2024 NSW Local Government elections: Political participants bulletin No.13
Bulletin No.13
Issued 11 October 2024
On this page
Closing local government election campaign accounts
The following information applies to campaign account users if:
- you were part of a group of candidates, or
- you were endorsed by a political party.
If you had a candidate campaign account and were elected, you can keep your campaign account and use it to accept political donations and make payment for electoral expenditure as an elected member.
If you no longer require a campaign account to deposit political donations and/or pay for electoral expenditure:
Ensure all payments for electoral expenditure have been made.
If there are funds remaining in the campaign account, and you paid your own money into the account, you may reimburse yourself up to the amount that you paid into the account.
If there are still funds remaining in the account, disperse the funds according to the instructions below.
Obtain bank statements for the account.
Funds remaining in a campaign account must be dispersed as follows:
a candidates’ or elected members’ campaign account - remaining funds are to be paid to the political party of which you are a member at the time of the election, or
a group of candidates’ campaign account - remaining funds are to be paid to the campaign accounts of the members of the group, divided equally, or
if the above does not apply, remaining funds are to be paid to your nominated charity or a charity nominated by the Electoral Commission.
- After the funds have been dispersed from the campaign account and bank statements have been obtained, the account should be closed if it is no longer required. Accounting records are required to be kept for at least three years.
- The above information does not apply to a political party’s local government campaign account.
Disclosure obligations after the elections
Candidates and groups, as well as elected members (councillors and mayors) and other political participants must disclose political donations received and made, and electoral expenditure incurred, to the NSW Electoral Commission. Disclosures must be lodged even if no political donations were made or received during the half-yearly period and/or no electoral expenditure was incurred during the annual period.
Please note the following due dates in 2025:
Political donation disclosures for the half-year period 1 July 2024 to 30 December 2024 are due by 11 February 2025.
Electoral expenditure disclosures for the annual period 1 July 2024 to 30 June 2025 are due by 22 September 2025.
Disclosures can be made using Funding and Disclosure online. Log in to your account, or request access if you don’t yet have access.
More information about disclosing political donations and electoral expenditure
Reminder to update nomination deposit return details
The nomination deposit will be returned to the person who made the deposit if:
the election is uncontested, or
the candidate dies before election day, or
the candidate withdraws their nomination, or
the candidate nomination is rejected, or
the candidate is elected or receives at least four per cent (4%) of the total number of formal first preference votes cast at the election, or
the candidate is included in a group for the councillor election, any one candidate in the group is elected or receives at least four per cent (4%) of the total number of formal first preference votes.
Candidates who are entitled to nomination deposit refunds are required to ensure their deposit return details lodged with their nominations are up to date. The Nominations Online Management System (NOMS) will remain available until 18 October 2024 to allow details to be updated. We strongly encourage all candidates to verify their nomination deposit return details to ensure refunds are made to the correct bank accounts.
Any deposit not refunded is forfeited to the council.
We value your feedback
Online survey
Following the declaration of results, we will be surveying candidates, party officials and scrutineers to measure your satisfaction with our election services and overall administration of the elections. The findings provide a valuable evidence base to inform the improvement of our services at future elections. While participation in this online survey is voluntary, we value your feedback and encourage you to have your say. Please keep a look out for the email.
Qualitative discussion
We have engaged Fiftyfive5 Pty Ltd (part of Accenture Song) and their partner Q&A Market Research to conduct independent research on the experiences of people who participated in the Local Government elections. This research will take place as an informal 45-minute interview (via Zoom, Teams or telephone) at a time and date of your convenience.
No preparation is required. It is an opportunity for you to share your recent experience first-hand. If this is of interest to you, please answer a short (two-minute) survey to opt in. You will then be contacted via telephone to arrange a suitable time. All feedback provided to us is anonymous. The insights will be used to improve our services.