliated with the United Front Work Department. Just to explain for your viewers, the United Front Work Department is the principal overseas outreach arm of the Chinese Communist Party that seeks to spread the Communist Party's message. Xi Jinping has described the United Front Work Department as China's "magic weapon." And the Australia Council for the Promotion of the Peaceful Reunification of China is one of those key United Front bodies that operates in Australia. If you're in any doubt of that, you should understand that this body failed to register as it was required to under the law, under the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme, and the Attorney General's department had to forcibly register it under the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme, that means it acts on behalf of the Chinese government in Australia. So if an office bearer of a United Front Work Department organisation paid money to attend a fundraiser with the Prime Minister, that is a very serious story which the Prime Minister must explain.
JAMES MORROW:
And I mean, again, I say that the charges have been reportedly denied by the restaurateur in question. But this does also bring up, and there were mentions in the story of links to Huang Xiangmo, who was the property developer who was eventually not allowed to return back to Australia. This does seem to echo a pattern that we have seen in the past of other situations where Labor has indeed been found to have ties to people who are trying to buy influence on behalf of the CCP.
JAMES PATERSON:
You're right, James, and it has been publicly reported that Huang Xiangmo's visa to Australia was cancelled on national security grounds and he has not been able to re-enter Australia. He previously was the president of the Council for the Promotion of the Peaceful Reunification of China, which I think again demonstrates the nature of that group and associations of people like that. Now, people might have got away with making mistakes like this five or even 10 years ago in a more innocent or naive time, but we have learnt a lot since then and there should be much better processes in place, particularly for the Prime Minister, to vet people that are paying money to attend a function that he attended. Now, this is not just some random interaction in the street; if it is indeed true, this is someone who paid money to sit with the Prime Minister at a small, intimate fundraising gathering, allegedly. And so I think the Prime Minister really does need to front up and explain how this happened, if it did indeed happen.
JAMES MORROW:
Yeah, no, I think you're absolutely right about that, Senator.
ENDS
**THIS INTERVIEW WAS INTERRUPTED BY TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES**