THE Canberra Liberals are questioning a $25 million contract for “media placement and advice” in the Chief Minister’s directorate, for collecting data from Canberrans.

Liberals leader Elizabeth Lee said it was concerning that this contract – with global company Universal McCann – is worth a significant amount of taxpayer money and included capabilities that would allow the Labor-Greens to not only micro-target Canberrans with specific information but find out more about them through data collection.

“The previous contract of this nature with a local Canberra company was worth just over $8 million and did not include the capabilities to use social media to execute deep-dive analytics and micro targeting,” said Lee.

“While it is important for the ACT government to ensure messaging around specific government services reaches those who need it, a $25 million contract for fairly specific purposes of microtargeting and collecting data from residents will no doubt be very concerning for many Canberrans.

“These capabilities will allow Labor and the Greens to use millions of taxpayer funds to know a lot more about individual Canberrans right down to name, age, suburb and what they engage with online, and there seems to be little transparency as to how this information will be stored and used.”

The contract begins on March 1 and expires in February 2026, but Lee said there was no provision around when the money could be spent and how early.

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