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The Guardian
17-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Victorian ocotogenerians dumped from committee running NSW Liberal party but federal intervention continues
The former New South Wales premier Nick Greiner will chair a new committee in charge of the state Liberal division after a federal takeover was extended for nine months. The Liberal party's federal executive voted on Tuesday to install the new body, which will replace a three-person panel announced in September 2024 following a council elections bungle. Two former committee members – Victorian Liberal octogenerians Alan Stockdale and Richard Alston – have been dumped but the third former member, ex-NSW state MP Peta Seaton, will serve on Griener's new seven-person panel. The other members are Jane Buncle, Mark Baillie, Peter O'Hanlon, James Owen and Berenice Walker. The federal executive on Tuesday also signed off on who would lead two separate reviews following the May election – one standard post-election review and another deeper dive into the future of the party. The Liberal party's peak administrative body announced the intervention into the NSW branch last year after the local government election nominations fiasco, installing an administrative committee to run the division for 10 months. Stockdale, Alston and Seaton were charged with reviewing the party's constitution, overhauling the administrative machinery and helping to conduct the federal election campaign. The committee's term was due to expire on 30 June, creating an early test for the new federal Liberal leader, Sussan Ley, as the competing factions in her home state wrangled over the division's future. The federal executive had the option of extending the three-person committee's term or ending the intervention and handing control back to the NSW executive. But a third option emerged in recent weeks, in which a federal-backed committee would remain, but the current members would be replaced with NSW figures. Sign up to Morning Mail Our Australian morning briefing breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion The internal push to replace the committee members gathered momentum after 80-year-old Stockdale said Liberal women were 'sufficiently assertive' and perhaps male candidates needed a leg up. The new seven-member committee will be in place until the end of March 2026. The Liberals went backwards in NSW at the 3 May federal election, losing Bradfield, Banks and Hughes and failing to win any of its target seats. It contributed to the worst result in the Liberal party's 80-year history, with the Coalition reduced to just 43 lower house seats in the next parliament.
The Guardian
10-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
‘Rambling rubbish': inside the battle for the soul of the Liberal party in NSW
Intense discussions are under way within the Liberal party about an alternative to the three-person administrative committee now in control of its NSW branch, with a growing consensus that it must be replaced when the federal executive meets next week. Younger members of the party have had enough after a scandal triggered by comments by one member of the trio, former Victorian MP Alan Stockdale. Stockdale, in his 80s, last week told the NSW Liberal Women's Council that Liberal women were 'sufficiently assertive ' and men might need a leg up. Although meant as a joke, the remarks appalled many in the party and raised questions about why two octogenarians from Victoria – Stockdale and ex-senator Richard Alston – and another retired politician, former NSW MP Peta Seaton, were tasked with reforming the Liberals' biggest branch. Stockdale further stoked outrage when he couldn't tell the women's council meeting whether the committee would retain Menzies-era rules that guarantee Liberal women members significant roles in the party's governance structure. 'It was just rambling rubbish,' one former member of the NSW executive, a moderate, said. A prominent member of the right said of the three-person committee's address to the women's council: 'Doing a meeting by Zoom meant it was always bound to be recorded and become public.' More concerning for members than off-target jokes is the lack of progress made by the troika installed to run the NSW branch by the federal Liberals after the 2024 council elections farce. Stockdale, Alston and Seaton were charged with reviewing the NSW branch's lumbering 279-page constitution, overhauling the NSW administrative machinery and helping conduct the federal campaign in May. The administration of the NSW division was sparked by its failure to nominate 140 candidates for 16 local council elections last August, a mistake that exposed long-held worries about the state branch's professionalism. 'The big picture here is that party membership is collapsing,' said one former member of the state executive. 'If we have another three years like the last six years, the party will disappear.' Liberals who spoke to Guardian Australia on the condition of anonymity, because they are not permitted to comment publicly, said there had been little engagement by the trio with the NSW party over the past eight months. The meeting with the women's council last week came just weeks before their commission is due to run out on 30 June. Members also criticised the committee's stewardship during the federal election. The Liberals had hoped to pick up two or three seats in NSW – instead, they lost three, including the heartland seat of Bradfield by just a handful of votes. Despite it being clear months before the election that the seat of North Sydney was to be abolished, funds raised by the North Sydney conference were only partially allocated to the surrounding seats, with the result that tens of thousands of dollars sat in a bank account, according to one member close to the federal campaign. Head office Liberals said this was not due to the committee, but to the conference itself, which distributed some funds to the seat of Warringah and held onto other funds. The federal opposition leader, Sussan Ley, will be highly influential in deciding what happens next to the NSW division. One close observer of the process said: 'I have yet to see the federal executive make a decision that goes against the federal leader's wishes.' Ley said last week: 'The Liberal party must reflect, respect and represent modern Australia and that means recognising the strength, merit and leadership of the women in our ranks.' Former prime minister Tony Abbott and then Liberal leader Peter Dutton pushed for the October 2024 intervention. Abbott remains a strong advocate for continuing the three-person panel's brief beyond 30 June. Two weeks ago, he publicly warned Ley not to be swayed by the factions, particularly her own centre right faction which is helmed by federal MP Alex Hawke. The leader of the right faction, Anthony Roberts, weighed in on Monday, telling the Daily Telegraph the administration of the NSW Liberals should continue and that those opposing the intervention were 'cockroaches' trying to sabotage reform. But increasingly, moderates, centre right and some right faction members are favouring either letting it lapse, which would result in the old state executive taking over, or coming up with third path – such as a streamlined committee made up of NSW figures who could complete the overhaul quickly and return the party to its members. Sign up to Morning Mail Our Australian morning briefing breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion Simply restoring the state executive could be problematic as the president, Don Harwin, has indicated he is not willing to return to the role. 'It's a poison chalice, particularly as the party is facing a class action from the failed local government candidates,' said one former member of the state executive. 'We're telling the state reps on federal executive that if they extend the intervention in NSW, then South Australia, Victoria and Western Australia will be next … because they are in even worse shape,' said another Liberal. 'We are just over 18 months away from a state election, we need to focus on that, because we already have a minority Labor government and we could actually win.' The most likely result is a compromise where a small committee of NSW Liberals takes over, with each of the factions represented. So what's at the heart of the problems with the NSW branch? Aside from an unwieldy 29-strong state executive, which acts as the equivalent of a board for the NSW Liberal party, the other problem is the rules surrounding branches. In the interests of stopping branch stacking and to ensure members are ideologically aligned with Liberal values, branches can reject members – and frequently do. Internal analysis showed that up to 75% of applications to join the Liberal party in some branches were rejected in recent years, Guardian Australia was told. There are limits on how many members can be admitted each month – another safeguard to stop the mass signing-up of members. In some heartland Liberal-held areas – known as conferences within the Liberal party – there can be many branches, so a person who wants to join can usually find one to accept them. But in Labor-held and marginal seats, there might only be two branches, which are often tightly controlled by a few families. 'This means they turn into fiefdoms, and it's really unhealthy for the party,' said one Liberal who has studied branch structures. Yet these are precisely the seats the party needs to win. Some Liberals, including the NSW leader, Mark Speakman, have floated the idea of abolishing branches altogether and returning to much larger party units based on conferences. Others want to relax the sign-up rules and the power of branches to reject members. Whatever solution is adopted will have implications for the factions – and the future of the Liberal party in NSW which has, for the last 40 years, been dominated by the moderates. 'This is a battle for the soul of the Liberal party: whether we become a far-right rump run by octogenarians or whether we become a centrist election-winning party again,' the former state treasurer and leading moderate Matt Kean told Guardian Australia last week. Stockdale, Alston and Seaton were contacted for comment.
