Up the glass elevators on the 26th floor of 1 Bligh Street in Sydney’s central business district is an empty room at the heart of the campaign against the Indigenous voice to parliament.
This is the registered office of Whitestone Strategic, a “conservative campaign consultancy”. According to some in Canberra, the company has close ties to Advance Australia – the rightwing advocacy group behind the main organisation promoting a no vote, Fair Australia.
Unlike Advance Australia, however, it doesn’t brag about its wins – or admit its losses – preferring to keep its clients, and the staff who service them, in the shadows.
Guardian Australia has searched for the secretive firm’s digital breadcrumbs to reveal its ties to the no campaign, which hopes to sway how Australians will vote on Saturday.
After a series of questions to Whitestone Strategic, the firm confirmed to Guardian Australia it was “contracted” to Advance’s no campaign, run by Fair Australia.
But Whitestone’s website provides little insight into how it delivers a successful campaign, beyond saying it provides its clients “up-to-the-minute technology and campaign clout”.
One example of its work, as has been reported, is Whitestone’s listing as a manager for Advance’s Facebook page. In 2019-20, Australian Electoral Commission election returns also show Advance owed a $23,605 debt to the company.
Metadata, information released under freedom of information requests and email addresses sighted by Guardian Australia show there are more ties between Whitestone, Advance and the no campaign than previously known.
A document obtained under freedom of information shows that Whitestone Strategic issued multiple invoices to “Price” and “Chandler” for work done between January and June 2023. The details of the invoices have not yet been released.
A spokesperson for Tasmanian Liberal Claire Chandler’s office said the work done by Whitestone was not related to the no campaign. The Liberal member for Durack, Melissa Price, and Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, the leader of Fair Australia, did not respond to a request for comment.
Metadata found on Fair Australia’s website, as well as Christians for Equality – another no-aligned website authorised by Advance – suggest staff from the company have been involved with creating pamphlets, fact sheets and other material for Advance Australia’s campaign against the voice.
The name of a Canberra graphic designer appears as an author in Fair Australia PDF metadata, for example. Documentation seen by Guardian Australia shows that she has a Whitestone email address.
Another graphic designer, whose LinkedIn bio says she once worked for the political consultancy firm Topham Guerin – credited with Scott Morrison’s meme strategy during the 2019 election – also appears in the PDF metadata.
Chris Inglis, a former Canberra Liberal staffer who was exposed by Nine newspapers instructing no volunteers to use emotive language to sow fear and uncertainty about the voice, is national field director for Advance.
He also at one time had the title of field director with Whitestone, and an email address associated with that company. Inglis did not respond to a request for comment.
A Whitestone spokesperson said its “relationship with staff, clients and contractors is private and confidential”. Advance said it no longer comments to Guardian Australia.
Whitestone stays out of spotlight
Guardian Australia visited the company’s Sydney CBD address on Wednesday but were told by reception that no Whitestone staff were present that day in the serviced offices. An office floor in the Canberra suburb of Phillip, in the Australian Capital Territory, which is listed as an address in some documentation, also seemed quiet.
Stephen Doyle is the firm’s director, according to Australian Securities and Investments Commission documents, and was previously chief of staff to the former Coalition senator Zed Seselja, who was defeated by David Pocock in the 2022 federal election.
But even as polling suggests the no camp is heading for a victory, Whitestone has remained remarkably hidden compared with your average political consultancy firm.
Several Whitestone staff past and present, who have been identified by Guardian Australia, don’t list the company on their LinkedIn or any other social media profiles.
The woman to whom the Whitestone’s website domain is registered, for example, does not include the firm on her LinkedIn bio. It says only that she works in political and communications consulting.
Co-founder and former director David Hutt, previously director of communications at the Australian Christian Lobby, is one of the few to include Whitestone on his LinkedIn page.
Documents filed with the AEC as well as website records show the company has done work for the former Australian Christian Lobby head Lyle Shelton and Fred Nile’s Christian Democratic party.
Shelton, whose personal website is registered to Whitestone, is the face of Advance’s latest effort against the voice – a group called Christians for Equality that aims “to prevent Australia’s constitution from being used as a lever for anti-Christian ideology”. The Canberra graphic designer’s name also appears as the author in the metadata of a document on the new website.
Canberra Liberals have previously confirmed the party used Whitestone Strategic “to consult” during the 2022 federal election period.
At the time, Seselja, a member of the Morrison government’s ministry, was fighting off a challenge from Pocock. Advance had run an attack campaign against the independent candidate and former Wallaby, accusing him being an undercover Greens member, but were ultimately unsuccessful in thwarting his election.
A Canberra Liberals spokesperson said it had not used the firm since the election.
Whitestone Strategic was previously listed as donating $263,483 to the Northern Territory’s Country Liberal party, of which Jacinta Nampijinpa Price is a member, during the 2022 federal election. That election return has now been amended to remove the donation.
A spokesperson for Whitestone Strategic said the disclosure was “incorrect” and “an administrative error on the part of others”.
“There was no donation,” they said.
The company also shares a number of addresses with a who’s who of conservative lobbying in Australia.
Whitestone’s Asic contact address, a GPO box in Adelaide, is shared with Gender Awareness Australia, the company behind anti-trans advocacy group Binary, and the Australian Family Coalition. Advance and Australians for Unity, the group behind the no campaign, also share this address.
Australians for Unity’s directors include Warren Mundine, a prominent face of the no campaign, and Advance’s director, Matthew Sheahan, as well as Vicki Dunne and Gary Johns. Dunne is also a director of Advance.
The political strategist Kos Samaras, a former deputy campaign director for Victorian Labor, said it was important not to overstate the no campaign’s success.
Polling by his firm, Redbridge Group, showed Fair Australia’s messaging had not cut through, and the no campaign’s support had been rising due to an information “vacuum” left by the yes campaign.
“Whoever’s worked on the no campaign should not be judged as geniuses because the campaign was lost by the other side,” Samaras said.
Hutt and Price did not respond to a request for comment.
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