What a difference a year makes. After being unceremoniously booed at the Victorian Liberal party council in 2023, the opposition leader, John Pesutto, received a standing ovation from members who gathered at Moonee Valley Racecourse on Sunday.
Just months after rumours of an impending spill against him, Pesutto – a moderate – has managed to tighten his grip on the leadership, seeing off an attempt by conservative forces to take over the party president position and other key administrative roles.
He has also experienced an incredible turnaround in the polls after Daniel Andrews’ handover to Jacinta Allan and in the wake of a tight budget, concerns around youth crime and revelations of alleged criminal links in the construction union.
Though still trailing behind Labor on a two-party preferred basis, the Liberals are looking competitive for the first time in almost a decade.
So the mood was buoyant at the weekend when Pesutto announced one of his first considerable pieces of policy work ahead of the 2026 election.
In what could be described as catnip to the party faithful, he announced a promise to “cut red tape” and “speed up approvals” and “provide greater certainty for our construction sector”.
How? Apparently, by tightening the rules around Indigenous community involvement in planning decisions.
Pesutto claimed the legally required cultural heritage management plans (CHMPs) – which are approved by registered Aboriginal parties – were stalling development and creating uncertainty for developers on Melbourne’s fast-growing fringe.
He said by establishing unspecified timelines and costs for cultural heritage procedure and committing to annual published audits of cultural heritage approvals linked to housing developments – as well as introducing annual performance audits for Melbourne Water – “more homes” will be “built sooner”.
He said this would give “every Victorian the best opportunity to own their own home” and singled out young people (though his audience skewed over 60).
Politically, it makes sense to focus on housing. One of the only things the state and federal Liberal MPs can agree on – regardless of their factional aligning – is that the party needs to boost home ownership rates to improve its electoral chances.
As former Victorian Liberal deputy state director Tony Barry has repeatedly said in the wake of the 2022 federal election and successive byelection losses, “you can’t create conservatives if they have got nothing to conserve”.
“If you don’t own a house, you can’t conserve. That’s our natural constituents and we need to get back to that,” Barry has said.
But is revamping CHMPs going to do that? According to the government and Indigenous groups, the answer is no.
The minister for treaty and first peoples, Natalie Hutchins, said the policy “won’t speed up any approvals”, noting fewer than 1% of developments require a CHMP.
The deputy premier, Ben Carroll, said it would do “nothing to alleviate the housing crisis”.
A spokesperson for the First People’s Assembly – the state’s democratically elected body representing traditional owners – said they were “not contacted or consulted with from anyone in the Liberal party” prior to Sunday’s policy announcement, despite having an “open door to political parties”.
“The data simply doesn’t support the suggestion that cultural heritage laws are holding up housing developments,” they said.
Marcus Stewart, an inaugural co-chair of the First People’s Assembly, went further. He accused Pesutto of “race-baiting” and attempting to “appease and throw some red meat towards the extremist right wing in his party” by blaming First Nations people for the housing crisis and pointed the finger at local councils for planning delays.
Pesutto outright rejected this characterisation at a press conference on Monday.
“This is very straightforward. In some ways, it’s kind of unremarkable that we would want to reduce red tape, contain costs and also reduce timelines. That’s something I think all serious-minded and fair-minded people would want to support,” he said.
Pesutto conceded he hadn’t consulted First Nations groups before announcing the policy but said the issue was being “raised regularly” in his discussions with developers and said “tens of thousands of homes and many estates” were currently held up.
There’s no doubt there are concerns about the current regime, including among registered Aboriginal parties.
Guardian Australia understands the Department of Premier and Cabinet has also reached out to several stakeholders in recent months to discuss streamlining the process.
But Matt Burns, from the Taungurung Land and Waters Council Aboriginal Corporation, said the group was under increased pressure as the government works to meet its target of 800,000 homes in the next decade, as well as its transition to 100% clean energy.
“There’s arguably more work than ever but at the same time we have also received a reduction in funding from the state government for this financial year,” he said.
But in any event, the policy only deepens the division between the Coalition, First Nations groups and more socially progressive Liberals, after the opposition scrapped its support for treaty earlier this year.
Concern about cultural heritage was one of the main reasons given for the decision. At the time, Liberal MPs said Pesutto’s botched the announcement but it was the right call in the wake of the voice referendum – though there is no doubt it will hurt him in his own seat of Hawthorn, as will this policy.
Perhaps, in charting this course, the opposition leader hopes he will further unite his party behind him.
The internal division over Liberal MP’s Moira Deeming booting from the Liberal party room was the reason he was heckled a year ago.
He’ll need all the support he can get ahead of the looming defamation trial, brought on by Deeming in September.
