3 days ago
‘How does this look?': Greens turn fire on WA senator Dorinda Cox over defection to Labor Party
Defecting Senator Dorinda Cox has been accused of betraying her values and her party after quitting the Greens to join the Labor government.
Ms Cox's shock switch came within a week of the AlbAnese government approving the controversial North West Shelf gas project.
One Greens source questioned the optics of the move and called into question Ms Cox's motivations.
'How does this look? An Indigenous Green Senator moving over to Labor on the very week that they approved the North West Shelf project which pushes up emissions and is said to threaten Indigenous rock art,' the source said.
Ms Cox, who identifies as a Yamatji Noongar woman, previously opposed the gas extension while in the Greens.
But since announcing her defection, she has refused to comment on the project's merits, instead citing procedural grounds.
'It wouldn't be for me to make public commentary, particularly during the provisional approval stage,' Ms Cox said at a press conference on Monday.
'My understanding is that Woodside do need to come back to Minister Watt.'
The shift follows Ms Cox's loss in a party-room vote for deputy leader to Senator Mehreen Faruqi, by nine votes to three.
Labor sources have since characterised Ms Cox's decision as a reaction to 'extremism' in the Greens' policy approach.
Her departure reduces the Greens to 10 senators and hands Labor a 29-member bloc in the upper house.
Ms Cox has been a controversial figure within the Greens, having faced allegations of bullying from former staff members.
However, the Labor Party has confidence that it thoroughly examined these allegations before approving her admission to the party.
Ms Cox was also caught up in pro-Palestinian activism in 2024, saying she supported the slogan 'from the river to the sea', which Mr Albanese has condemned.
'I do support and have participated in the change from the river to the sea,' Ms Cox told Sky News in May 2024.
"We are urging the government to step up their action to condemn Israel about its actions in Gaza," she said.
"And I think that we will continue to chant 'from the river to the sea' to ensure that freedom and peace are delivered.
"And I don't have any objection to that."
Ms Cox denied knowledge of the origins of the phrase, a term which was used by Khaled Mashal, the founder and former leader of Hamas.
Mr Albanese has welcomed Ms Cox into the Labor caucus, stressing she understood the expectations of party discipline.
'Dorinda Cox understands that being a member of the Labor Party means that she will support positions that are made by the Labor Party,' he said on Tuesday.
Ms Cox was first appointed to the Senate in 2021 to fill a casual Greens vacancy and was re-elected in 2022.
She was previously a Labor branch member before switching parties under the mentorship of then-Greens Senator Rachel Siewert.
Greens leader Larissa Waters condemned her former colleague's decision and said she had only been informed of the move an hour before it was announced.
'The Greens are disappointed in Senator Cox's decision to leave the Greens and join the Labor party as a backbencher,' Ms Waters said.
