This is a story that matters. It’s about foreign dark money funding green lobby groups in Australia who are actively manipulating the government away

from coal, gas, and nuclear so that so-called renewables providers can rake in billions in government money, which is to say taxpayers money. There’s billions of dollars at stake in what amounts to perhaps the largest foreign influence operations since World War II and arguably even bigger than. And whilst many of us had our suspicions, it is only due to the outstanding work of the Page Research Center that we now have some hard numbers. And we can see the shocking reality of just how big and how pervasive this foreign influence operation really is. Gerard Holland from the Page Research Center broke this story in the Australian and they’ve submitted a 44-page report to the Senate Select Committee on Information Integrity on Climate Change and Energy.

Basically, this Senate Select Committee is a fishing exercise where the government invites conflicted organizations like universities and lobby groups who profit from the great green boondoggle to give the government the excuse that it desperately craves to crack down on so-called misinformation on climate change so that they finally have a pretext for censoring the Australian people like they’ve been itching to do for decades. But they didn’t count on the Page Research Center who saw exactly the game that they were playing and set about beating them at it. What they’ve submitted to the committee and now onto the public record. And the work that Gerard has done is so important that I’m doing this video purely for the purpose of bringing your attention to it. You can view the Page Research Center submission. It’s number 140. I’ve put the link to the submissions page in the description. Just find number 140 and check it out. It’s truly extraordinary and we’ll go to it in a moment.

But first, my name’s Topher Field. This is the Topher Project and I help busy people like you to keep up with the world as it changes around you. Sometimes that means I do my own videos fully researched from scratch, but from time to time it means that I do what I’m doing today and simply point the way to someone else’s incredible work that you need to know about whilst adding some important context and background information along the way. Now, you can help me to keep the Topher Project going by buying me a coffee via the button at topherfield.net. And if you like what I’m doing with these videos, then you will love what I’ve done with my books about government, law, power, human rights, and civil disobedience. And you’ll find my books, as well as my DVDs, t-shirts, and more at goodpeoplebreakbadlaws.com.

Most of the submissions to this committee are little more than love letters from green lobby groups like Greenpeace Australia or Friends of the Earth or sycophantic messages from bureaucratic government funded groupies like the Australian Human Rights Commission who I did a video about the other day. Topher Project episode 193 if you’re interested. Covering the fact that the Australian Human Rights Commission has tried to say that letting people exercise their human right to freedom of speech with regard to climate change is somehow a human rights violation. Go watch that video if you want to find out more about what they had to say to this same select committee. But the submission prepared by the Page Research Center and Gerard Holland, well, that is a whole different ballgame.

Now, full disclosure, I’ve known Gerard since 2022. I’ve reached out to him for an interview, and I hope to bring you that interview next week, but this is a story that’s too big and too urgent for me not to bring it to you as quickly as I can. Gerard wrote an outstanding summary of his 44-page report in the Daily Telegraph. And I apologize, this isn’t what I normally do, but he has summed it up so well that I’m going to use his article directly, but I will pause along the way to add some very important background information that you need to keep in mind as we read.

So, in the words of Gerard Holland, “Forget Russian meddling. We’ve uncovered Australia’s homegrown foreign interference nightmare.

Money from abroad is flooding our shores, arming eco-warriors to sabotage our resources sector and dismantle our energy grid. Over the past decade, a tightly coordinated activist network has embedded itself deep in our democracy. Backed by over $100 million in foreign funding, it has reshaped our energy policy, flooded the public with propaganda, and waged war on cheap energy.”

Pause there. He mentions a homegrown foreign interference nightmare. Australia has something called the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme or FITS which was introduced in 2018. And the very first time those laws were used, they were used against former Prime Minister Tony Abbott, who was scheduled to speak at the Australian Conservative Political Action Conference in Sydney, just a day after he was suddenly told that he had to register as a foreign agent in Australia. Now, to his credit, Tony Abbott simply refused to comply with the demand that he register as a foreign agent. And in the end, a challenge went to the High Court. But the High Court upheld in a split decision the requirement for parties to register under the scheme if they were engaging in political lobbying or communications intended to influence Australian government or public opinion, dispersing money or goods for political purposes such as funding events or campaigns, parliamentary or journalistic activities aimed at political influence.

Now, the key here is this last point. The foreign influence transparency scheme applies if these activities are undertaken with a foreign principal’s knowledge or expectation. Or in other words, you’re doing it on behalf of a foreign organization of some sort. These foreign influence laws were sold to us as being about ensuring that foreign governments or shadowy organizations were transparent whenever they lobbied in Australia. But in practice, it’s been selectively applied and appears very politically skewed. Just keep that in mind. This foreign influence transparency scheme and the fact that they used it to target Tony Abbott. As we keep reading this article by Gerard Holland or all about foreign dark money funding the Australian renewables lobby.

At the Page Research Center, we’ve submitted evidence to the Senate’s inquiry into information integrity on climate change and energy showing just how deep this goes. At least $108 million, likely far more, has flowed into Australia from foreign donors to underwrite a network of third-party advocacy groups dedicated to shutting down the use of fossil fuels. These groups masquerade as grassroots campaigns. They’re not. They’re well-drilled, well-funded, and well-coordinated. Their goal: eliminate coal and gas from Australia’s energy system and block any potential transition towards nuclear energy.

With a war chest of over $170 million in the 2023–24 financial year alone, the organizations that we investigated have raised more in one year than both major parties spent combined at the last election. Their success in demonizing fossil fuels has handed a bonanza to renewable giants who are now reaping billions in taxpayer funded subsidies through the government’s capacity investment scheme.

The model is slick. International donors cut million-dollar checks to a few well-connected advocacy hubs with anonymity where the money is laundered through tax-deductible charitable structures.

From there, the funds are chopped up and sent downstream to legal centers, activist groups, and environmental lobbies. All of them singing from the same hymn sheet. No coal, no gas, no nuclear. It’s dark money. It bypasses disclosure laws, and it avoids public scrutiny and accountability. Their structure creates the illusion of a spontaneous grassroots movement against traditional energy. In reality, it is a foreign funded centrally directed campaign that has astroturfed the national debate and entrenched a fifth column within our democracy.

At the heart of this operation is a group called the Sunrise Project, which received tens of millions from foreign mega foundations like the Ballmer Group Group, the Oak Foundation, and the Sequoia Climate Foundation. Pause. Again, those foundations may not be familiar to you, so let me give you a quick rundown. The Ballmer Group Group is funded by Steve Ballmer Group of Microsoft fame. Make of that what you will. The Oak Foundation was seeded by Alan M. Parker, who made his money in duty-free shopping and is notable for being a pioneer of using complex offshore structures for tax minimization skills that I would suggest these groups are still putting to good use as they distribute their money covertly around the world. He’s also a supporter of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, by the way. And finally, the Sequoia Climate Foundation is a relative newcomer, being founded in 2020. But their first hire and current president is a former Obama White House staffer, Cristy Oldman, who held roles including the director of the Office of Climate and Clean Energy at the US Department of Energy, at the White House Council on Environmental Quality as Deputy Associate Director, and at the US Treasury in the Office of Environment and Energy. You get the idea. This is where the money is coming from.

Again, all of this is in the context of Australia’s foreign influence laws, which are so strict that former Prime Minister Tony Abbott was asked to register because he was speaking at an Australian conference that was associated with an American conference. The bottom line is that this is foreign money being spent in Australia for the purpose of buying influence over public opinion and over our politics. And they are getting away with it or at least they’ve been getting away with it until now. Whether they keep getting away with it, well, that’s up to what the rest of us do now that we know about it.

Back to the article. Sunrise operates as the financial hub, funneling cash into groups like Greenpeace, the Environmental Defenders Office, the Climate Action Network Australia, and the Australian Institute. Pause again. Sorry, but I have to. Three out of the four organizations that Gerard just named have also made submissions to the Senate Select Committee on Information Integrity on Climate Change and Energy. So these same organizations that are receiving foreign money for the purpose of influencing public and political opinion in Australia for the benefit of foreign principles are also making submissions to the government about misinformation in Australian public affairs. And for those of you who want the receipts, Greenpeace Australia Pacific made submission number 133. The Environmental Defenders Office made submission number 61. And the Climate Action Network made submission number 62. Go and read them for yourselves and ask yourself, do you want foreign money-funded organizations promoting these sorts of ideas to our Australian Parliament?

Back to the article. This is not speculation. We’ve seen the documents that name the key players. In 2011, a strategy memo was circulated, funded by the Rockefeller Family Fund, explicitly laying out a plan to disrupt, delay, and ultimately destroy Australia’s coal sector. They wanted to shift investor confidence, erode public support, and make coal projects so politically toxic and expensive that no government or company would dare go near them. They’re now attempting the same with gas. A key pillar of this strategy has been to tie up productive projects in the courts with green lawfare. The Environmental Defenders Office, the largest green law firm in the Southern Hemisphere, has made a business out of holding Australia’s primary industries hostage. They’ve spent years holding up projects like  Barossa, Carmichael, Bolong, and New Acland in endless court battles. This has led to billions in investment delayed, thousands of jobs on ice, and some projects abandoned altogether, even after hundreds of millions in investment were sunk. This is not a conspiracy theory. It is a matter of public record. And it raises serious questions about our sovereignty as a nation. How did we allow foreign entities with no accountability to the Australian people to bankroll such a vast network of activist groups focused on delaying and destroying our critical infrastructure?

In any other area, be it defense, foreign affairs, or even agriculture, this would spark a national outcry.

But because it’s dressed up in the language of climate virtue, and perhaps even serves the interest of the current federal government, too many have looked the other way. Make no mistake, this is the biggest foreign influence operation in modern Australian history. The amounts of money involved are staggering. The consequences higher bills, weaker industry, and lower reliability are being felt every day by Australian households and businesses. As a nation, we must do better. Our politics has been captured by interests that do not answer to the Australian people.

And that’s the end of the article by Jared. Foreign money flowing to Australian lobby groups who are actively seeking to influence public opinion and political outcomes and, in some cases, are making submissions supporting censoring the Australian people and stopping us from questioning climate change altogether. Like I said at the start, this is a story that matters. It is explosive and it should trigger investigations, and at a minimum, it should lead to many of these organizations being forced to register under the foreign influence transparency scheme and admit to the world what they are foreign funded lobby groups acting on behalf of a foreign principle to quote the language from the Fitz legislation.

In my opinion, these revelations should probably lead to prosecutions, but don’t hold your breath. My hope is that now that this dark money has been revealed, thanks to the work of the Page Research Center, that we will see a lot more pushback against these astroturfed lobby groups and that these revelations will be the final nail in the coffin for net zero in the LNP. These revelations are a political weapon which can and should be used against all supporters of net zero, both political and private. And any organizations which have received this dark money without registering in the foreign influence transparency scheme should lose their standing in court. They should not be able to use foreign money working on behalf of foreign principles to then use the Australian courts against Australian coal, gas, and nuclear energy.

Time will tell what happens out of this, but this should be a bombshell that changes everything.

And I will keep you updated as this story develops. My name’s Topher Field. This is the Topher Project, and this is what I do. I help busy Australians like you to keep up with the big stories and to really understand the world as it changes around us. If you’ve appreciated this video, then please go and follow the Page Research Center on all their socials. They do great work, of which this is just one example. But also, if you’d like to help me to keep the Topher Project going, well, sadly, I don’t get any foreign dark money. So, I’d be very grateful if you’d buy me a coffee instead via the button at topherfield.net. And if you like my style, then you will love my books about government, power, human rights, and civil disobedience. My books are titled Good People Break Bad Laws and Good Christians Break Bad Laws. And you’ll also find my multi-award-winning, internationally acclaimed DVD documentary, Battleground Melbourne, as well as my t-shirts and hoodies and more at goodpeoplebreakbadlaws.com.

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And as always, think free.