James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

cGRATH () (): Tonight I wish to expose the hypocrisy of a prominent authority on disinformation and the architect of the teal's digital campaign. In October 2021, an astroturfing campaign named, 'We love our hospitals'—WLOH—surfaced on social media. It had a website and a Facebook and Instagram presence. The website mostly featured generic stock photos of hospital scenes, but one image featured what appeared to be surgeons in scrubs holding up a sign that had been amateurly photoshopped to include the WLOH logo.

Cam Wilson, Crikey's associate editor, was the first to twig to this mysterious astroturfing campaign, in an article: 'Who's spending $10K on anti-Morrison Facebook ads? We don't know—and that's a problem'—find it and read it. According to Crikey, the 'about' section of WLOH's Facebook page claimed that it's for showing appreciation 'for our hospitals and the wonderful people who work in them'. But the page's posts focused on attacking the federal coalition government for a lack of hospital funding.

It's important to appreciate that in October 2021, after 10 months hovering under 100, COVID hospitalisations had risen to a new peak of around 1,500, with 300 people in intensive care. After the Crikey article, the Facebook page was deleted and the website was amended to remove imagery and references.