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Clive Palmer has pledged to spend $40 million on UAP advertising during the election campaign.Credit:James Brickwood

Speaking at the National Press Club on Thursday,Mr Palmer estimated he would spend a total of $70 million on the UAP’s advertising campaign,having already spent more than $31 million since August.

“I’d say that between now and the election we’ll spend about $40 million,” he said.

An advertising splurge of this size would almost certainly outstrip the combined efforts of both major parties,which spent about $10 million apiece during the 2019 campaign,andhas revived calls for election expenditure caps. Mr Palmer defended his right to spend the money,saying a diversity of ideas was “good for democracy”.

“Suddenly,if I want to say something,our party wants to say something,it’s a threat to democracy,and I just don’t accept it,” he said.

Mr Palmer’s speech sought to pitch the UAP as a viable alternative for voters angry about vaccine mandates and worried about their economic future,as he heaped criticism on Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Labor leader Anthony Albanese. He decried the record levels of government debt racked up during the coronavirus pandemic,saying the Morrison government had “adopted worse policies than Labor in relation to the amount of debt that we’ve had”.

But he said the party had not decided whether to preference Liberal over Labor in lower house seats,saying the issue was not a “clear-cut thing” and one option being considered was to direct voters to number the incumbent MP last on their ballot.

“There’s also a situation where the Liberal Party locked down Sydney and a lot of our party members are upset about that still. And they’ve got to say what happens in NSW,” he said,adding that members were similarly angry about the COVID-19 responses in Western Australia and Victoria,both Labor states.

“I think I’d put the Greens ahead of Liberal and Labor,that’s my personal perspective,because they haven’t been in government and they haven’t been responsible for this debt.”

As for the Senate,he said the three parties would not be in the party’s top six preferences on its how-to-vote card for voting above the line.

Mr Palmer cut a preference deal with the Coalition early in the 2019 campaign and ran an anti-Labor advertising blitz in the final weeks. He spent almost $84 million on his party’s tilt that year but failed to win a single seat.

His speech on Thursday laid out UAP’s economic policies,which include capping mortgage rates at 3 per cent for five years,imposing a 15 per cent export tax on iron ore,forcing superannuation funds to bring $1 trillion invested in offshore shares back to domestic investments,and increasing the pension by $180 a fortnight. Mr Palmer’s mining company Mineralogy has interests in a magnetite iron ore project in a joint venture with Chinese company CITIC.

Jacqueline Maley cuts through the noise of the federal election campaign with news,views and expert analysis. Sign up to our Australia Votes 2022 newsletterhere.

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