The man behind a flyer promoting the Labor Party's Port Stephens local government election candidates has defended not referencing the party on the material.
The two-page A4 flyer titled 'Why you should vote 1 Leah Anderson's Team' introduces Ms Anderson, west ward councillor Giacomo Arnott and central ward councillor Jason Wells.
At first glance, the prominent red design makes the flyer appear as though it is a piece of Labor campaign material, but the party is not mentioned nor is its logo used.
Ms Anderson referred questions about the flyer's design to its creator Cr Arnott.
Cr Arnott said not all Labor material carried the party's name or logo.
"We have corflutes that don't have Labor Party logos on them. There's no requirement to have the logo on them," he said.
"In the case of the flyer I used a template that didn't have the logo on it by default so it didn't end up on it."
He said the flyer was the party's first piece of local government campaign material and future items would promote the party.
"Our next pieces of material that will go out in the next week most certainly have the Labor logo on it. We are standing behind the fact that we are Labor candidates," he said.
"The flyer was developed before anybody started making a big deal about [party] politics and local council; it's a total farce because everyone who runs for council is involved in a political party."
Save Port Stephens candidate Mark Watson said he believed the flyer was misleading and had reported it to the NSW Electoral Commission.
"It clearly fails to identify any party affiliation," Mr Watson, who previously contested the state seat of Port Stephens for One Nation, said.
"It can be deemed misleading as there is no mention of Labor anywhere on the flyer, from the authorisation to the email address it fails to mention their party."
A NSW Electoral Commission spokeswoman said the commission did not comment on specific compliance matters.
"However, generally, section 356B(c)(iv) of the Local Government (General) Regulation 2021 provides that electoral material is not compliant if it 'contains information that is incorrect or misleading about whether a person is or is not endorsed by a registered political party'," the spokeswoman said.
"This would be the case, for example, if electoral material of a party endorsed candidate referred to the candidate as 'independent' or, conversely, if the material of an independent candidate contained the logo of a registered political party."
