Zero Political Funding Pledge — Version 1.0 — 1 August 2026 McGovern Solutions Pty Ltd (ABN 83 632 212 849) — operator of zeropoliticalfunding.com.au
1. Who we are
McGovern Solutions Pty Ltd operates the Zero Political Funding Pledge scheme. We handle personal information in accordance with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs). Contact: privacy@zeropoliticalfunding.com.au.
2. What we collect and why
| Information | Source | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Contact name and email of the applicant's representative | You | Administering the application and membership |
| Signatory name, role, IP address and timestamp of each attestation | Recorded at attestation | Evidence that the Pledge, declaration and Member Agreement were accepted, and by whom |
| Director names of the applicant group | You | Sole purpose: screening the applicant group against the published AEC Transparency Register |
| Controlled entities and trading names | You | Defining the group covered by the pledge and screening |
| Legal name, ABN, certification dates | Australian Business Register / generated | Public register of current members |
| AEC Transparency Register records (which include names of individual donors as published by the AEC) | AEC public data | Screening. We do not republish these records |
| Screening reports and AI rationales | Generated | Internal decision support; never published |
| Payment records | Stripe | Billing. We never receive or store card details; Stripe is the payment processor and we are the merchant of record |
We collect director names only because screening a corporate group against the AEC register is not possible without the names of the natural persons who may have made disclosable donations. We do not collect more than we need, and we do not use director names for any other purpose.
3. Automated and AI-assisted processing
Screening uses deterministic name matching, with an AI model (provided by Anthropic) used only to help disambiguate shortlisted candidate records. Every decision to grant, decline, suspend or revoke certification is made by a person. No decision is made solely by a computer program. AI outputs are recorded as rationales and reviewed by the human decision-maker. From 10 December 2026, additional transparency requirements for computer programs that make or substantially assist decisions apply under APP 1.7–1.9; this policy is intended to satisfy them and will be reviewed before that date.
4. What is published — and what never is
Published while you are certified: legal name, ABN and certification dates, on the public register and via the verification API and badge.
Never published: director names, contact details, signatory and attestation records, screening reports, AI rationales, declined applications, and the reason a business is not currently listed. Public status is limited to "certified" or "not currently certified".
5. Overseas disclosure (APP 8)
| Recipient | Location | What is disclosed |
|---|---|---|
| Anthropic (AI provider) | United States | Declared entity names, trading names and director names, where needed to disambiguate a screening match |
| Netlify (application hosting) | United States (serverless functions, US East) | Data processed in transit through application functions |
| Stripe (payments) | Global (US parent) | Billing contact details; card data is collected directly by Stripe |
Our database is hosted by Supabase in Sydney (ap-southeast-2), and our email provider (Maileroo) was selected for Australian data sovereignty. Where we disclose personal information overseas we take reasonable steps, including contractual terms with the providers listed above, to ensure it is handled consistently with the APPs. Anthropic does not use data submitted via its API to train models by default.
6. Security (APP 11)
Data is stored in access-controlled infrastructure in Australia, encrypted in transit and at rest. Access is limited to personnel who need it to operate the scheme. An append-only audit log records administrative actions. We review our providers' security certifications.
7. Retention
| Information | Retention |
|---|---|
| Declined applications (including director names) | Purged 12 months after decision; a minimal decision record (without director names) is retained |
| Membership records | Life of membership plus the period required for legal and accounting obligations |
| Attestation records (signatory name, role, IP, timestamp, instrument version) | Retained as evidence of consent and contract formation |
| Audit log | Append-only; not deleted. It records actions, and is corrected by annotation rather than deletion |
8. Access, correction and complaints (APP 12–13)
You may request access to, or correction of, your personal information by emailing privacy@zeropoliticalfunding.com.au. We respond within 30 days. Because our audit log is deliberately immutable, corrections to logged records are made by appending a correction notice to the record rather than altering history; current-state records (such as contact details and group composition) are corrected directly.
If you have a privacy complaint, contact us first; we will acknowledge within 7 days and respond within 30. If you are not satisfied, you may complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (oaic.gov.au, 1300 363 992).
9. Data breaches
We comply with the Notifiable Data Breaches scheme. If a breach is likely to result in serious harm, we will notify affected individuals and the OAIC as required.
10. Cookies and analytics
The public site uses only the cookies necessary to operate it, and does not use analytics or tracking cookies. The badge embed and verification API do not set cookies on host sites.
11. Changes
We may update this policy from time to time. The current version is always published on the Site, and material changes affecting members will be notified by email.