Council
12 December, 2024
Dyson surpasses donation milestone
INDEPENDENT candidate for Wannon Alex Dyson celebrated reaching a fundraising milestone for his grassroots campaign recently.
Mr Dyson reaching 500 individual donors, with Warrnambool’s Narelle McNamara becoming the campaign’s milestone 500th donor when she donated $100.
She joins a growing list of people across south west Victoria donating big and small via the campaign website at www.AlexDysonIndependent.com.
Mrs McNamara said she was motivated to support the campaign after seeing others volunteer their time.
“I think it’s fantastic that Alex is getting so much community support, and I wanted to do my bit to help,” she said.
“I’m buoyed by the fact that there’s an honest person from our community willing to put their hand up.
“I think integrity of the whole political system needs to improve.”
Mr Dyson said every donation counted.
“We are so grateful to everyone who has chipped in so far, from $10 upwards,” he said.
“It became evident in my first campaign, where my entire budget was $5000, that we’d need more funds to compete with the major parties.
“By donating, you are helping buy things like volunteer T-shirts, printing signs, and paying the rent for our community hubs.
“Right now, we are fundraising to print and deliver our own positive flyer to letterboxes across the electorate to counteract the lies being spread by our opponents.”
Mr Dyson said transparency was a core aspect of his campaign, to such an extent he was making his donors list publicly available in real time – something major parties do not do until after the election.
He said the name and amount of every donation above $1000 is disclosed on the ‘Donate’ page of the website, as well as donations of smaller amounts from people who agree to have their names published.
“Integrity and transparency issues was one of the reasons why I chose to run as an Independent,” he said.
“Our list of donors is updated regularly and there for all to see – unlike the major parties which only publish their donors after each election.”
Mark Wootton and Eve Kantor from Jigsaw Farms near Hamilton have pledged a $50 boost for every new donor who donates $10 or more.
Crowdfunding group Climate200 has seen the local momentum in Wannon and donated to the movement.
The group supports independents who want action on climate change, integrity in politics, and equal opportunity for women.
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