MacTel tops political IT donors list

Macquarie Telecom has emerged as the tech industry’s most generous political donor once again.

According to annual disclosures of donations to Australian political parties, released today, Macquarie gave a total of $176,633 to the Australian Labor Party and the Australian Liberal Party in 2012-13. Of this, $126,633 went to the ALP and $50,000 went to the Liberals.

Mac Tel ramped up its contributions from the $133,000 pledged in the previous financial year, and Queensland’s Liberal National Party fell off its list of recipients.

The telco and managed service provider close to tripled its financial offering to the ALP in 2012-13.

Other IT and telecommunications companies digging deep for the political parties include Optus, CSC and data management specialists Intalock.

Optus gave $33,873 to the ALP, who at the time held government, and another $4400 to Queensland Labor.

CSC gave a total of $15,150 to the ALP, and three year-old Queensland company Intalock found $16,500 for the Liberal Party.

US based wireless infrastructure provider Crown Castle gave the ALP $9100.

A number of smaller donations and fundraising commitments were made by HP, Telstra, TechnologyOne and Vodafone.