Furious rank and file members of the New South Wales Liberal party are marshalling against federal intervention to override branch preselections and impose candidates in eight prize federal seats, a move that will almost certainly see the party plunged into legal action.
“They’ve carpet bombed the entire division” said one member of the NSW state executive. “It’s disgusting.”
The federal executive is due to meet on Friday morning when it is expected to endorse candidates for Warringah, Hughes, Dobell, Parramatta, Greenway and Eden-Monaro as well as re-endorsing three sitting MPs: Sussan Ley in Farrer, Alex Hawke in Mitchell and Trent Zimmerman in North Sydney.
Under the NSW Liberal party’s constitution, candidates are now to be chosen by plebiscites in which all branch members can participate.
The federal executive is expected use its powers of intervention to direct the NSW branch to endorse the candidates, though it could take over the functions of the branch entirely.
The flashpoint for anger within the party is a deal that was stitched together by factional heavyweights and put to the state executive on Wednesday.
The motion was rejected 16 to 6, with two people not voting, but that was sufficient to block the use of special powers which require 90% support.
The motion specifically said it had the support of prime minister Scott Morrison, NSW premier Dominic Perrottet and the federal president of the party, John Olsen.
The deal would install disability campaigner and moderate Liberal David Brady as the candidate for Warringah over the conservative Lincoln Parker, as well as management consultant Alex Dore in the seat of Hughes over state MP Melanie Gibbons.
Dore does not live in Hughes and has not nominated, but is a former Young Liberal president whose uncle is the editor in chief of the Australian newspaper.
Brady had nominated for the Senate but had not nominated for Warringah.
The proposal also installs others into seats without branch plebiscites. The new, more democratic approach for choosing candidates in NSW was introduced into the NSW Liberal constitution in 2018.
A branch president in Tony Abbott’s former electorate of Warringah, Walter Villatora, emailed party officials vowing “a civil war in the party that will go far beyond Warringah and could derail the Morrison government’s already fragile electoral prospects”.
“Warringah is the home of the democratic reform movement. And yet you are proposing to breach the party’s constitution and install a person who’s first contact with the conference will be on the basis of breaching the rules in contempt of the membership from which he will be seeking support,” Villatora said.
“If this happens, the Warringah Liberal members will revolt and simply walk away,” he warned.
“There will be no grassroots or donor support for an illegitimately appointed, unknown outsider. To beat the incumbent Independent [Zali Steggall] the party needs all the resources and support it can get.’”
State executive member Matthew Camenzuli, has again engaged barrister Scott Robertson SC for advice about a legal challenge to the intervention, which is expected.
Camenzuli successfully challenged the party’s legal advice on a separate but related matter in the supreme court earlier this week.
At least two unsuccessful nominees who had hoped to go before a branch preselection are also considering legal action.
A last ditch proposal to get state executive to consider branch plebiscites conducted on a truncated timetable has been stalled after the state president, Philip Ruddock, declined to circulate it to state executive.
“Captains’ picks are not democracy”, NSW senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells wrote to NSW Liberal members on Wednesday night.
“It is entirely unclear as to who has decided to anoint these certain candidates and by-pass the normal pre-selection process where YOU have a say,” she wrote.
“What is clear is that it proposes to deny any competitive pre-selections, in circumstances where in some cases (such as Mitchell and Dobell) nominations closed more than 10 months ago,” she said.
